Managed Properties Not Populating with Data – Metadata Property Mappings

I had an issue with managed properties and custom search results, where i was unable to properly search across custom fields as well as customising the search results.  The objective was to create a custom search engine that uses a scope configured to include results for items from a specific content type, where the content type has been deployed to multiple Site Collections.  The issue was that the managed property was not being populated with the expected data from all site collections.  Instances where the custom metadata fields was found on the primary collection worked fine, allowing the custom field to be included in the search and displayed in the results.

For all items on other site collection that use the same content type, the expected value was not included in the Managed Property.  When viewing search results, items from these site collections had no data for the value of the managed property when viewing the search results.

I found that the issue related to deploying the content type to each site collection.  After the deploy was complete, only the custom column from the primary site collection was accessible when mapping fields to the managed property.  The internal names for the equivelant columns on each of the other site collections were set in the format of an Id.  Redeploying the content types allowed the columns accross each site collection to be referrenced using the standard internal name instead of the column Id, or removing and re-adding the problem columns from the content types.  A temporary workaround was to map each instance of the columns from each site collection to the required managed property, with the option “Include values from a single crawled property based on the order specified” selected.

See Managed Properties Not Populating with Data – Metadata Property Mappings for details.

Issue Deploying Solution After adding to Solution Store – SharePoint (MOSS 2007)

Deployment Status remains as “None” after deploying a solution, even thought result of the last operation states: “The solution was successfully deployed”.

The following article explains how to deploy the solution manually on the frontend server of the SharePoint Farm:
Issue Deploying Solution After adding to Solution Store – SharePoint (MOSS 2007)

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Replicate / Migrate data into sharepoint lists from an external sql database

Solutions for integrating data from an external SQL database in SharePoint. Migrate data from an external database into Sharepoint Lists and libraries, or configure data connections to retreive data directly from the external database to be displayed on pages or stored in SharePoint.

Replicate / Migrate data into sharepoint lists from an external sql database

A common change to the web.config file for a SharePoint instance is to enable custom errors, and the stack trace of an error when it ocurrs.  Enabling custom errors will result in a more detailed description being displayed instead of the “An Unexpected Error has Ocurred” message or similar.  This will help when troubeshooting issues, as it will tell you where the problem is, or at least point you in the right direction.

The article SharePoint Web.Config: How to Show Full Errors explains the various configuration changes which can be made in order to display more information when an error ocurrs, including enabling custom errors, enabling the call Stack Trace feature, enabling debugging mode, and enabling the ASP.NET tracing feature.  Additional information and tips are also provided for when making changes to web.config files relating to some important steps and considerations which should be taken before making and applying changes to a web.config file.

SharePoint Web.Config: How to Show Full Errors

Ever performed a desktop search to find the web.config file, only to find that there are multiple web.config files on the same server. A number of web.config files are required to configure an IIS web server and SharePoint?

There will be a separate web.config file for each virtual server in IIS which hosts SharePoint site collections. There is also a web.config file for each of the system directories on a SharePoint site, such as the _vti_bin, _layouts, etc. There is also a web.config file which is used to identify trusted web parts.

To find out which directory is used by various SharePoint applications/websites, view the properties of the SharePoint website in IIS and from the “Home Directory” tab, the value in the “Local path” field will take you to the directory where the web.config file is for the specific instance of SharePoint / Application in IIS.

See Where is SharePoint web.config? for more information about the various web.config files which are required to configure SharePoint & ASP.NET web applications, including inforpation about where to find the web.config file for a SharePoint environment.