SharePoint 2013 Search Series - Post 1 - Configure Custom Search

Overview: This series of posts examines SharePoint 2013 search.  It looks at configuration to get Search working for you.  There are other posts on this blog about configuring your Search architecture and farm.

This post looks at 2 main points: 1.> crawling content and 2.>  Result Sources.

Search Series:
SharePoint 2013 Search Series - Post 1 - Configure Custom Search (This Post)
SharePoint 2013 Search Series - Post 2 - Refiners
SharePoint 2013 Search Series - Post 3 - Search Box Web Part to only query Managed Properties
SharePoint 2013 Search Series - Post 4 - Search Result Source Removal
SharePoint 2013 Search Series - Post 5 - Restricting Results & Enable pdf previews

1.> Crawling Content:  The UI in CA has changed but if you understood crawling in previous versions of SharePoint, it still works the same way.  You are looking to create indexes by crawling content.  The image below shows the Search Administration screen after choosing the "Content Sources" option.  This will allow you to create content sources and configure them so SharePoint can get data into the indexes and have permission awareness (ACL).

After setting up your Content Sources run a full crawl to populate the indexes.

The "Crawl Log" is extremely useful to see when crawls where run and what content has been included. 

Once all the content is crawled you are ready to look at the Results Source formally referred to as Search Scopes.

Tip: The crawler must run through all content to be searchable, I still see clients trying to restrict data by no crawling it.  Crawl everything and restrict on the query side what comes out. 
Tip: Don't create to many Content Sources.  This can be a tough item to figure out, my advice is use as few Content Sources as possible and break them up by how often the content needs to be crawled.

2.> Result Sources: You can create Result Sources at the SSA/farm level down to the web/SPSite level.  This example is looking to return data from a specific path for a particular content type, so I created the Result Source at the site level.

Tip: The "Search Result Preview" is really useful for checking you are doing this correctly.

Once I have a "Result Source" setup I go to my search page and add a "Search Results" web part to output the results to my user.  I  can edit the "Search criteria" on the web part to use my new "Result Source".  The picture below is annotated to explain setting up the Search Results Web Part.

Search Series:
SharePoint 2013 Search Series - Post 1 - Configure Custom Search (This Post)
SharePoint 2013 Search Series - Post 2 - Refiners
SharePoint 2013 Search Series - Post 3 - Search Box Web Part to only query Managed Properties
SharePoint 2013 Search Series - Post 4 - Search Result Source Removal
SharePoint 2013 Search Series - Post 5 - Restricting Results & Enable pdf previews

Migration test of Sharegate to SP2013

Problem: I am looking at migrating some basic content into an SP2013 farm from SP2010.  I would normally opt for Metalogix or DocPoint if the client already has the licences but today I needed to use another tool namely Sharegate.  I used Sharegate.Migration.4.6.3

Scenarios:
SP2010 blog posts to an existing SP2013 blog.
SP2010 lists into SP2013.

Screenshot of the tool:

Verdict:  A great tool, easy to use, mapped over data cleanly.  Absolute winner! 

Updated: 2018/10/23
I also like Metalogix but Sharegate is still a brilliant tool for SharePoint data migration.

CAML Designer for SharePoint 2013 is Brilliant

I always used U2U for checking my CAML queries in SharePoint.  I have just used CAML Designer for SharePoint 2013 and it is brilliant.

Link to the CAML Designer tool
http://karinebosch.wordpress.com/2012/12/13/caml-designer-for-sharepoint-2013-released/

Simple Example of using CAML to query a list:
string riskListCAMLQry  = "<Query><Where><Eq><FieldRef Name='Status' /><Value Type='Text'>Scheduled</Value></Eq></Where><View><RowLimit>1000</RowLimit></View></Query>"

Call using C# CSOM
CamlQuery camlQuery = new CamlQuery();
camlQuery.ViewXml = riskListCAMLQry;   // Add a where clause on the status on the list to restrict the result set, only return the first 1000 rows

Content database Sizing & Cleanup

Problem:  At a customer site, a content database is massive.  Various Site collections are using the same content database. 

