In this post, we want to make a review of the main novelties arising resulting from the integration of FAST Search Server in SharePoint 2013, one of the most outstanding novelties of SharePoint 2013 and which provide the powerful features of this platform for enterprise search product, and that before was installed separately.
SharePoint 2013 combines two search “SharePoint Search” engines and “FAST Search Server for SharePoint” in a single search platform much more powerful and fast, providing greater redundancy and the performance benefits of offering FAST. To this end, a new simplified architecture that combines the best functionality and features of the previous products, achieving a more scalable and highly configurable platform has been developed.
Search interface
The new and updated interface includes elements that resemble search browsers most popular web providing the user a more enriched experience and family.
More intelligent searches
The refinement of search results through the information that is extracted from the metadata associated with the content, was one of the best received of the version of SharePoint 2010. Now in this new version and thanks to integration with FAST, we can make more intelligent searches through the application of filters and suggestions of terms based on searches carried out by other users. With all of this, we get more relevant search results and discover people and recommended documents that are related.
Search panels provide previews, full of documents providing a user interface more rich than in previous versions.
Tracker component
This new component is responsible for crawl content that comes from different sources of information and on an ongoing basis, thus a new document uploaded to SharePoint appears in search results almost in real time.
It is possible to track a wide range of content sources as, for example, file shares, content from SharePoint or line of business, among other applications.
In summary, we can say that the combination of the power of FAST with the simplicity of SharePoint offer us an outstanding intranet with a custom search and great satisfaction experience for users.