The search center is the second
location users can leverage to execute searches and return results.
Search centers are SharePoint sites dedicated to the function of search
that hold all the search pieces, tabs, Web Parts, search pages, results
pages, etc. They provide the end-to-end ability to enter advanced
queries, select preferences, and retrieve, filter, and action search
results.
SharePoint 2010 is not restricted to one search
scope per search center. Depending on the needs of an organization, many
scopes may be made available. The most common are “All Sites” and
“People” search pages. In addition to these, specialized search pages
may be created for different user groups, departments, sites, and
federated environments, to name a few. Each search tab is designed
around a fixed scope, so when the “People” search tab is accessed, it
automatically applies the “People” scope.
Access to various search pages can be provided
through a few paths. When a site-specific search is executed through the
query box, the user is navigated to a search page for the target site.
When a search is performed through the query box to a collection of
sites or all sites, the user is directed to the corresponding search
results page. When a user navigates to the All Sites center tab, the
option can be made available to choose several search pages other than
All Sites.
Note
When queries are executed through the query box, the user is directed
to a search center. In an out-of-the-box configuration, the difference
between manually navigating to a search center and entering a site
search through a query box is the availability of the Advanced Search
page and the Preferences page. It is important to understand, however,
that the query box can be directed to a site search results page or the
same search center a user can manually navigate to.
The search center can be accessed just like any other site. Once the search center is selected, the landing page shown in Figure 1 will appear.
Figure 1. Enterprise Search Center home page
From this page, there are a few more options
made available. Users can change the scope of their query through tabs
above the query field, navigate to the Advanced Search page, navigate to
the Preferences page, or enter a search query. The various tabs
available here are generally set to different search scopes. They may be
configured to execute queries against different content sets, and the
search results page each tab returns can be configured for a customized
look and feel. In the default SharePoint 2010 Enterprise Search Center
shown in Figure 1,
users can execute queries against content in the entire site
collection, or select the People tab to execute a query against the
people scope. The format of the search results page that returns for
queries executed through each of these tabs is different. More
customized deployments may offer search tabs that are specialized to the
needs of a particular department or may direct queries to specific
content sources.
Queries entered through the search center will
function in the same manner as those entered in the search query box. By
default, the standard search center home page is set to “All Sites” (Figure 2).
“All Sites” is the broadest search scope available and includes all
available content sources, items, and sites, with the exception of
people. When a query is entered through the “All Sites” tab, the user
will be navigated to the corresponding search results page.
Figure 2. Standard All Sites results page
In addition to the All Sites search tab, the
People search page can be accessed by selecting the People tab above the
search field. By doing so, the scope of the search is redirected to the
People search results page. Figure 3
shows a standard SPS2010 People search results page. Most of the
functionality on the People search results page is similar to that of
the All Sites results page.
Figure 3. Standard People search results page
On both the All Sites and People search results
pages, there is the option to tab between the available search scopes.
In a fully developed SharePoint 2010 deployment, other search tabs may
be made available.
In global companies with more than one
SharePoint farm, it is common to provide access to search against
federated environments through search center tabs. Federated searches may include
content pulled from global search engines or other SharePoint
deployments within a global company. With federated search, a query can
be entered through one farm and passed to a different content source,
where it is then processed by that respository's search engine.
Access to federated search is commonly provided
through tabs on the search center. This allows users to search their own
farms by default, but select to search against other content
repositories as needed. An example of search tabs set up for federation
is shown in Figure 4.
Figure 4. Federated search tabs
