Is it possible to create a bucket that doesn't use sub-folder buckets?

Question

I have an item that will contain a large number of subitems as direct children, which I would like to give bucketing treatment to.

Unfortunately these items don't have a reasonable way to be grouped in subfolders.

I've created a custom rule in Item Bucket Settings:

Example Rule
where the item bucket is based on the [Examples] template
  and where the new bucketable item is basedon the [Example] template
create the new folder structure based on the name of the new bucketable item with [0] levels

Choosing 0 levels defaults the bucket path to use the creation date of the item in the default yyyy/MM/dd/HH/mm format.

Is there a way to bucket these items without the intermediate folders?

I'd prefer that they be accessed at http://example.com/examples/example-name rather than http://example.com/examples/ ... path here ... /example-name, and I'd rather not need to introduce a * item just to correct the paths.

Answer 1

This answer does not exactly match your question, but I believe it matches your requirements based on the comments you have made.

If you want the Item Bucket search features on the parent item but do not want the child items added into sub folders you can easily add those features to the parent item.

Make sure that you can view Standard Fields and find the Editors field of the parent item. Then you can add the Search editor to the list and move it to the top so it becomes the default:

If you have multiple items based off the same template you can also do this on the Standard Values of the item.

Then you have all the search features and can just add child items as normal.

Edit:

To make the sub items hidden then you can set that on the standard values of the templates of the items you add to the parent:

This items will only be visible if the Hidden Items checkbox on the View ribbon is ticked:

Answer 2

Yes, there is. I wrote a bog post about it:

https://www.skillcore.net/sitecore/sitecore-item-buckets-custom-folders-structure

In shoortcut you need to create action extending RuleAction<T> where T : BucketingRuleContext and set ruleContext.ResolvedPath to whatever you want.

Here is the example of action which adds author user name to the folder structure:

public class AuthorAndCreateDateBasedPath<T> : CreateDateBasedPath<T> where T : BucketingRuleContext
{
  public override void Apply(T ruleContext)
  {
    base.Apply(ruleContext);
    if (Sitecore.Context.Data != null && Sitecore.Context.Data.User != null)
    {
      ruleContext.ResolvedPath = 
        Sitecore.Context.Data.User.LocalName + "/" + ruleContext.ResolvedPath;
    }
  }
}

You can create your action in similar way.

Then we create new Action under /sitecore/system/Settings/Rules/Definitions/Elements/Bucketing item and set Text and Title fields like that: