ARCHIVED: About the transition at IU from Google Search Appliance (GSA) to Microsoft SharePoint FAST Search service

The UITS Enterprise Web Tech Services team is evaluating the Microsoft SharePoint FAST Search (FAST) service as an alternative to the Google Search Appliance (GSA) for enterprise search at Indiana University. For more about FAST at IU, see ARCHIVED: What is the Microsoft SharePoint FAST Search service?

Comparing GSA and FAST

The GSA is a hardware and software solution licensed by Google for custom search in an enterprise intranet environment. The limitations of the license included a limit on the number of document URLs that can be indexed, plus a lack of available service redundancy.

FAST provides a number of improvements, including the ability to leverage IU's SharePoint service, no limits to the number of document URLs that can be indexed, more control for site managers over appearance and result relevancy, and more control for end users over advance search options.

FAST also separates the processes of crawling documents and serving search results, and provides improved redundancy of both processes. Also, performance of each process is greatly improved compared to previous search solutions. Site managers can expect more control over search keywords and relevancy, as well as improved performance of document crawling. End users can expect more advanced search options, as well as improved performance and relevancy in the delivery of their search results.

GSA changes during the transition to FAST

During the transition to FAST, the GSA will remain active; however, existing sites using the GSA have been migrated to the FAST service. Users performing searches targeting the GSA are redirected to use FAST instead. When the transition to FAST is complete, the GSA will be retired.