Customer Reviews

Inside the Index and Search Engines: Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007 (Pro-Developer)

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

There's a good bit of information out there about SharePoint search. Patrick & Lars did a fantastic job pulling all this together in this book. You see the OOTB config options, a solid discussion on the other search options with the MSFT Search Server editions. I really like the API stuff though... working with the full text and keyword searches in the API as well as a detailed discussion on the Query and QueryEx Web services. The section on customizing the OOTB search result response is also very helpful.

All the stuff in the book exists on the internet however this book bundles the knowledge very nicely and you can appreciate the Enterprize search and its power. I highly recommend this book

Books is abotu configuring Search Services, it is for administrators as well as a little bit for developers.

This book covers the MS Search platform (not FAST) for enterprise search. It covers both MOSS and Search Server 2008 concepts.

It covers basic configuration, architecture, and coding approaches - so it's useful for both IT and Developers wanting to get the most value out of by far the best Enterprise Search platform on the market. Why is enterprise search so different? Well, search in the enterprise is NOT just a bunch of web pages - it's content stored in documents, spreadsheets, powerpoints, PDF files, file shares, Lotus Notes, etc.

The SharePoint 2007 search engine includes quite a lot of new features and customization options.

This is the only book I have seen that covers all aspects of the SharePoint 2007 search engine. The book is an ideal reference for anybody that want to learn about how use, customize and administrate the search engine.

The book includes also more complex topics such as using facetted search and the search API.

This book has been a gold mine. It does have the administrative foundation but where it really shines is in opening up the hood and explaining how the engine works at a fairly low level. Without the chapter on protocol handers and filters, we never would have been able to develop a custom ifilter for our customers. We are digging into the Query API now and shows promise in solving a user complaint on how people search should be sorted alphabetically.

The listed code snippets have been helpful and they are sprinkled liberally throughout the text. This leads me to a major disappointment, the The URL mentioned in the book for downloading the complete code samples and small utilities used in the book now points to a Microsoft training site and the only mention of the code samples is in the marketing blurb right above "Buy this book now for $49.99!". Hitting the search engines gives nothing either. TechNet and MSDN have pages that reference the same classes but no code samples. Specifically, there is a screenshot on page 427 of a demo app for trying out SQL queries against the index and displays the results. The chapter mentions that the demo is part of the sample package and implies that it is available online. Where though? I've yet to find it.

I'd love to give this book a 5 star rating, but without the code samples, 4 is all I can give it.