SharePoint bug – the “created by” and “modified by” search

Hi All,

I am back ................. Another interesting finding...................

What seems to be a SharePoint bug – the “created by” and “modified by” search mappings in advanced search never actually index the relevant metadata, meaning that you cannot usefully search on either of these. Looking at the meta data properties returned on items from a fulltextsqlquery, createdby and lastmodifiedby information is always blank - meaning that these properties are not indexed. This is pretty surprising as these criteria are available on the advanced search on by default.

This appears to be bug. The protocol handler that crawls SharePoint content is not populating the ows_Modified_x0020_By(Text) or the ows_ModifiedBy(Text) or ows_Created_x0020_By(Text) or ows_Created(Text)crawled property.

Good News .....There is work-around for this. I have not tested it rigorously but seems it gives correct result.


1) Open Central administration -> Shared Services -> SharedServices (X being the number of the shared services provider for the site you are creating a mapping) - > search settings -> metadata property mappings
2) Click “Modifiedby” to edit the properties
3) Make sure “Include values from all crawled properties mapped” is selected
4) Click “add mapping” and select the “Office” category from the dropdown list.
5) Look for a property named “OFFICE:8” , click “OK”
6) Click “add mapping” and select the “ows_Last_x0020_Modified(text)” from the ALL categories dropdown list, Click “OK”
7) Make sure the box is checked “Allow this property to be used in scopes”, click “OK”
8) Click on “Crawled Properties” link on the left side of the Shared Services Administration page. 9) Click On the “Office” Category.
10) The mapped property you just created should be listed in the “Mapped To” column of the Office:8(Text) category.
11) Click on the Office:8(Text) category to view the properties.
12) In the “name and information” section, you should see the “property Set ID:” value is 'F29F85E0-4FF9-1068-AB91-08002B27B3D9' ...This is very important!!!
13) In the “Mappings to managed properties” section the managed property you edited in steps 2 – 7 should be listed.
14) The box to “Include values for this property in the search index” should be checked.
15) Click “OK” to exit this page.
16) Open “Shared Services administration” -> “ShareservicesX” -> “Search Settings” -> “Content Sources and crawl schedules”
17) Click on “Local Office SharePoint Server sites” to expand the dropdown list and select “Start full crawl” .
Do the same for CreatedBy and map to Office:4(Text) ,ows_Created_x0020_By(Text).

So the finally both the properties should look like:-
ModifiedBy -- Office:8, ows_Last_x0020_Modified(text)CreatedBy -- Office:4(Text) ,ows_Created_x0020_By(Text)