Is it possible if someone types the name of an article which doesn't yet have any text that that person could be sent to a search page for that topic. Thus, if I type http://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schengen, instead of getting a page saying that this page doesn't exist, I would instead get the search results page? Would anyone else want this?
This is the behavior when you use the Go button: If the article exists, it is directly displayed, if it does not, the search results are shown. So if you want to pass along URLs which work as you describe, use an URL of this pattern:
http://www.wikipedia.org/w/wiki.phtml?search=Schengen&go=Go
with Schengen replaced by the article title.
Regards,
Erik