SAGE: Solr 6 versus Solr 9

Overview

SAGE historically used Solr 6. Several years ago, attempts were made to upgrade to Solr 9. In May 2026, this upgrade was finally deployed to production.

Missing Documents

Warning

Eleven Solr documents are absent from the Brazos Map collection. This is caused by a bug in Fedora Karaf’s indexing behavior that prevented those 11 records from being indexed into the collection.

To move forward, these missing documents were skipped with the intent to recreate them manually following the Solr 9 schema (see Adding Documents via the Solr API).

Schema Comparison

The Solr 9 schema differs from Solr 6 in several important ways:

  • Field names changed: title_txt_en_split → title_text_si_en_split; spatial_txt_en_split_multi → spatial_multi_string

  • Facet, text, and string variants of fields are more consistently named (e.g., creator_facet, creator_text)

  • _text_ws and _text_ are explicit full-text copy fields

  • date_issued is now an integer array rather than a string

  • local_coordinates is now an array rather than a scalar string

  • Internal Solr fields _version_ and score are not present in stored documents

Solr 9 Document Structure

{
  "application_type": "fedora",
  "application_type_facet": ["fedora"],
  "collection": ["https://api.library.tamu.edu/fcrepo/rest/3b/6f/c3/25/3b6fc325-f6ca-41d8-b91e-8c5db3be8c13/brazos-maps_objects"],
  "collection_facet": ["https://api.library.tamu.edu/fcrepo/rest/3b/6f/c3/25/3b6fc325-f6ca-41d8-b91e-8c5db3be8c13/brazos-maps_objects"],
  "content_type": ["StillImage"],
  "content_type_facet": ["StillImage"],
  "creator": ["Orr, J. A."],
  "creator_facet": ["Orr, J. A."],
  "_text_ws": ["Orr, J. A.", "StillImage", "Texas A & M University--Maps", "Official city map of the city of College Station, Texas"],
  "_text_": ["Orr, J. A.", "StillImage", "Texas A & M University--Maps", "Official city map of the city of College Station, Texas"],
  "date_issued": [1941],
  "reformatting": ["application/tif", "reformatted digital"],
  "reformatting_facet": ["application/tif", "reformatted digital"],
  "genre": ["StillImage"],
  "genre_facet": ["StillImage"],
  "local_coordinates": ["(W 96°21ʹ23ʺ--W 96°18ʹ42ʺ/N 30°38ʹ04ʺ--N 30°35ʹ45ʺ)"],
  "local_coordinates_string": ["(W 96°21ʹ23ʺ--W 96°18ʹ42ʺ/N 30°38ʹ04ʺ--N 30°35ʹ45ʺ)"],
  "id": "aHR0cHM6Ly9hcGkubGlicmFyeS50YW11LmVkdS9mY3JlcG8vcmVzdC8zYi82Zi9jMy8yNS8zYjZmYzMyNS1mNmNhLTQxZDgtYjkxZS04YzVkYjNiZThjMTMvYnJhem9zLW1hcHNfb2JqZWN0cy84OQ==",
  "local_digital_identifier": ["https://api.library.tamu.edu/fcrepo/rest/3b/6f/c3/25/3b6fc325-f6ca-41d8-b91e-8c5db3be8c13/brazos-maps_objects/89"],
  "local_digital_identifier_text": ["https://api.library.tamu.edu/fcrepo/rest/3b/6f/c3/25/3b6fc325-f6ca-41d8-b91e-8c5db3be8c13/brazos-maps_objects/89"],
  "local_digital_identifier_facet": ["https://api.library.tamu.edu/fcrepo/rest/3b/6f/c3/25/3b6fc325-f6ca-41d8-b91e-8c5db3be8c13/brazos-maps_objects/89"],
  "manifest": "https://api.library.tamu.edu/iiif-service/fedora/presentation/3b/6f/c3/25/3b6fc325-f6ca-41d8-b91e-8c5db3be8c13/brazos-maps_objects/89",
  "rights_access": ["A copyright review process in November 2020 has determined that this particular item is still in copyright, held by the publisher, the City of College Station, Texas, who graciously shared permission for Texas A&M University Libraries to display this image in this online exhibit. The written permission of any copyright and other rights holders is required for distribution, reproduction, or other use that extends beyond what is authorized by fair use and other statutory exemptions. Responsibility for making an independent legal assessment of an item and securing any necessary permissions ultimately rests with persons desiring to use the item. http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/"],
  "spatial_multi": ["College Station (Tex.)"],
  "spatial_multi_string": ["College Station (Tex.)"],
  "standard_digital_identifier": ["3b/6f/c3/25/3b6fc325-f6ca-41d8-b91e-8c5db3be8c13/brazos-maps_objects/89"],
  "standard_digital_identifier_text": ["3b/6f/c3/25/3b6fc325-f6ca-41d8-b91e-8c5db3be8c13/brazos-maps_objects/89"],
  "standard_digital_identifier_facet": ["3b/6f/c3/25/3b6fc325-f6ca-41d8-b91e-8c5db3be8c13/brazos-maps_objects/89"],
  "subject": ["Texas A & M University--Maps"],
  "subject_facet": ["Texas A & M University--Maps"],
  "subject_ws": ["Texas A & M University--Maps"],
  "title": "Official city map of the city of College Station, Texas",
  "title_text_si_en_split": "Official city map of the city of College Station, Texas",
  "title_facet": ["Official city map of the city of College Station, Texas"],
  "timestamp": "2026-05-08T20:40:14.725Z"
}

