Add or remove a query component

Applies to: SharePoint Server 2010

In Microsoft SharePoint Server 2010 Search, query components return search results to the query originator. Each query component is part of an index partition, which is associated with a specific property database that contains metadata associated with a specific set of crawled content. You can distribute query load by adding mirror query components to an index partition and placing them on different farm servers. For more information about index partitions, see Add or remove an index partition.

Typically, a given index partition contains one or two query components depending on whether you want to provide load balancing or failover capabilities to the index partition. You can add more than two query components to an index partition, but in general, we recommend that in such cases, you instead create a new index partition.

You can decide which servers in a farm will service queries by creating a new query component on that server. If you want to balance the load of servicing queries across multiple farm servers, add mirror query components to an index partition and associate them with the servers you want to service queries.

To add a query component to an index partition

1. In Central Administration, in the Application Management section, click Manage service applications.

2. On the Service Applications page, click the name of the Search Service Application to which you want to add a query component.

3. On the Search Administration page, in the Search Application Topology section, click the Modify button.

   Note

   The SharePoint Search topology cannot be changed in Standalone installations.

4. On the Manage Search Topology page, click a query component in the index partition you want to modify, and then click Add Mirror.

5. In the Add mirror query component dialog box, in the Server field, select the farm server to which you want to add the query component.

6. The Associated Property Database field displays the property database associated with the index partition you are modifying. This field cannot be changed while adding a mirror query component to an index partition.

7. In the Location of Index field, you can optionally specify the location on the server that will be used for storage of the index files after receiving them from the crawl components. If you want to accept the default location, leave the contents of this field unchanged.

8. In the Failover-only Query Component section, you can select the Set this query component as failover-only check box if you want the query component to receive queries only in the event of a failure of the primary query component in the same index partition.

9. Click OK to add the new mirror query component to the job queue.

10. On the Manage Search Topology page, click the Apply Topology Changes button to start the SharePoint timer job that will add the new mirror query component to the selected index partition.

    Note

    You can make other changes to the Search topology and then apply them all at once by clicking the Apply Topology Changes button.

To remove a query component from an index partition

1. In Central Administration, in the Application Management section, click Manage service applications.

2. On the Service Applications page, click the name of the Search Service Application from which you want to remove a query component.

3. On the Search Administration page, in the Search Application Topology section, click the Modify button.

   Note

   The SharePoint Search topology cannot be changed in Standalone installations.

4. On the Manage Search Topology page, click the query component you want to remove, and then click Delete.

5. In the message box that appears, click OK to add the removal of the query component to the job queue.

6. On the Manage Search Topology page, click the Apply Topology Changes button to start the SharePoint timer job that will remove the query component from the selected index partition.

   Note

   If you remove all the query components from an index partition, the index partition will be removed from the farm completely and all the data from the partition will be copied and distributed into the remaining partitions. Depending on resource availability and the volume of data in the partition, this operation may take a long time and may affect farm performance. You cannot remove the last remaining index partition in a given Search Service Application.

   Note

   You can make other changes to the Search topology and then apply them all at once by clicking the Apply Topology Changes button.

See Also

Concepts

Search topology operations in SharePoint Server 2010 (white paper)