Initial Hypothesis:  Smaller site collections can be moved to new separate content databases.  This reduces the size to some degree.  The SQL log (ldf) is in good shape.  The excessive size is due to 3 unavoidable issues, multiple versions of large blobs (we need the versioning so not an option).  The recycle bin is set to the default 50% and my dumping older content is brings down the size and lastly, delete content databases are still sored within SQL. 

Resolution: Remove the previously deleted site collections fro the content database.   Using CA, I tried to run the "Gradual Site Delete timer job", it no difference, the delete site was still lingering about. 

Used PowerShell to remove the deleted site collections as shown above.  E.g. PS> Remove-SPDeletedSite -Identity ""

More Info:
http://blogbaris.blogspot.co.uk/2013/01/delete-sharepoint-2010-site-collection.html
 

SharePoint 2013 urls

I am often having to go to Google to find SP url formations, to work with the product as I don't memorise them.  Ahmed Farag has a good post on this:

                                   

Ahmed Farag

Microsoft

MSFT

1,342 Points 5 1 0

Recent Achievements

Blogger II New Blog Commentator New Blogger

View Profile

"Famous SharePoint URLs & Locations"

My common ones are:
Login using Windows credentials
/_windows/default.aspx

Web Part Maintenance Page

?Contents=1

Sign in as a different user

/_layouts/closeConnection.aspx?loginasanotheruser=true

Change Site Master Page

/_layouts/ChangeSiteMasterPage.aspx

Master Pages library

/_catalogs/masterpage/Forms/AllItems.aspx

User Information list per Site Collection
/_catalogs/users/simple.aspx 

/_catalogs/users/detail.aspx  (also see)

/_layouts/userdisp.aspx?id={UserID}&Force=True

List all users whi have accessed the Site collection

/_layouts/15/people.aspx?MembershipGroupId=0

Get the custom property bag propeties on the Root SPWeb of the site collection

/_api/web/allproperties

Get the version of the SharePoint server (Patch level)

 /_vti_pvt/Service.cnf
SharePoint Workbench for SPFx
/_layouts/15/workbench.aspx

Also see:
http://blogs.msdn.com/b/how24/archive/2013/05/23/famous-sharepoint-urls-amp-locations.aspx

SharePoint 2013 publishing site blog won't allow anonymous access

Problem:  I have a public facing website that has a blog.  I have been hitting my head trying to make it anonymous when eureka Google saved me on a topic I had totally forgotten. 

Initial Hypothesis: I have anonymous access enabled on the web application and on the site collection.  I started thinking it was the blog not inheriting permissions so I tried applying anonymous access at the site level followed by examining permissions on the posts list.  All erroneous so I reverted to full inherited permissions.  I Google-ed the symptoms and viola, it is the ViewFormPagesLockDown feature.

Resolution: Turn off the ViewFormPagesLockDown feature for the site collection and anonymous access users will not get the credential prompt when accessing the post.
PS> $lockdown = Get-SPFeature viewformpageslockdown
PS> Disable-SPFeature $lockdown -url http://sitecollectionURL
and confirm the change.

More Info:
http://blogs.msdn.com/b/varun_malhotra/archive/2012/01/13/can-t-access-a-list-on-an-anonymous-site-sharepoint-2010.aspx
http://blog.mastykarz.nl/preventing-authenticated-visitors-browsing-system-pages/ (Important)

Anonymous REST JS call error using SP2013

Problem: I am making an anonymous JavaScript REST call to a image library.  I get the error "Request failed.  The method GetItems of the type List with id ... is blocked by the administrator on the server.nundefined".

 

Resolution:  Change the ClientCallbackSettings on the web application as shown below.

 

 



$wa = Get-SPWebApplication http://www.demo.dev
$wa.ClientCallableSettings .AnonymousRestrictedTypes.Remove([microsoft.sharepoint.splist],"GetItems")
$wa.Update()

More Info:
http://www.sharepoint-zone.com/search/label/ClientCallableSettings.AnonymousRestrictedTypes