Adobe PDF IFilter Indexing with SharePoint 2010

This note explains how to enable PDF indexing using the Adobe IFilter version 9.0 in Microsoft SharePoint 2010. This note is adapted from the Adobe note explaining how to configure the 64 bit IFilter for SharePoint 2007 (see: http://www.adobe.com/special/acrobat/configuring_pdf_ifilter_for_ms_sharepoint_2007.pdf ).

• First, install the Adobe PDF 64 bit IFilter version 9 from this location: http://www.adobe.com/support/downloads/detail.jsp?ftpID=4025

Now add PDF as a file type:

• Run Central Administration.
• Click Manage service applications under “Application Management”:

• Click the Search Service Application link in the list of applications.

• Click File Types  under “Crawling” in the left navigation area:

• Click New File Type.
• Enter pdf for the “File Name Extension” and click OK.

• Using Regedit on the server, navigate to

\\HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Office Server\14.0\Search\Setup\Filters

•  Right-click the Filters  folder and select New Key. Enter “.pdf” for the key value.
• Add the following values to this key:

<REG_SZ> Default = <value not set>
<REG_SZ> Extension = pdf
<REG_DWORD> FileTypeBucket = 1
<REG_SZ> MimeTypes = application/pdf

 The key should look like:

• Navigate to: \\HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Office Server\14.0\Search\Setup\ContentIndexCommon\Filters\Extension
•  Right-click the Filters  folder and select New Key. Enter “.pdf” for the key value.
• Set the “default” value to {E8978DA6-047F-4E3D-9C78-CDBE46041603}

 The key should look like:

You can now add an image to be used for the icon for PDF documents:

• Add an image (typically gif or png, use Google images to find an example) for the PDF icon to the folder:

C:\Program Files\Common Files\Microsoft Shared\Web Server Extensions\14\TEMPLATE\IMAGES

•  Open the file docicon.xml from the location:

C:\Program Files\Common Files\Microsoft Shared\Web Server Extensions\14\TEMPLATE\XML

•  Add a link to map the pdf extension to the image by adding a link like the following to the ByExtension element:

                 <Mapping Key=”pdf” Value=”pdf_icon.gif” OpenControl=””/>

•  Finally, issue an IISReset and restart the Windows services “SharePoint Foundation Search V4” and “SharePoint Server Search 1”.

Your PDF documents should now be indexed on the next indexing crawl.

 Update 15-Feb-2011: See this blog post for a useful PowerShell script that automates this process: http://www.sharepointusecases.com/index.php/2011/02/automate-pdf-configuration-for-sharepoint-2010-via-powershell/