13.1. The Indexing Service

Windows Server 2003 includes version 3.0 of the Indexing Service that catalogs files stored on network drives, corporate intranets, and Internet sites, and provides a web-based query form for easy search and retrieval of those cataloged resources. The service is part of Internet Information Services (see Chapter 8 for a complete and detailed walkthrough of IIS).

Part of the power behind the Indexing Service is its ability to catalog documents without needing them reformatted to a special, proprietary format. The service understands most Microsoft Office file formats, including Word and Excel documents. This makes the service very useful, even beyond its basic premise of indexing plain web sites.