Silobreaker Rumor
June 28, 2008
With Powerset off the search chess board, Really Simple Sidi asks, Will Silobreaker be the next information access vendor to be acquired? The question did not spring from thin air. Silobreaker executives have spoken with a number of companies about its technology. I will track Silobreaker more closely. You can read an interview with one of the company’s founders here.
Stephen Arnold, June 28, 2008
The Whale and the Walrus: Two Views of Sergey and Larry
June 28, 2008
The purpose of this essay is to describe the life trajectory of two technology-centric companies. I don’t want to mention the firms by name, but you may be able to guess which company is the whale and which is the walrus.
The whale is a big creature, a whale of a company. Wherever the whale goes, it gets its way. More accurately, the whale used to get its way. Now the whale is lying on its side near the Seattle waterfront close to upscale boutiques and a Starbucks.
The second is a walrus, now quite old for a semi-leviathan. The walrus prefers to sit on a rock not far from Half Moon Bay, soak up the sun and snag whatever fish get too close. The walrus prefers to conserve its energy. Oh, the walrus will stretch and sometimes roar. Most of the time, the walrus half sits, half reclines looking — well –disconnected from the world beyond the sand bar. The walrus has some new friends named Sergey and Larry.
Let’s look at three aspects of each creature and then think about the future of each powerful beastie.
The Whale
The whale is the largest mammal. Not surprisingly, the whale is never sure if a sucker fish is tagging along for a free ride. The whale is also not really aware of its surroundings. The whale sings and tries to find other whales, but whales get together once in a while. Think of it as a Warren Buffet cocktail party with only whales allowed. Otherwise whales think whale thoughts, oblivious to their world.
Our whales know that tiny creatures can annoy a whale, but tiny creatures rarely hurt a whale. This whale believes it is master of all the known universe. The trick is to stay away from tiny creatures with weapons that can make life difficult. Every once in a while, the whale can gobble a tasty morsel like Fast Search & Transfer. Life has been good, but the whale senses trouble in a restless ocean.
The Walrus
The walrus is tired. The old game of providing tips to lost dolphins and tuna is not working any more. So, the walrus kicks back and thinks about what might have been.
The walrus is old, and the new ways of finding young fish eager to learn the old ways are tiring. This walrus prefers to lay down, make some noise, and wait for the next meal. Think of this walrus living in an assisted-living facility. The real world is too unfamiliar. The walrus has two new friends, Sergey and Larry. Sergey and Larry bring the walrus fish once a day. Getting fish is better than catching fish. The walrus likes not working too hard. The rock is a fine place. The waves lapping the beach in Half Moon Bay sooth the walrus. The walrus changes position but does not move.
Interpreting the Two Stories
The whale is a company that is disconnected from the world beyond the ocean. The whale is, for the first time in its life, unnerved, maybe frightened. Sergey and Larry people have a different business model. Customers use software and information and an advertiser pays the bill. The whale wants to swat Sergey, Larry with its tail. Sergey and Larry dance out of the way. The whale is frustrated and getting tired carrying the old business model into every skirmish and chase.
The walrus is an old timer in the digital world. The spring and bounce have been weighted down by wild and crazy decisions. Walrus friends are leaving the walrus more and more alone. The walrus is isolated. The old ways have lost their zip. The walrus remembers reading about automobiles and buggy whip manufacturers. The walrus believes that he might become a wallet, maybe a pair of shoes. Change, however, is hard at the walrus’ age. The walrus stays where it is, moving to catch the rays of the setting sun. Sergey and Larry will bring another fish today.
The message is clear. The whale is going to fight to survive. The walrus has given up. Sergey and Larry have the ability to deal with both the whale and the walrus with equal aplomb.
Observations
Neither creature has many years left. You have to admire the fighting whale. Too bad its own weight and mass will sap his strength. Not much future unless the whale shed some pounds like Subway’s Jared, the tuna eater. The walrus has found a new best friend and does not want to work too hard. The walrus will gladly do what Googzilla says. Those free fish are really tasty, thinks the walrus.
And what about Sergey and Larry in their “we’re just guys” outfit. Sergey and Larry want to out think the whale. The walrus seems happy as long as he gets a couple of fish every day.
In the great theater of business, the whale and the walrus are sushi.
