Last updated: 6/17/2026

Full text indexing installation

The Full Text Indexing component enables search within document content in ShareAspace.

Full text search is used to find phrases and text inside indexed files.

Note

The Full Text Indexing component and Elasticsearch can be installed on separate machines. However, it is recommended to install them on the same machine for simplicity and security.

The Full Text Indexing component can be installed on the same server as the ShareAspace Host. However, it is recommended to run external extensions on a separate server when possible.

Prerequisites

The Full Text Indexing component requires:

Hardware prerequisites for a Full Text Indexing Server (IIS).
Software prerequisites for a Full Text Indexing Server (IIS).

Note

It is possible to set up the Full Text Indexing component on one machine and the Elasticsearch on another machine but it is recommended to install them both on the same machine for reasons of security.

Elasticsearch setup

Elasticsearch is required to store and query indexed content.

Note

Official installation instructions are available at the Elasticsearch documentation: https://www.elastic.co/guide/en/elasticsearch/reference/current/zip-windows.html.

Note

The following setup process is an example using the default SSL certificate and username/password.

TLS certificate setup (automatic)

Start Elasticsearch once to automatically generate TLS certificates:

PS C:\elasticsearch\bin> .\elasticsearch.bat

Certificates are placed in: config\certs.

Note

If valid certificates already exist, new ones will not be generated.

Note

Any certificate can be used instead of the one created by the Elasticsearch setup scripts. Usernames and passwords can also be changed. The Elasticsearch website has documentation covering this.

Trust the certificate:

Import-Certificate -FilePath "C:\elasticsearch\config\certs\http_ca.crt" -CertStoreLocation Cert:\LocalMachine\Root

Note

The certificate must be trusted by the server hosting the Full Text Indexing component.

Manual TLS setup (optional)

Important

Elasticsearch provides tools for managing certificates. Refer to the Elasticsearch certificate utility documentation for more information: https://www.elastic.co/guide/en/elasticsearch/reference/current/certutil.html

ShareAspace full text indexing appsettings.json

{
  ...
  "ConnectionSettings": {
    "ServiceEndpoint": "https://localhost:9200/",
    "CertificateFingerprint":  "a8e7fee41...19b9687"
  },
  ...
}

To generate a self-signed Elasticsearch TLS certificate for localhost, use the elasticsearch-certutil.bat script found under the bin folder of the Elasticsearch installation.

PS C:\elasticsearch\bin> .\elasticsearch-certutil.bat cert --self-signed --pem --multiple

The script will ask for a series of questions press enter on all but:

"Enter instance name:" - type: localhost
"Enter DNS names for instance (comma-separated if more than one) []:" - type: localhost

A ZIP file (default certificate-bundle.zip) containing the certificate (localhost.crt) and the key (localhost.key) will be created.

Unpack the certificate and key under \config\certs.

Create a trust to the certificate.

Import-Certificate -FilePath "C:\elasticsearch\config\certs\http_ca.crt" -CertStoreLocation Cert:\LocalMachine\Root

Open the Elasticsearch configuration file \config\elasticsearch.yml and add the following lines:

xpack.security.http.ssl.enabled: true
xpack.security.http.ssl.certificate: "certs\\localhost.crt"
xpack.security.http.ssl.key: "certs\\localhost.key"

Finally, read the certificate fingerprint from the certificate and update the ConnectionSettings.CertificateFingerprint in the ShareAspace Full Text Indexing component appsettings.json configuration file.

# Get certificate fingerprint from the http_ca
$cert = New-Object System.Security.Cryptography.X509Certificates.X509Certificate2("C:\elasticsearch\config\certs\http_ca.crt")

$sha256 = [System.Security.Cryptography.SHA256]::Create()
$hashBytes = $sha256.ComputeHash($cert.RawData)
$fingerprintSha256 = ($hashBytes | ForEach-Object { $_.ToString("x2") }) -join ":"
$formattedFingerPrint = $($fingerprintSha256 -replace ":")

Important

Do not confuse the SHA‑256 hash of the certificate (used in this configuration) with the SHA‑1 hash that is typically displayed in Windows as the certificate “thumbprint”. Both values are hashes of the same certificate but use different algorithms.

Superuser password

A default password for the elastic superuser is generated automatically. It can easily be changed later by running the following command:

PS C:\elasticsearch\bin> .\elasticsearch-reset-password.bat -a -b -s -u elastic

Ingest

The Ingest plugin is included as a module in Elasticsearch since version 8.12.1 and does no longer have to be installed as a plugin.

If Elasticsearch cannot read the external GEO IP database (this can be seen in the log) it is possible to turn off this feature.

Open the Elasticsearch configuration file \config\elasticsearch.yml and add the following lines:

ingest.geoip.downloader.enabled: false

Install as a service

Elasticsearch can be installed and hosted as a Windows service.

To install run:

PS C:\elasticsearch\bin> .\elasticsearch-service.bat install

Once installed the Windows service can be started using:

PS C:\elasticsearch\bin> .\elasticsearch-service.bat start

Installation steps

Step 1: Run the installer

Run the FullTextIndexing.msi installer to install the component on the IIS server.

