Inverted index
Before we talk more about search, I want to talk about the inverted index. Knowing about inverted index will help you understand the limitations and strengths of Elasticsearch compared with the traditional database systems out there. Inverted index at the core is how Elasticsearch is different from other NoSQL stores, such as MongoDB, Cassandra, and so on.
We can compare an inverted index to an old library catalog card system. When you need some information/book in a library, you will use the card catalog, usually at the entrance of the library, to find the book. An inverted index is similar to the card catalog. Imagine that you were to build a system like Google to search for the web pages mentioning your search keywords. ...
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