You should be reading Joel Oleson’s blog. If you did you would gain the wisdom of the ages as it pertains to SharePoint. He used to be an admin for MSW and then moved over to the SharePoint product team. Anyway, every once in a while he posts cool tips to enhance and extend the usability of SharePoint. This post is one example. If you have Vista, you can add a SharePoint search center URL for Instant Search.

1. Click on Start Button.

2. Type Gpedit.msc, Group Policy Editor will open (Click Allow if prompted for elevated privileges)

3. Navigate down and expand the following tree nodes: User Configuration\Administrative Templates\Windows Components\Instant Search.

   

4. Double Click Custom Instant Search Internet search provider.

5. In the **Custom Instant Search Internet search provider Properties **dialog edit the following settings:

   1. Choose Enable
   2. Enter Search Catapult Systems for the string
   3. Enter http://intranet.mysharepoint.com/searchcenter/pages/results.aspx?k=%w for the URL
   4. Click OK

6. Close Group Policy Editor

7. You may need to Reboot or run the following command in a command window as Administrator Gpupdate /force