How do I sort using Fields["Fieldname"]

Question

How do I sort my search results using item.Fields["Name"}?

var queryable = context.GetQueryable<SearchResultItem>();
queryable  = queryable.OrderByDescending(x => x.Fields["MyDateField"]);
var results = queryable.GetResults();

It throws an error when I run it:

The method 'get_Item' is not supported. Declaring type: System.Collections.Generic.Dictionary`2[[System.String, mscorlib, Version=4.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b77a5c561934e089],[System.Object, mscorlib, Version=4.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b77a5c561934e089]]. Exception: System.InvalidOperationException: variable 'x' of type 'Sitecore.ContentSearch.SearchTypes.SearchResultItem' referenced from scope '', but it is not defined

On the other hand, this works:

queryable  = queryable.OrderByDescending(x => x.CreatedDate);
var results = queryable.GetResults();

Answer 1

You will need to define a custom model that inherits from SearchResultItem to define the field you want to sort based upon using the Content Search API. So assuming your Date field was called Podcast Date, you would define the following model:

namespace Something.Data
{
   public class PodcastDateSearchItem : SearchResultItem
   {
      [IndexField("podcast_date")]
      public DateTime PodcastDate { get; set; }
   }
}

Once you have that, your Content Search Api Query should look like this:

namespace Something.Data.Repository
{
    public class AudioRepository
    {
        public IEnumerable<Items> GetPodcastItems()
        {
            using (var context = Sitecore.ContentSearch.ContentSearchManager.CreateSearchContext(new SitecoreIndexableItem(Sitecore.Context.Item)))
            {
                var query = context.GetQueryable<PodcastDateSearchItem>();

                query = query.OrderByDescending(x => x.PodcastDate);

                var results = queryable.GetResults();
            }
        }
    }
}

You can use Luke to find out what the index field name is for your field, it's typically all lowercase and spaces are replaced with underscores.