The SharePoint 2007 Search Center with tabs offers several benefits over the search box found on all non-administration pages of your SharePoint sites:
· It can be centralized or located within the collaborative environments.
· It uses Web Parts, not field controls, and therefore provides an easily customizable set of user interfaces without writing code.
· It is a separate site, which supports inherited or unique permissions.
The Search Center has no default content other than the three default pages—the search page, the advanced search page and the results page. It is a SharePoint site and, as such, can contain other pages and content. Those three pages are the default.aspx, advanced.aspx and results.aspx.
We introduce these three pages in the linked article Using a Search Center in Office SharePoint Server 2007 and discuss how to customize them in the following linked articles.
* The linked articles require Adobe Reader.
Customize the Search Page in an Office SharePoint Server 2007 Search Center Site
The Search Page in a SharePoint Server 2007 Search Center site is a Web Part page with two default Web Parts, the Search Box and a Content Editor Web Part.
The preceding linked article discusses how to modify a Search Page in a SharePoint Server 2007 Search Center site and the Web Part settings associated to the two default Web Parts. We will also discuss the recommendations and best practices for additional modifications and suggested Web Parts that can be added to this page.
Customize the Advanced Search Page in an Office SharePoint Server 2007 Search Center Site
Customizing the Advanced Search page in a SharePoint Server 2007 Search Center site will involve understanding the page construction, the existing and available Web Parts and how to use them. The unique configuration required by your organization may require multiple Advanced Search pages for different purposes, different users or different SharePoint Server 2007 Search Centers.
The preceding linked article covers the steps to customize these pages and best practices and recommendations for making the advanced search pages for your Search Center site more effective.
Customize Search Results Pages in an Office SharePoint Server 2007 Search Center Site
The results page for any search is a very important page as it does the heavy lifting of the query process. A SharePoint Server 2007 Search Center results page is the most complex of the three default search pages with a total of seven Web Part zones and 10 Web Parts.
The preceding linked article describes how a search is executed and what information is passed back to the Search result page. You will learn how to customize the search results page, read about the available Web Parts, how to configure those Web Parts and learn best practices for modifying this important page.
Adding Pages to an Office SharePoint Server 2007 Search Center Site
One of the search customization tasks that is certain to be required in a SharePoint Server 2007 Search Center site will be creating additional search pages for your Search Center, especially if you have a central Search Center for all users. That is the focus of this post.
The Search Center “light” template supports the collaboration features of Windows SharePoint Services 3.0, but only contains three pages by default:
· The Search Page
· The Advance Search Page
· The Results Page
In the preceding linked article we discuss the mechanics of creating new pages, customizing the pages and some best practices. Since there are many advantages in using SharePoint Designer to create additional pages we include a light discussion on its use as well.
Ben Curry is SharePoint MVP, an enterprise network architect, and a senior instructor for Mindsharp.
Bill English is a SharePoint MVP, author, educator specializing in SharePoint Products and Technologies, and Mindsharp CEO.