Windows search index differently on each Windows server?

Question

I need to check the patching status on 20 Windows Server 2016 with similar configuration. So I remote control (mstsc) into each server, click the Window icon at left bottom, type in "installed" to look for View installed updates.

All the servers are Win Server 2016 and were started on same day around 2 years ago. However the search results are not the same. In some servers I cannot find View installed updates. I have to key in "view" or "updates" in locate this item. In some cases I cannot find this item at all.

My question is, since the item is built-in component (not 3rd party add-on), why Windows in different server index it differently? Can I enforce the indexing to work in same way across all Windows servers?

Answer 1

Hi there,

There might be many reasons for this behavior in Servers . You can try rebuilding the Search Index.

Open Control Panel > Indexing Options. In the Advanced Options, Click on Restore Defaults and also Rebuild Index. Click OK.

Type ‘services.msc’ in the run . Scroll down to the ‘Windows Search Service’, and ensure that it is set on Automatic and Running. Restart this Service. You will also have to ensure that RPC (Remote Procedure Call) is running and set on automatic.

---

--If the reply is helpful, please Upvote and Accept it as an answer--

Answer 2

You could start by recycling the Windows search service.

net stop WSearch
net start WSearch

Or maybe a reboot.

For patching I would suggest that at 20 servers, it's time to stop manually installing updates and implement some automation. There are a number of sites on the net that show how to do that with Powershell.

https://www.nakivo.com/blog/automate-windows-updates-using-powershell-short-overview/

https://searchwindowsserver.techtarget.com/tutorial/How-to-automate-patch-management-in-Windows

https://devblogs.microsoft.com/scripting/use-powershell-to-audit-and-install-windows-patches/

You can also use Active Directory Group Policy.

https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-server/administration/windows-server-update-services/deploy/4-configure-group-policy-settings-for-automatic-updates

At the company that I used to work for, we used WSUS to manage updates. We did monthly patching. We would update test servers first and then apply those updates to our production servers the next month. That gave us roughly 30 days to see if the patches broke anything before we updated our critical systems.