Is global search in android still available for developer?

Question

I'm stuck for adding global search to my app. I did everything that I should do. my question is is global search is still available for developer? I read somewhere that Google replaced it with index.

Thank you for your time and help

Seafood

Answer 1

While global search (via the searchable.xml includeInGlobalSearch attribute) is available as part of Making Android TV Apps Searchable, the current Google Search app on phones and tablets does not support global search. As you mentioned, Google now strongly recommends using App Indexing to surface results from your app within the search results.

Brede

Thank you so much. so there is no way to use global search in smart phone anymore? do you have any better resource for App indexing? – Seafood

This App indexing working based on communication between App and web site. now my question is, how about if my App doesn't have website yet? Or, how about if my web site doesn't have high page rank that show up in fist page of the Google? Any idea? Thank you so much. – Seafood

Per the implementing the App Indexing API: If there is corresponding web content, the web URL parameter should be passed in as well. However, it is optional to pass the web URL parameter. - you don't necessarily need web content to support deep linking (just make sure you have good titles!). While I believe results from App Indexing are given some preference (over normal search results) if the app is installed, but much of that is controlled by Google's algorithms. – Brede

so what is this? Adding Custom Suggestions Once you provide custom suggestions, you can also make them available to the system-wide Quick Search Box, providing access to your content from outside your application. – Seafood

Unfortunately, per this commit from the KitKat release the Quick Search Box no longer pulls suggestions from apps. – Brede

I tried the sample leanback app from google. The global search is still not working on TV however the recommendtions are working. Any clue? There is a youtube app and global search works perfectly fine for it and google play app, but not for the sample leanback app for TV – Cosmism

if the quick search box is no more relevant, is it really anymore useful to handle the ACTION_SEARCH intent? – Alleviation

@RaphaelC - only if you're an Android TV app, like the answer says. – Brede