Convert

The convert processor converts a field in a document to a different type, for example, a string to an integer or an integer to a string. For an array field, all values in the array are converted. The following is the syntax for the convert processor:

{
    "convert": {
        "field": "field_name",
        "type": "type-value"
    }
}

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Configuration parameters

The following table lists the required and optional parameters for the convert processor.

Parameter	Required	Description
`field`	Required	The name of the field that contains the data to be converted. Supports template snippets.
`type`	Required	The type to convert the field value to. The supported types are `integer`, `long`, `float`, `double`, `string`, `boolean`, `ip`, and `auto`. If the `type` is `boolean`, the value is set to `true` if the field value is a string `true` (ignoring case) and to `false` if the field value is a string `false` (ignoring case). If the value is not one of the allowed values, an error will occur.
`description`	Optional	A brief description of the processor.
`if`	Optional	A condition for running this processor.
`ignore_failure`	Optional	If set to `true`, failures are ignored. Default is `false`.
`ignore_missing`	Optional	If set to `true`, the processor does not modify the document if the field does not exist or is `null`. Default is `false`.
`on_failure`	Optional	A list of processors to run if the processor fails.
`tag`	Optional	An identifier tag for the processor. Useful for debugging to distinguish between processors of the same type.
`target_field`	Optional	The name of the field in which to store the parsed data. If not specified, the value will be stored in the `field` field. Default is `field`.

Using the processor

Follow these steps to use the processor in a pipeline.

Step 1: Create a pipeline.

The following query creates a pipeline, named convert-price, that converts price to a floating-point number, stores the converted value in the price_float field, and sets the value to 0 if it is less than 0:

PUT _ingest/pipeline/convert-price
{
  "description": "Pipeline that converts price to floating-point number and sets value to zero if price less than zero",
  "processors": [
    {
      "convert": {
        "field": "price",
        "type": "float",
        "target_field": "price_float"
      }
    },
    {
      "set": {
        "field": "price",
        "value": "0",
        "if": "ctx.price_float < 0"
      }
    }
  ]
}

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Step 2 (Optional): Test the pipeline.

It is recommended that you test your pipeline before you ingest documents.

To test the pipeline, run the following query:

POST _ingest/pipeline/convert-price/_simulate
{
  "docs": [
    {
      "_index": "testindex1",
      "_id": "1",
       "_source": {
        "price": "-10.5"
      }
    }
  ]
}

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Response

The following example response confirms that the pipeline is working as expected:

{
  "docs": [
    {
      "doc": {
        "_index": "testindex1",
        "_id": "1",
        "_source": {
          "price_float": -10.5,
          "price": "0"
        },
        "_ingest": {
          "timestamp": "2023-08-22T15:38:21.180688799Z"
        }
      }
    }
  ]
}

Step 3: Ingest a document.

The following query ingests a document into an index named testindex1:

PUT testindex1/_doc/1?pipeline=convert-price
{
  "price": "10.5"
}

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Step 4 (Optional): Retrieve the document.

To retrieve the document, run the following query:

GET testindex1/_doc/1

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