Implement, Manage and Customise Search Server 2008

Course Duration – 3 days

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Overview
This 3-day course is designed to give SharePoint administrators basic and intermediate information and skills they need to design, implement, deploy, customize, and manage Microsoft Search Server 2008 in a standalone, Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 or Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007 environment.

Prerequisites
The ideal students have knowledge of general networking concepts and a basic understanding of Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 and SharePoint Server 2007. Attendees with a technical orientation will be expected to understand and perform the following administrative activities:

• DNS - Know how to create alias records and A records in the DNS Manager interface. Knowledge of how the Hosts file works is helpful.
• IIS - Know how to create new Web sites and host headers, and be able to work with site security. Also, have a basic understanding of application pools.
• Active Directory - Basic understanding of how to use Active Directory Users and Computers. Should also know how to create new user accounts, reset passwords, and general user and group account activities.
• SQL Server - Basic understanding of how to apply permissions to a database and how to add an account to the SQL installation.
• Windows 2003 Server - Have some experience working with this server platform.
• Networking - Basic understanding of general connectivity issues, and how to assign IP addresses and host names.
• SharePoint Server 2007 and/or Windows SharePoint Services - Possess basic understanding of how to administrate a SharePoint farm. Also, knowledge of basic SharePoint concepts.

Audience
The primary audience for this course is SharePoint administrators who are responsible for the planning, deployment, and management of search and indexing solutions using Microsoft Search Server 2008. The secondary audience for this course is nontechnical management personnel who are responsible for planning and designing your implementation.

Module 0: Course Introduction
This module summarizes the topics covered in this course, and also provides a brief introduction to Microsoft Search Server 2008 (MSS). Topics in this module include:

• Architectural overview
• Discussion of product features, navigation, and basic administration locations
• Comparison discussion between Google Search Appliances and MSS

Module 1: Overview of Microsoft Search Server 2008
In November 2007, Microsoft introduced a new search product that can be used to upgrade and enhance the search capabilities of Windows SharePoint Service 3.0. A licensed version of this product, Microsoft Search Server 2008(MSS), will be available in early 2008, along with a free version, Microsoft Search Server 2008Express (MSSX). Since the features of both products are the same, this course focuses on MSS. The topics in this module include:

• Introduction of MSS
• Purposes
• Interoperability
• Identify extended scalability of MSS
• Business Need Considerations

Module 2: MSS Installation
Like most Microsoft products, the planning decisions prior to installation are more difficult than the installation process. MSS is somewhat unique in that decisions made during the installation of prerequisite products determine your options during installation. The topics in this module include:

• Plan for installation
• Installation and configuration
• Initial search configuration
• Install MSS into current WSS and MOSS farms

Module 3: Crawl and Query Architecture
Understanding how the crawler extracts data from a content source and places it in the index is foundational to administrating an MSS server. In addition, knowing how queries are executed against the index help you assist users in using this tool more effectively. This module includes discussions on the following topics:

• Crawler architecture
• Overview of Indexer components
• Query architecture
• Overview of basic query syntax components
• Troubleshooting concepts using the crawl log
• Built-in query reporting services

Module 4: Administration and Management
Installing MSS adds sections to Central Administration Web pages including Shared Service Provider Management. Search administration introduces a new dashboard management page. The topics in this module include:

• Central Administration home page changes
• Application management changes
• Operation management changes
• Shared Services Provider management
• Search administration
• Disaster recovery for SSP

Module 5: Federated Queries
MSS introduces federated queries that provide the ability to forward user’s search terms to external search engines concurrently with queries to its own index. The topics in this module include:

• OpenSearch 1.1
• Federated queries
• FLD files
• Installation of available FLDs
• Create custom FLD files

Module 6: Leverage Live.com
Microsoft has implemented a solid integration between Live.com and MSS. This module shows how to extend the federated query technology with Live.com to create a customized, highly relevant result set for your end users. The topics in this module include:

• Create Live.com accounts
• Live.com basic and advanced features
• Build federated queries that integrate with live.com

Module 7: Design Search Center Topology
This module discuss the design topics inherent in developing a robust, customized search center topology. Ensuring that the result set has high relevance is one of the main foci in this module. The topics in this module include:

• Centralized Search Center
• Decentralized Search Center
• Hybrid design

Module 8: Customize Search Centers and Search Pages
This module focuses on explaining how to create a customized MSS end-user experience that enhances the presentation and findability of content items in a result set. You do not need to know how to read or write code to customize MSS. Topics in this module include:

• Default layout of the search center and the resulting set pages
• Out-of-the-box configurations to customize the presentation of the result set for end-users

Module 9: Search Administration at the Site Collection Level
Like Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007, MSS effectively divides management tasks among farm administrators, search administrators, and site collection administrators. This module focuses on the abilities of site collection administrators to customize search for their users. The topics in this module include:

• Activate MSS for the site collection
• Create Search Centers for site collections
• Search scopes for the site collection
  
• Keywords and best bets for the site collection
• Indexing of sites, lists, and libraries