Solr 6 Document Structure

{
  "id": "aHR0cHM6Ly9hcGkubGlicmFyeS50YW11LmVkdS9mY3JlcG8vcmVzdC8zYi82Zi9jMy8yNS8zYjZmYzMyNS1mNmNhLTQxZDgtYjkxZS04YzVkYjNiZThjMTMvYnJhem9zLW1hcHNfb2JqZWN0cy84OQ==",
  "title": "Official city map of the city of College Station, Texas",
  "title_txt_en_split": "Official city map of the city of College Station, Texas",
  "creator": ["Orr, J. A."],
  "subject": ["Texas A & M University--Maps"],
  "local_digital_identifier": ["https://api.library.tamu.edu/fcrepo/rest/3b/6f/c3/25/3b6fc325-f6ca-41d8-b91e-8c5db3be8c13/brazos-maps_objects/89"],
  "collection": ["https://api.library.tamu.edu/fcrepo/rest/3b/6f/c3/25/3b6fc325-f6ca-41d8-b91e-8c5db3be8c13/brazos-maps_objects"],
  "manifest": "https://api.library.tamu.edu/iiif-service/fedora/presentation/3b/6f/c3/25/3b6fc325-f6ca-41d8-b91e-8c5db3be8c13/brazos-maps_objects/89",
  "application_type": "fedora",
  "content_type": ["StillImage"],
  "rights_access": ["A copyright review process in November 2020 has determined that this particular item is still in copyright, held by the publisher, the City of College Station, Texas, who graciously shared permission for Texas A&M University Libraries to display this image in this online exhibit. The written permission of any copyright and other rights holders is required for distribution, reproduction, or other use that extends beyond what is authorized by fair use and other statutory exemptions. Responsibility for making an independent legal assessment of an item and securing any necessary permissions ultimately rests with persons desiring to use the item. http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/"],
  "genre": ["StillImage"],
  "spatial_multi": ["College Station (Tex.)"],
  "spatial_txt_en_split_multi": ["College Station (Tex.)"],
  "standard_digital_identifier": ["3b/6f/c3/25/3b6fc325-f6ca-41d8-b91e-8c5db3be8c13/brazos-maps_objects/89"],
  "reformatting": ["application/tif", "reformatted digital"],
  "local_coordinates": "(W 96°21ʹ23ʺ--W 96°18ʹ42ʺ/N 30°38ʹ04ʺ--N 30°35ʹ45ʺ)",
  "date_issued": "1941",
  "_version_": 1840544036712087554,
  "timestamp": "2025-08-15T17:39:35.995Z",
  "score": 8.481773
}

Adding Documents via the Solr API

To manually recreate a missing document, POST it to Solr’s JSON update handler. The commit=true parameter flushes the document to the index immediately; omit it if you are batching multiple updates and want to commit once at the end.

Important

Replace <solr-host>, <port>, and <collection> with the values for your environment. The id field must be unique within the collection.

Using curl

curl -X POST \
  "http://<solr-host>:<port>/solr/<collection>/update?commit=true" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '[
    {
      "id": "<unique-base64-id>",
      "title": "My Document Title",
      "application_type": "fedora",
      "application_type_facet": ["fedora"],
      "content_type": ["StillImage"],
      "content_type_facet": ["StillImage"],
      "timestamp": "2026-05-08T00:00:00.000Z"
    }
  ]'

Note

The body must be a JSON array even when adding a single document. Solr’s update handler accepts one or more documents in a single request.

Using Python (requests)

import requests

SOLR_URL = "http://<solr-host>:<port>/solr/<collection>/update"

document = {
    "id": "<unique-base64-id>",
    "title": "My Document Title",
    "application_type": "fedora",
    "application_type_facet": ["fedora"],
    "content_type": ["StillImage"],
    "content_type_facet": ["StillImage"],
    "timestamp": "2026-05-08T00:00:00.000Z",
}

response = requests.post(
    SOLR_URL,
    params={"commit": "true"},
    json=[document],
)
response.raise_for_status()
print(response.json())

Verifying the Document Was Added

After posting, confirm the document is indexed by querying for its id:

curl "http://<solr-host>:<port>/solr/<collection>/select?q=id:<unique-base64-id>&wt=json"

Note

Base64 id values often contain characters (+, /, =) that must be URL-encoded when used in a query string. Use q=id:"<id>" with quotes, or percent-encode the value.