Configuring search in Sharepoint (MOSS 2007)

Configuring search in sharepoint is easy task , if you know the steps. Sometimes i saw people are struggling to configure search, so i thought of writting one blog about search configuration.

prerequisites for configuration.
The important one is the user account .


SSP application pool security account
Security account for the application pool that the SSP resides in.

SSP service account
Used by the following:
•SSP Web services for inter-server communication
•SSP Timer service to run timer jobs
Office SharePoint Server Search
Used as the service account for the Office SharePoint Server Search service. There is only one instance of this service and it is used by all SSPs.

Default content access account
The default account used within a specific SSP to crawl content. If a specific account is not specified for a content source, the default content access account is used.

Content access account
A specific account that is configured to access a content source. This account is optional and is specified when you create a new crawl rule. For example, content sources that are external to Office SharePoint Server 2007 (such as a file share) might require a different access account.

User profile and properties content access account
Connect to a directory service, such as the Active Directory directory service, a Lightweight Directory Access Protocol (LDAP) directory, a Business Data Catalog application, or other directory source.
Import profile data from a directory service.
If no account is specified, the default content access account is used. If the default content access account does not have read access to the directory or directories that you want to import data from, then plan to use a different account. You can plan up to one account per directory connection.
More details use the link-http://technet2.microsoft.com/Office/en-us/library/f07768d4-ca37-447a-a056-1a67d93ef5401033.mspx?mfr=true

Before configuring search you have to start the indexing service
Configuring Search Indexing services

1. Start > Programs > Microsoft Office Server > SharePoint 3.0 Central Administration > menu from the application server. This will open SharePoint central administration site in internet explorer.
2. In SharePoint central administration site go to the “Operations” menu.
3. In operation page go to the Topology and Services section.
4. Click the Services on Server link, this will open Services on server page.
5. Click the Office SharePoint Server Search link will open a new page.
6. Select Use this server for indexing content.
7. Select Use this server for serving search queries.
8. Give the user name and password in the appropriate textboxes.
9. Select Reduced under Indexer Performance.
10. In Web Front End And Crawling select Use a dedicated web front end computer for crawling.
11. Click Start.

Windows SharePoint Services Help Search

1. Start > Programs > Microsoft Office Server > SharePoint 3.0 Central Administration > menu from the application server. This will open SharePoint central administration site in internet explorer.
2. In SharePoint central administration site go to the Operations menu.
3. In operations menu go to the Topology and Services section.
4. In Topology and Services section Click the Services in the Server link will open same window .Click on Windows SharePoint Services Help Search link will open a new page
6. Give the user name and password in the appropriate textboxes.
7. Select Windows Authentication under Database authentication.
8. Enter 30 minutes for Indexing schedule.
9. Click Start.

Next steps are expecting Shared Service Provider is created and configured.If you need help on configuring ssp look at my other blog.
http://shyjumohan.blogspot.com/2007/03/configuring-sharepoint-service-provider.html

Set the content database searchable.

1. Start > Programs > Microsoft Office Server > SharePoint 3.0 Central Administration > menu from the application server. This will open SharePoint central administration site in internet explorer.
2. In SharePoint central administration site click on Application Management Menu.
3. In Application Management page under SharePoint Web Application Management section
4. Click Content Databases link
5. This will open Manage Content Databases page.
6. In Manage Content Databases page select the Web application need to be searched.
7. After changing web application click on content database link
8. Select Windows SharePoint Services search server as
9. Click OK to set the changes.

Now you can start searching.

How to do advance configuration see my next blog