Stephen Arnold, June 28, 2008
More SharePoint Goodness
June 28, 2008
My posts about Microsoft SharePoint, the polymorphic content-collaboration-KoolAid system from Redmondians, are popular. A helpful but anonymous reader pointed us to useful information about how to figure out how much storage you will need for your SharePoint installation. Oh, you did not know that SharePoint storage needed special care and feeding. Well, once you get SharePoint up and running, you will become enlightened pretty darn quick.
Navigate to Sanjive Nair’s MSDN Web log here and download the text and the links. Believe me, trying to locate these on the Microsoft Web sites takes some serious work. Mr. Nair reviews the places where storage chokepoints typically occur; for example, your favorite database, SQL Server.
Mr. Nair addresses search as well. He writes:
Searching is extremely important for most portals. You would need to have a good understanding of your search requirements, while you are planning for capacity. Most importantly while planning for capacity you need to understand how much data will be indexed. While SharePoint can crawl and index Web Sites, Exchange folders, file folders BDC etc., the storage/search requirements may vary. For instance if you are indexing BDC content or large text files the index size may be larger compared to indexing Power Point files. By far in a SharePoint farm index server is the most processor intensive . So you need to provide enough processing power and memory to handle the indexing and crawling process. An Index server requires a Web Front Server which will serve the content while indexing. By default the Web Front End machines in your farm are set up to perform this task. However it may be beneficial to set up your index server as the Web Front End to perform this task, as it would avoid index server going over the network during the crawling process.
Mr. Nair provides a link to supplementary information which is a tough one to locate using Microsoft’s own search tools. The link to Microsoft’s search training videos is quite useful. I must admit that I did not watch any videos because system latency with my whiz bang Verizon wireless card prefers text to videos.
Kudos to Mr. Nair and a bowl of steaming burgoo when you come to Harrod’s Creek, high-technology center of Kentucky.
Stephen Arnold, June 28, 2008
SharePoint Placemat
June 28, 2008
Microsoft SharePoint got to know one another several years ago. Via referral, a Microsoft Gold Certified Partner wanted my team and me to run some tests on a SharePoint application. We got everything running, wrote our report, and the Gold Certified Partner was a quick pay.
After the project, one of my colleagues remarked, “SharePoint is really complex.” We put the idea aside until someone emailed us a SharePoint placement. A copy of this remarkable diagram is available if you want to look at it. You can find it in SharePointSearch.com here.
Here is a thumbnail of the full diagram, but I strongly urge you to download the diagram. Do you think it is a joke of some type? My colleagues and I saw something similar from a Microsoft partner in New Zealand a year ago, but this placemat is a triumph of sorts. The company preparing the diagram is Impac Systems Engineering.
The complexity of search in general and SharePoint in particular is an interesting topic. Search can be quite a challenge. One recent example is the inability of Internet Explorer to open a SharePoint document. You can read more here and download a fix here. Embedding search into a content and collaboration system with data management features may push the boundaries of software to their limits.
CleverWorkArounds.com has an essay called “Why Do SharePoint Projects Fail”. You can look at Part 5 here. I was unable to locate the other portions of this discussion, however. (Part 3 is here.) For me, there are three main points that address the issue of the almost-funny placemat diagram:
- The skills required to implement SharePoint include “IIS, Windows Server, TCP/IP & networks, SQL Server 2005 Advanced Administration, Firewalls, Proxies, Active Directory, Authentication, Security, IT Infrastructure Design, Hardware, Performance Monitoring, Capacity Planning, Workflow, IE, Firefox, Office Client tools, ASP.NET, HTML, JavaScript, AJAX, XSL, XSLT, Exchange/SMTP, Clustering, NLB, SANs, Backup Solutions, Single Sign on, Monitoring & Troubleshooting, Global Deployments, Dev, Test, Staging, Production – Staged deployments, ITIL, Vitalization.”
- “SharePoint is complex and the products it relies on are also complex. In the wrong infrastructure/architect hands, this can cause costly problems.”
- “… if there is not a certain degree of discipline around change management, configuration management, procedures, standards and guidelines to administrators, users, site owners and developers, bad things will happen.”
These points underscore the problem with “boil the ocean” systems. The fire needed to get water sufficiently hot to cook eggs can consume the pot, leading to a big mess.
Observations
I took another look at the placemat diagram and re read Part 3 and Part 5 of the essay “Why Do SharePoint Projects Fail?” Let me offer several observations from my dirt floor cabin in the hills of rural Kentucky:
First, SharePoint is a beast. Enterprise search is a monster. What will the progeny of these two behemoths be like? My opinion is that it will be tough to see through the red ink flooding some SharePoint projects. Toss in a hugely complex system such as Fast Search & Transfer’s Enterprise Search Platform, and you have a very interesting challenge to resolve.
