The SharePoint 2013 search results return errors when you are querying federated locations with SEP CU 2014 OR higher applied

 

Use Case Description:

In Sp2013 Federated search can be defined as using search indexes created by external search sources for e.g. search engines like Bing to supplement SharePoint search results. With federated search, user will be able to query, retrieve and display search results for content that is not crawled by the SharePoint search server. For example, you can set up a search to return content indexed by an external search engine like Bing.

You can configure result source (configured through Site Settings > Result Sources) pointing to external federated search source. For e.g. you can configure Bing federation through settings like bellow.

i. Name:                  Bing Federation

ii. Protocol:              OpenSearch 1.0/1.1

iii. Source Url:          https://www.bing.com/search?q={searchterms}&format=rss

We want to make you aware that after installing the September 2014 CU, if you are receiving an error message(exception stack trace below) when a search query is issued against an OpenSearch query to external result sources for e.g. BING (https://www.bing.com), then you may be running into this known issue.

Exception:

ExecuteFlowInternal FlowExecutor:Microsoft.ProductivitySearchFlow Exception: System.ArgumentException: key is null or empty Parameter name: key Server stack trace: at Microsoft.Office.Server.Search.Query.PropertyBag`1.ValidateKey(String key)    

at Microsoft.Office.Server.Search.Query.PropertyBag`1.InternalSet(String key, Object value) at Microsoft.Office.Server.Search.Query.SS14ImsLookup.ResultTableCollectionGeneratorEvaluator.ResultTableCollectionGeneratingRecordSet.PopulateMetadata(ResultTableCollection resultTableColletion, IRecord record) at Microsoft.Office.Server.Search.Query.SS14ImsLookup.ResultTableCollectionGeneratorEvaluator.ResultTableCollectionGeneratingRecordSet.DoMoveNext() at Microsoft.Ceres.Evaluation.Processing.RecordSets.RecordSet.MoveNext() at Microsoft.Ceres.Evaluation.Processing.RecordSets.RecordSet.<GetEnumerator>d__0.MoveNext() at System.Linq.Enumerable.First[TSource](IEnumerable`1 source) at Microsoft.Office.Server.Search.Query.Pipeline.Executors.OpenSearchProviderFlowExecutor.ExecuteCore(KeywordQueryProperties keywordProperties) at Microsoft.Office.Server.Search.Query.Pipeline.Executors.QueryPipelineFlowExecutor.Execute(KeywordQueryProperties keywordProperties) at Microsoft.Office.Server.Search.Query.Pipeline.Executors.QueryPipelineHardWiredFlowExecutor.Execute(KeywordQueryProperties keywordProperties) at Microsoft.Office.Server.Search.Query.Pipeline.QueryPipelineComponent.ExecuteFlowInternal(IQueryPipelineFlowExecutor executor, KeywordQueryProperties keywordProperties, String flowName, Int32 timeout) at Microsoft.Office.Server.Search.Query.Pipeline.QueryPipelineComponent.ExecuteFlow(String flowName, KeywordQueryProperties keywordProperties, Int32 timeout) at Microsoft.Office.Server.Search.Query.Pipeline.Processing.QueryRouterEvaluator.QueryRouterProducer.ExecuteQueryFlow(String flowName, KeywordQueryProperties input) at System.Runtime.Remoting.Messaging.StackBuilderSink._PrivateProcessMessage(IntPtr md, Object[] args, Object server, Object[]& outArgs) at System.Runtime.Remoting.Messaging.StackBuilderSink.AsyncProcessMessage(IMessage msg, IMessageSink replySink) Exception rethrown at [0]: at icrosoft.Office.Server.Search.Query.Pipeline.Processing.QueryRouterEvaluator.QueryRouterProducer.ExecuteQueries(IRecord originalQueryRecord, IEnumerable`1 routingRecords, QueryExecutionContext executionContext, IUpdateableDictionaryField`2 resultField) at Microsoft.Office.Server.Search.Query.Pipeline.Processing.QueryRouterEvaluator.QueryRouterProducer.ProcessRecordCore(IRecord record) at Microsoft.Ceres.Evaluation.Processing.Executor.ProducerOperatorExecutor`1.ProcessProducerRecord(IRecord inputRecord)    

Proposed Fix:

Microsoft Product group is aware of this issue and diligently working and prioritizing it to include the fix in one of the upcoming CUs. Please contact Microsoft support for more details on CU {Cumulative Update}.

 

POST BY : SRINI DUTTA [MSFT]