The Search Service is not Online

I got this message trying to start SharePoint search for querying via-stsadm. As it turns out, Search service has to be running prior to setting the propagation location that will be used for querying.

So now, I firstly start the Search service:

stsadm –o osearch –action start –role query –farmcontactemail someone@somewhere.com –farmperformancelevel reduced –farmserviceaccount domain\SharePointSearch –farmservicepassword p@ssword1

Once Search has been started successfully, I run the command again with the propagationlocation switch:

stsadm –o osearch –action start –role query –farmcontactemail someone@somewhere.com –farmperformancelevel reduced –farmserviceaccount domain\SharePointSearch –farmservicepassword p@ssword1 –propagationlocation E:\SharePoint\Query

SharePoint would automatically share the location with the Search account being granted write access.