Always find what you need with indexing in draw.io for Confluence

You know what it’s like when your spouse takes it upon themselves to reorganize your home.  In theory, it was amazing, but in practice, you can never find anything after that.  Confluence and draw.io provide you with something that’s basically the opposite of that: a way to find exactly what you need when you need it.  Today we’ll be talking a little bit about the indexing function of draw.io and how you can use it to your advantage.

Seamless Integration

Confluence and draw.io are like peanut butter and jelly – they just go together.  We want to make sure that your experience with draw.io within the Confluence realm is as efficient as possible.

Text that you add to your diagrams is indexed and therefore searchable from within Confluence.  This means that from the Confluence search, you can find a diagram that contains the specific term you’re searching for.

So how does this work?

Your colleague created an org chart a few months ago.  Great!   But now you need to locate it because you have a new employee that you’re going to be onboarding.  However, your colleague is on holiday and no one knows where the diagram is saved.  You’re in luck with draw.io and Confluence! The indexing of your diagram took place the moment you saved your diagram the first time.

Instead of trying to contact your colleague while they’re on vacation:

1. Open your Confluence instance.
2. In the search field, type in the word/phrase you would like to find (e.g. a name/word you know is in the document).
3. Use the filters on the right-hand side to further refine your results.
4. Boom, you found what you were looking for.

Item #3 is important if you have more than one document with the same search term.  Please view the Confluence documentation on search syntax so that you can make the most of your searches.

Now that you’ve learned how to get the most out of draw.io for Confluence with indexing, get down to the nitty-gritty of draw.io by checking out our learning hub. See what other kinds of cool tips and tricks your team can pick up. We also have the draw.io YouTube channel where you can see first-hand how to create the diagrams you need.  We love hearing from you so don’t hesitate to contact us with any questions or comments! Until next time, happy diagramming.