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Use the Microsoft Search API to request spelling corrections

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You can use the Microsoft Search API in Microsoft Graph to request spelling corrections to handle mismatches between typos in user queries and correct words in matched contents. To request spelling corrections, specify the following properties in the queryAlterationOptions property of the searchRequest:

  • enableSuggestion to enable/disable spelling suggestions for the user query. You can pass true to get the suggested spelling correction information for typos in the user query.

  • enableModification to enable/disable spelling modifications for the user query. You can pass true to get the search results for the corrected query when there are no results for the original query with typos, and get the corresponding correction information.

The priority of spelling modification is higher than spelling suggestion if they are both enabled.

If speller suggestion is disabled while speller modification is enabled, results can still contain the speller suggestion for the original query with the typo. This is by design, because the feature provides the spelling suggestion by default if spelling modification is enabled.

All the user query strings should be the same to enable spelling corrections for searches of multiple entities.

Example 1: Request spelling suggestions

The following example queries listItem resources that contain the string accountt and requests a spelling suggestion for the query.

The response contains alterationResponse objects for the spelling suggestion.

Request

POST https://graph.microsoft.com/beta/search/query
Content-Type: application/json

{
    "requests": [
        {
            "entityTypes": [
                "listItem"
            ],
            "query": {
                "queryString": "accountt"
            },
            "from": 0,
            "size": 25,
            "queryAlterationOptions": {
                "enableSuggestion": true,
                "enableModification": false
            }
        }
    ]
}

Response

HTTP/1.1 200 OK
Content-type: application/json

{
    "@odata.context": "https://graph.microsoft.com/beta/$metadata#Collection(microsoft.graph.searchResponse)",
    "value": [
        {
            "searchTerms": [
                "accountt"
            ],
            "hitsContainers": [
                {
                    "total": 0,
                    "moreResultsAvailable": false
                }
            ],
            "queryAlterationResponse": {
                "@odata.type": "#microsoft.substrateSearch.alterationResponse",
                "originalQueryString": "accountt",
                "queryAlteration": {
                    "@odata.type": "#microsoft.substrateSearch.searchAlteration",
                    "alteredQueryString": "account",
                    "alteredHighlightedQueryString": "account",
                    "alteredQueryTokens": [
                        {
                            "offset": 0,
                            "length": 8,
                            "suggestion": "account"
                        }
                    ]
                },
                "queryAlterationType": "Suggestion"
            }
        }
    ]
}

Example 2: Request spelling modifications

The following example queries listItem resources that contain the string accountt and requests a spelling modification for the query.

In this example, there are no results for the original query with typo accountt. The response contains results related to corrected string account and alterationResponse objects for the spelling modification.

Request

POST https://graph.microsoft.com/beta/search/query
Content-Type: application/json

{
    "requests": [
        {
            "entityTypes": [
                "listItem"
            ],
            "query": {
                "queryString": "accountt"
            },
            "from": 0,
            "size": 25,
            "queryAlterationOptions": {
                "enableSuggestion": true,
                "enableModification": true
            }
        }
    ]
}

Response

HTTP/1.1 200 OK
Content-type: application/json

{
    "@odata.context": "https://graph.microsoft.com/beta/$metadata#Collection(microsoft.graph.searchResponse)",
    "value": [
        {
            "searchTerms": [
                "account"
            ],
            "hitsContainers": [
                {
                    "total": 1,
                    "moreResultsAvailable": false,
                    "hits": [
                        {
                            "hitId": "FlULeN/ui/1GjLx1rUfio5UAAEl",
                            "rank": 1,
                            "summary": "",
                            "resource": {
                                "@odata.type": "#microsoft.graph.listItem",
                                "createdDateTime": "2019-06-10T06:37:43Z",
                                "lastModifiedDateTime": "2019-06-10T06:37:43Z",
                                "name": "web_part_test_long Notebook",
                                "webUrl": "https://contoso.sharepoint.com/sites/contoso-team/Lists/Issue tracker list/DispForm.aspx?ID=1",
                                "sharepointIds": {
                                    "listId": "33498de0-d695-4d23-ac26-e1bf95a3206e",
                                    "listItemId": "13"
                                },
                                "createdBy": {
                                    "user": {
                                        "displayName": "System Account"
                                    }
                                },
                                "lastModifiedBy": {
                                    "user": {
                                        "displayName": "System Account"
                                    }
                                },
                                "parentReference": {
                                    "sharepointIds": {
                                        "listId": "da61a2b0-4120-4a3f-812b-0fc0d79bf16b"
                                    },
                                    "siteId": "m365x231305.sharepoint.com,5724d91f-650c-4810-83cc-61a8818917d6,c3ba25dc-2c9f-48cb-83be-74cdf68ea5a0"
                                }
                            }
                        }
                    ]
                }
            ],
            "queryAlterationResponse": {
                "@odata.type": "#microsoft.substrateSearch.alterationResponse",
                "originalQueryString": "accountt",
                "queryAlteration": {
                    "@odata.type": "#microsoft.substrateSearch.searchAlteration",
                    "alteredQueryString": "account",
                    "alteredHighlightedQueryString": "account",
                    "alteredQueryTokens": [
                        {
                            "offset": 0,
                            "length": 8,
                            "suggestion": "account"
                        }
                    ]
                },
                "queryAlterationType": "Modification"
            }
        }
    ]
}

Known limitations

Spelling correction is only supported for the following resources: message, event, site, drive, driveItem, list, listItem, and externalItem.

Next steps