1. A server/client system for searching for digitized entities in a data collection comprising: an indexing input device for collecting basic information pertaining to at least one distinctive feature and at least one locator for each digitized entity in a set of entities from the data collection, an index database for storing index information relating to the digitized entities in the set, a search engine for receiving search directives and in response thereto performing searches in the index database, and a user client interface for receiving a search request from at least one user client terminal, forwarding the search request as a search directive to the search engine, receiving a hit list of digitized entities and returning a result of a corresponding search in the index database to the at least one user client terminal, wherein the index database is organized such that the index information for a particular digitized entity comprises at least one rank parameter, which is indicative of a degree of relevance for at least one distinctive feature with respect to that digitized entity.