Propagating a Content Index

You must ensure that the following conditions exist before you can propagate a content index:

• You have configured a search service account for the server farm. This account must have local administrator permissions on the search (destination) server. For information about configuring the search service account, see Configuring Server Farm Account Settings.
• The destination server is on a trusted domain.
• There is sufficient disk space available on the destination server. For each propagated index, allow for more than twice its size in disk space.

  Note  If propagation fails due to lack of disk space on the destination server, Microsoft Office SharePoint Portal Server 2003 logs an error in the Application Log in Microsoft Windows Server 2003 Event Viewer (commonly referred to as the event log) of both the destination search server and the index management server.

The contents of a new index are not accessible on the search server until propagation has completed. The index is not accessible if propagation fails, even if a previous propagation was successful.

For more information about search content propagation, see About Search Content Propagation.

Propagate a content index

1. On the SharePoint Portal Server Central Administration for Server server_name page, click Configure search and indexing.
2. On the Manage the Search Service for SharePoint Portal Server page, in the Indexes section, click Manage propagation.
3. On the Search Propagation page, rest the pointer on the index name, and then click the arrow that appears.
4. On the menu that appears, click Force Propagation.