Looking for some advice on how to search for things on my site.

I have created a site for guitar and song writing and have started to put up my own tabs I have done, scales and chords. From this I have noticed that the info is quite large. On other types of site I have seen something like an a to z at the top and a search box to search for files. Could someone point me in the right direction on how to start going about this.

I know its prob quite a large topic and I'm not expecting anybody to do it for me or try to explain it all just a good site or previous post that could help explain what I need to do.

Thanks

I think you should add a Google search bar on your site. that should do it. get the html code from google and put it on your site and change it according to your needs

And the server side code that could be used is?

Is the content in a database or in text tiles?

do you use a CMS that may already have a search feature available?

If you enter a term in the Google Sites search box, you can search across all the site's content and attachments. In addition, Google Sites offers multiple search options:

• Search across multiple sites (not just the current site). For example, a team site might configure the search box to search its own site as well as related team sites to increase the relevant content searched.
• Search across the entire domain. An intranet site might change the search box to search across all sites in the domain.
• Search using a Custom Search Engine. A wiki site, for instance, might offer an option for a particular topic to search using a Custom Search Engine which includes third- party sites on the same topic.
• Search using a Google Search Appliance. For example, an intranet site might power the search box with a Google Search Appliance which also crawls additional applications behind the firewall.
  * To configure this, just copy and paste the URL from a results page from your Google Search Appliance; Google Sites will extract the necessary configuration options from the URL.

If there is just one provider enabled, the site displays the search button only. If there are multiple providers, a drop-down list appears, so people who visit your site can select what type of search they want to do.
To enable search options for your site, follow these steps:

1. From the More actions menu, select Manage site.
2. Click Site layout, then click the Configure search button.
3. Select Advanced.
4. Click Add provider, select a provider from the dropdown menu, and specify a name.
   * To search across multiple sites, select each site from the Sites to include dropdown menu, and click Add site.
   * To use a Google Custom Search or Google Search Appliance, provide the URL of a search result page. Since the search term is replaced, you may simply search for "test" within your search appliance or custom search engine and use the resulting URL, resembling: https://mysearch.mydomain.com/search?q=test
5. Click OK to add the search provider.
   • If you want to make your new search provider the default search, follow these steps:
     • Navigate to the General tab.
     • From the By Default Search dropdown menu, select your new search provider.
6. Click OK, then click Save Changes to save the search settings for the site.
7. Click Return To Site to test the search box.

I you are using wordpress you can add a plugin. You can try "custom search engine". This is very useful. There are choices on how will it search your site. Some example are using tags,categories, post title and custom field.

You can see sample on my blog that i am doing ryt now.

visit: blog.sexypinoy.net

If you don't want to pay alot for a programmer and don't have a CMS plug-in you can try Pico Search. Pico Search is a search function template created for any website all you would have to do it place the javascript on your site and its done. You can customize the result page to your websites look and feel so the client won't think they left your site.
You can also customize the algorithm and other options of your website for each search done.
http://www.picosearch.com/

google is the best, and most people gravitate towards that as well. good luck!