Although this post is older, I have discovered a simple solution for integrating it with Joomla 1.6 and wanted to share it. It involves a core hack, which may not be ideal due to potential issues during upgrades, but it is relatively straightforward to implement.
Many users, myself included, have been looking for a way to allow text entered in the search box on a page to generate results displayed on a blank page within the template, rather than having them appear alongside other content on the same page or being redirected to a separate search page via a menu item.
When utilizing a Search box within a Joomla! page to initiate a search, it is actually the 'component' part – as opposed to the 'module' – of Search that is being utilized. There is a specific section within the Search Component Controller that either assigns an ID for use with a menu or automatically directs the results to display on the requesting page itself. By disabling this feature, we can effectively direct the search results to a blank page.
In /components/com_search/controller.php, simply comment out the following code:
/* // set Itemid id for links from menu
$app = JFactory::getApplication();
$menu = $app->getMenu();
$items = $menu->getItems('link', 'index.php?option=com_search&view=search');
if(isset($items[0])) {
$post['Itemid'] = $items[0]->id;
} else if (JRequest::getInt('Itemid') > 0) { //use Itemid from requesting page only if there is no existing menu
$post['Itemid'] = JRequest::getInt('Itemid');
}
*/
Following this adjustment, your search results should now be displayed within the content section of a blank page in your template. This method worked successfully for me, and hopefully will work for you as well.