Work with Custom Facet in Sitecore 9

In this blog, you can find details about how to set, fetch and update custom facet models to XDB. To know about how to create a custom facet model please find my previous blog here.

Facet will be saved with respect to the Contact, whether it is new or existing contact. If contact does not exist, then create a new contact and add it to XDB if it exists then get that contact first.

I am starting this blog by setting new custom facet properties, later fetching the existing facet and updating the properties, and saving it to XDB.  You need to use client.SetFacet() method to set or update facet.

• Add a new custom facet:

In this following example, I am adding the CustomFacetInformation facet on contact. This contact does yet not have the CustomFacetInformation facet. You need to create a new object of facet then assign properties and set it to contact.

using (XConnectClient client = SitecoreXConnectClientConfiguration.GetClient())
    {
       try
        {
          Contact contact = client.Get<Contact>(new IdentifiedContactReference("Your_Source", "Your_Identifier"),
                           new ContactExpandOptions());
          if (contact != null)
           {
             CustomFacetInformation customFacetInformation = new CustomFacetInformation()
              {
                CarModel = "Baleno",
                PassportNumber = "PAS34567NUM890",
                PreferredLanguage = "English"
              };
             client.SetFacet(contact, CustomFacetInformation.DefaultFacetKey, customFacetInformation);
                   
           }
         else
          {
               //create new contact and set facet properties
               Contact contact = new Contact(new ContactIdentifier("Identifier", "Source",  ContactIdentifierType.Known));
               client.AddContact(contact);
               // Facet is new
               var newFacet = new customFacetInformation
               {
               	CarModel = "Baleno",
                PassportNumber = "PAS34567NUM890",
                PreferredLanguage = "English"
               }
               client.SetFacet(contact, "CustomExmFacet", newFacet);
          }
         client.Submit();
       }
      catch (XdbExecutionException)
       {
            // Exception
       }
  }

• Fetch and update custom facet:

To fetch a custom facet you need to define it into the ContactExpandOptions method. To Update the facet, you need to retrieve the existing facet object and update the properties. In this below example I am updating the existing CustomFacetInformation facet on contact:

// Get contact from xConnect, update and save the facet
using (XConnectClient client = SitecoreXConnectClientConfiguration.GetClient())
    {
       {
          try
            {
               Contact contact = client.Get<Contact>(new IdentifiedContactReference("Your_Source", "Your_Identifier"),
                      new ContactExpandOptions(CustomFacetInformation.DefaultFacetKey));
               if (contact != null)
                 {
                     // Retrieve facet by name
                     var facet = contact.GetFacet<CustomFacetInformation>(CustomFacetInformation.DefaultFacetKey);
                     if (facet != null)
                      {
                         facet.CarModel = "Audi";
                         facet.PreferredLanguage = "German";
                         client.SetFacet(contact, CustomFacetInformation.DefaultFacetKey, facet);
                      }
                     else
                      {
                         //Create new facet for Custom model and SetFacet
                      }
                     client.Submit();
                   }
              }
           catch (XdbExecutionException ex)
             {
                // Exception handling 
             }
        }
   }

To verify it connect to your database check in XDB_Shard0 or XDB_Shard1 database, using the below query:

SELECT * FROM [Helixbase_Xdb.Collection.Shard0].[xdb_collection].[ContactFacets] where FacetKey=’CustomFacetKey’

SELECT * FROM [Helixbase_Xdb.Collection.Shard1].[xdb_collection].[ContactFacets] where FacetKey=’CustomFacetKey’

Here “Helixbase” is my Sitecore instance name replace it with yours.

You can find your custom facet values in the FacetData column in JSON format.

Do Remember:

• If you are adding a facet first time then you don’t need to mention the facet key into ContactExpandOptions
• If you are updating an existing facet, then you have to mention the facet key into ContactExpandOptions

In my next blog, I will let you know about “How to display Custom Facet on Experience Profile Tab”.

Happy Sitecoreing