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Files and Search

File Management

Updated Aug 27, 2025

Files are one of the most powerful features in Anythink, allowing you to store, organise, and deliver files globally through our integrated CDN. Whether you're building a content management system, e-commerce platform, or document repository, our file management makes it simple.

File Upload Fields

When creating a file upload field, you get a complete file management system automatically. Files are stored securely in the cloud and delivered via CDN for lightning-fast access worldwide.

Setting up file uploads:

Choose File Upload as your field type
Configure allowed file types and size limits
Set public/private access permissions
Define upload quantity limits

Your file field will display as an intuitive drag-and-drop interface with upload progress, file previews, and management controls.

File Types & Display

Configure your file field to handle specific content types:

Images - JPG, PNG, GIF, WebP, SVG with automatic thumbnail generation and gallery display

Documents - PDFs with built-in viewer, Word documents, Excel spreadsheets with preview support

All Files - Accept any file type for maximum flexibility

Custom Types - Define your own allowed file extensions and MIME types

File Storage & Delivery

Every uploaded file gets:

Unique storage key for secure file identification
CDN distribution for global fast delivery
Automatic optimisation for web performance
Metadata tracking including size, type, and upload date

Files are accessible via clean CDN URLs:

http

https://cdn.anythink.cloud/org/{your-org-id}/files/{storage-key}

Public vs Private Files

Public Files - Accessible to anyone with the URL, perfect for images, marketing materials, and public documents. These files are cached globally for maximum performance.

Private Files - Require authentication to access, ideal for user documents, sensitive content, or premium resources. Access is controlled through your API permissions.

File Operations

Your file explorer includes everything you need:

Drag & Drop Upload - Simply drag files or click to browse
Bulk Selection - Select multiple files for batch operations
File Preview - Click any file to view or download
Search & Filter - Find files by name or type instantly
Copy Public Links - Get direct CDN URLs for sharing

API Integration

Files integrate seamlessly with your API. When you fetch an entity with file relationships, you get structured data:

json

{
  "images": {
    "__data": [
      {
        "id": 2,
        "file_name": "optimized-filename.jpeg",
        "file_size": 2049732,
        "file_type": "image/jpeg",
        "is_public": true,
        "storage_key": "31606ea3ebdd42e8b7494fce4fbb136e.jpeg",
        "original_file_name": "My Original Photo.jpeg"
      }
    ],
    "__count": 1
  }
}

Security & Limits

Every file upload includes:

Configurable size limits to prevent abuse
File type validation to ensure only allowed formats
Upload quantity limits to control storage usage

Performance Features

Automatic Optimisation - Images are automatically compressed and converted to optimal formats

Global CDN - Files are distributed worldwide for fast access from anywhere

Caching - Public files are cached for maximum performance

Best Practices

File Organisation - Use descriptive filenames and separate file fields for different content types

Size Management - Keep images under 2MB and documents under 5MB for optimal performance

Access Control - Use private files for sensitive content, public files for assets that need to be cached

Bulk Operations - Upload files in batches rather than individually for better performance

Files in Anythink aren't just storage - they're a complete content delivery system that scales with your application and provides the performance your users expect.

Anythink Search

Updated Jul 9, 2025

Search is deeply integrated into Anythink, and each Anythink instance contains a full-text search engine that you can use internally to find your content inside the Anythink platform, or through the API allowing you to use this in your apps; but with privacy in mind, you can choose which fields you want to be publicly available or remain private.

Search configuration is automatically handled as you build out your data model, with changes made to your entities almost immediately synced to your search engine ready for discovery.

Using the search engine

You will find the endpoints you need for search inside the API Docs menu item, under search you will see an endpoint that looks like this: /org/{{org_id}}/search With your api base url, and your correct org_id your full endpoint should look like this:

http://api.anythink.cloud/org/2132413/search\

You can then use the two parameters q and e to first enter your search query "q" and the entities you wish to search "e".

Search is multi-index search out of the box, so you can search across multiple entities by simply comma separating the entities you wish to query.

So an example query may look like this:

http://api.anythink.cloud/org/2132413/search?q=mclaren&e=cars,drivers\

This will search for "mclaren" across two entities named cars and drivers. This might therefore return you McLaren Cars, and Bruce McLaren (founder of McLaren and 1960s F1 driver) by searching across two entities (indexes, in search terminology) at the same time.

Note: it is currently not possible to search for an empty string, but searching for the wildcard * will return an initial result set.

Public Vs. Private Search

By default, all of your entity changes are synced to the search engine, so that they can be discovered in the top bar search within the platform, this is "private" search, RBAC rules are respected, so if your user is not entitled to discovery those certain items then they will not be available to you in top bar search - preserving security.

Public search allows you to control which fields you would like to be searchable or not. For example, if you are storing an entity which contains information about a client, say a vendor for your marketplace then you will want certain information to be discoverable like vendor name, vendor category, products and others but you likely won't want to expose private information you might store like owners name, owners address, owners email address.

You can control this simply by checking or unchecking "publicly searchable" in the entity data model for each field you would like to be visible in your public search. Changes made here will immediately be made in your search index to update the public visibility of the fields you've selected.

Users and security

Automation

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