Searching your SharePoint sites with Internet Explorer 8

IE8 has a very customizable Search Toolbar. Of course, the default search engine used by it is the Live Search, but you can manage the search providers in a very easy way. Just click on the “Find More Providers” menu:

On that page you can find the most popular search providers like Google, Live Search, AOL, Yahoo!, etc. You can add them to your search toolbar with a simple click:

Moreover, on the right side of the screen you can find a very interesting section: “Create Your Own”. Here you are, that’s your friend if you want to add your SharePoint search page to the IE toolbar! For example, if your SharePoint search’s result URL is http://intranet/search/Pages/results.aspx, you have to enter this to the first text box: http://intranet/search/Pages/results.aspx?k=TEST (the ‘k’ parameter passes the search expression to the results page). The second text box have to be filled with the name of this search provider as you want to see in IE8:

Here you are, now you’re able to use your SharePoint search site directly from your browser!