Enterprise Search Sourcebook 2008

COMMENTARY few items presented in their searches. The abilities to tune relevance to provide the right results and to promote certain results to expected queries are important features of an enterprise search tool. Internet search engines rank relevance based upon link analysis. Pages that are frequently linked to on the internet are ranked as more relevant. However, enterprise applications are typically stovepiped, with no interlinking, so this method does not work for enterprise search. One method used to establish relevance for enterprise search is called “progressive relaxation.”When a particular search result is found, it is evaluated based on where it appears in the document. If the word or phrase appears in the Title metadata field, it is ranked very high. This ranking algorithm establishes relevance and combines the relevance with content from other repositories. In many cases, a single search will return a term used in many contexts. So, in addition to relevance alone, enhanced search capabilities include the ability to cluster results in context and to use metadata, such as names, dates, and content location, to sort or filter results. These capabilities help users refine their intentions and find the right results set from a very simple search. 6. Federation Some applications and repositories have their own indexes. So, rather than re-indexing the content, performance is enhanced if enterprise search can federate to those indexes. The act of indexing content takes processing resources from the application’s server. To avoid using those valuable cycles, there is often a tradeoff between how often to index and how up-to-date the index should be. But if one system is already indexing the content, there is no reason to index the content again if federating searches to it can leverage that first index. Each system has its own way of dealing with federated results. One method is called “suggested content.” Suggested content allows you to federate to external search engines and then segregate the results so that they are presented apart from the other search results. The results can be combined with a style sheet to control presentation. In the case of suggested content, it is up to the application to ensure security using single sign-on authentication. 7. Personalization Enterprise search results can be improved greatly by incorporating personal information into the results process. By relating individual searches to the searches of a line of business or network, you can gain the benefits of automatic relevance boosts when peers select specific information and search terms. At the same time, a user’s history of choices can guide the current results list. 8. Search-as-a-Service Enterprise search solutions should offer a full range of integration options, including a service-oriented architecture. This has some advantages: By making your enterprise search solution available through web services, other applications can run searches, get results, and present the results in that application’s context. A variety of systems—a call center system, a portal, an intranet site, etc.—can tap into your enterprise search services and present results to system users. As a pervasive, underlying technology, search as a service can provide a way to unify your IT infrastructure. 9. Enterprise Scale and Scope As you consider enterprise search, consider the scope of the problem search addresses as well as the scale of information search will retrieve. Be prepared for the scope of your enterprise search solution to grow. As you consider what needs to be searched, you will also find new uses and new users for your search technology. With new users comes a question: Should you choose separate search tools for different uses, or can you use a single search solution to address these different applications? This issue relates to the scale of the search implementation. A single enterprise search solution may be able to address different use requirements, but it must also be able to scale to the needs of your enterprise. If the search cannot scale, your desire to create a unified search will be replaced with the cost of supporting multiple redundant searches. You should also consider the languages used in your organization. Is your organization global? If so, you may need a search solution that can address the needs of speakers of specific languages and/or support multilingual search. 10. Support Finally, consider the issue of support. Where enterprises have deployed a unified search, they have discovered that this capability grows in importance and value to become a mission-critical component of their success. As you consider enterprise search, you now need to consider a search vendor that can address the requirements of multiple repositories, multiple authentication schemes, security, reliability, and results management while delivering the support associated with business critical IT tools. And One for the Road Total cost of ownership is a key evaluation point for enterprise search. Estimates of hardware as well as software costs should be included. You will find that some search engines are much more frugal in terms of processing requirements, and therefore your hardware costs will be lower, resulting in a lower total cost of ownership. By combining this frugality with the ability to securely connect to your vital applications and repositories, you will realize a rapid return on investment and greater overall customer satisfaction in terms of performance, comprehensiveness, and relevance. BRIAN DIRKING has been in the electronic publishing industry for more than 15 years. Formerly director of business development for Stellent, Inc., he is now principal product director at Oracle Corp. WWW.ENTERPRISESEARCHCENTER.COM 23 http://WWW.ENTERPRISESEARCHCENTER.COM

Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of Enterprise Search Sourcebook 2008

Enterprise Search Sourcebook 2008 Contents Editor’s Note Publisher’s Note Findings and Figures Why Enterprise Search Will Never Be Google-y Searching for Search Usability Your Users Are Talking to You What’s Your Search Story? Search Is Dead—Now What? Delivering on the Promise of Enterprise Search Taming Multiple Search Engines in Your Organization Enterprise Search: Trends for 2008 Enterprise Search Seen From the Inside Open Source Search: Elixir or Poison? Avoiding the Big Mistakes in Search Semantic Search Takes Root in the Enterprise E-Discovery Essentials: The Rules You Need to Know SharePoint Search: An Enterprise Contender? Integrating Security Into Your Enterprise Search Infrastructure Engineering a Better Search Infrastructure Letting End Users Ask the Questions, Stat! The Power of Knowledge Legal Research Using Enterprise Search: A Developer’s View From Treading Water to Full Steam Ahead Pulling Out All the Stops With Midas A Natural Search Solution An Incremental Approach to Improving Enterprise Search The Enterprise Search Sourcebook Showcase Directory Index to Advertisers and Companies Mentioned

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