Default installation path: C:\Program Files\Eurostep\ShareAspace\FullTextIndexing.

Step 2: Configure IIS

An IIS Application Pool named FullTextIndexing is created.

By default, it runs under LocalSystem.

Note

If a different account is used, it must have read access to the installation directory.

Step 3: Configure the component

See the Configuration section.

Important

The TLS certificate used by the Elasticsearch server must be trusted by the server hosting the Full Text Indexing component.

Step 4: Register the extension

See the Extension registration section.

Configuration

Open appsettings.json.

Default location: C:\Program Files\Eurostep\ShareAspace\FullTextIndexing\appsettings.json.

Example configuration

{
  "NovaConfig": {
    "SymmetricKey": "<generated-key>"
  },
  "ConnectionSettings": {
    "ServiceEndpoint": "https://localhost:9200"
  },
  "IndexedCharacters": 100000,
  "Elastic": {
    "Secret": "_FULLTEXTINDEXINGSECRET_"
  }
}

Configuration properties

NovaConfig.SymmetricKey – Symmetric key used when registering the extension.
ConnectionSettings.ServiceEndpoint – Elasticsearch endpoint.
ConnectionSettings.CertificateFingerprint – Elasticsearch TLS certificate fingerprint.
IndexedCharacters – Maximum number of indexed characters per document.
Elastic.Secret – Authentication secret for Elasticsearch.

SymmetricKey

Generate as described in: Generate Symmetric Signing Keys.

Elasticsearch connection

The ServiceEndpoint must match the Elasticsearch endpoint.

Important

The Elasticsearch TLS certificate must be trusted by the server hosting the Full Text Indexing component.

IndexedCharacters

Controls how much content is indexed per document.

Default: 100000
If the value is set to -1 the indexer will index all characters.

Warning

Indexing all characters may significantly impact performance and memory usage.

Authentication

The setting Secret in the Elastic section represents the secret key setup when authenticating against Elasticsearch.

The username/password is configured by passing --user and --password command line arguments to Eurostep.SAS.FullTextIndexingHost.exe:

Eurostep.SAS.FullTextIndexingHost.exe --user <USERNAME> --password <PASSWORD>

Eurostep.SAS.FullTextIndexingHost.exe --user elastic --password OLx..YskTyo=

Eurostep.SAS.FullTextIndexingHost.exe will return a "secret" to be used for configuration parameter Elastic.Secret.

OpenTelemetry configuration

The Full Text Indexing component supports OpenTelemetry (OTEL) for logging, metrics, and tracing.

Configuration is performed using configuration variables, for example:

{
  "OTEL_SERVICE_NAME": "ShareAspace.FullTextIndexing",
  "OTEL_EXPORTER_OTLP_ENDPOINT": "https://host.example.com:4317",
  "OTEL_EXPORTER_OTLP_PROTOCOL": "grpc"
}

Additional OTEL configuration options are available and are shared across all ShareAspace components.

See: OpenTelemetry logging.

Extension registration

The Full Text Indexing extension must be registered as a Nova Extension on a bootstrapped ShareAspace collection.

Example registration script:

Download Add-Extension.ps1

param (
    [Parameter(Mandatory = $true)]
    [string]$NovaHost,
    [Parameter(Mandatory = $true)]
    [string]$PersonalAccessToken,
    [Parameter(Mandatory = $true)]
    [string]$Extension,
    [Parameter(Mandatory = $true)]
    [string]$ExtensionApiKey
)

$uri = "{0}/collection/externalExtension/novaExtension" -f $NovaHost
$pat = [System.Convert]::ToBase64String([System.Text.Encoding]::ASCII.GetBytes(":$PersonalAccessToken"))
$headers = @{ "Authorization" = "Basic $pat" }
$body = @{ "hostUri" = $Extension; "apiKey" = $ExtensionApiKey; "tokenLifeTime" = 15 } | ConvertTo-Json

Invoke-WebRequest -Method Post -Uri $uri -Headers $headers -Body $body -ContentType "application/json" -UseBasicParsing

Example usage:

.\Add-Extension.ps1 `
  -NovaHost https://host.example.com:5001 `
  -PersonalAccessToken "<token>" `
  -Extension "https://preview.example.com/FullTextIndexing" `
  -ExtensionApiKey "<apikey>"

Table of Contents

Full text indexing installation

Note

Prerequisites

Note

Elasticsearch setup

Note

Note

TLS certificate setup (automatic)

Note

Note

Note

Manual TLS setup (optional)

Important

Important

Superuser password

Ingest

Install as a service

Installation steps

Step 1: Run the installer

Step 2: Configure IIS

Note

Step 3: Configure the component

Important

Step 4: Register the extension

Configuration

Configuration properties

SymmetricKey

Elasticsearch connection

Important

IndexedCharacters

Warning

Authentication

OpenTelemetry configuration

Extension registration