Second, complexity is a Miracle Grow for consultants. SharePoint is complex, and it will probably only get more complicated. In my experience, Microsoft software becomes efflorescent quickly.
Finally, SharePoint attempts to deliver what may be a system that will be out of step with cloud-based services. SharePoint as a hosted or cloud-based service is generating some buzz. However, will the latency present in most on-premises installations be an issue when delivered as a service? My view is that latency, more than issues of security or data confidentiality, will bog down the SaaS implementation of SharePoint.
SharePoint is hugely successful. I heard that there are more than 65,000 licenses in North America alone. The SharePoint market is a tempting one for companies like Google to consider as one ripe for an alternative.
Stephen Arnold, June 27, 2008
ISYS Inks Deal with UK’s Solcara
June 27, 2008
After a wizard from the Australian National Police spoke highly of ISYS Search Software, I checked out Version 8 and named it a “vendor to watch” in my April 2008 study Beyond Search, which the Gilbane Group published. Today’s announcement (June 27, 2008) about its deal with Solcara gives the company additional presence in the United Kingdom. ITWeek, a very good source of information in my view, published Matthew Lake’s “Firms Team Up to Deliver Enhanced Enterprise Search Solution.” You can read the story here. The key point in the write up for me is:
SolSearch Indexer aims to deliver a comprehensive and cost-effective enterprise search solution, which combines federated search technology with an advanced indexing capability. According to Solcara, SolSearch Indexer benefits from an enhanced functional administrator interface, and can extract entities and concepts when indexing documents, web sites and databases. These entities and concepts can then be used to support more efficient navigation of indexed content.
I like the ISYS system because it makes it easy to create a custom index for a particular collection of content. No fuss. No muss. For the work that I do, I appreciate ISYS Search’s metatagging. In my tests, patent applications and technical papers pose some interesting challenges. ISYS performs with the best of a small group of systems that my team and I use on a consistent basis.
But the major point of the announcement for me was the pressure this move will bring on Autonomy, arguably one of the top two or three vendors of search in the world. Solcara is confident that its approach can meet the needs of customers who may be interested in an alternative solution. Solcara’s announcement will catch the attention of prospects and Autonomy, a firm able to direct laser-beam intensity marketing on the market.
I will monitor the Solcara search solution, say “Congrats!” to the ISYS team, and keep my eye on the response, if any, from Autonomy’s office in Cambridge.
Stephen Arnold, June 27, 2008
Microsoft Powerset: Is There a Role for Amazon?
June 27, 2008
On May 10, 2008, I offered some thoughts about Microsoft’s alleged interest in Powerset. You can find this bit of goose quacking here.
In case you missed the flurry of articles, essays, and opinion pieces, more rumors of a Microsoft Powerset tie up are in the wind. Matt Marshall ignited this story with his write up “Microsoft to Buy Semantic Search Engine Powerset for $100 Million Plus”. You must read this here. The most interesting statement in the essay is:
Google has generally dismissed Powerset’s semantic, or “natural language” approach as being only marginally interesting, even though Google has hired some semantic specialists to work on that approach in limited fashion.
My research for BearStearns last year revealed that Google has more than “some specialists” working on semantic issues. Alas, that document “Google’s Semantic Web: the Radical Change Coming to Search
and the Profound Implications to Yahoo! & Microsoft” is no longer easily available. There is some information about the work of Dr. Ramanathan Guha in my Google Version 2.0 study, but the publisher insists on charging people for the analysis of Dr. Guha’s five patent applications. Each of these comes at pieces of the semantic puzzle in quite innovative ways. If Dr. Guha’s name does not ring a bell, he worked on the documents that set forth the so-called Semantic Web.
So, Google is–according to this statement by Mr. Marshall not too keen on Powerset-style semantics. I agree, and I will get to the reasons in the Observations section of this essay.
The story triggered a wave of comments. You can find very useful link trails at Techmeme.com and Megite.com. The one essay you will want to read is Michael Arrington’s “Microsoft to Buy Powerset? Not Just Yet.” By the time you read this belated write up, there will be more information available. I enjoy Mr. Arrington’s writing, and his point about the Powerset user interface is dead accurate. We must remember that user’s are creatures of habit, and the user community seems to like type a couple of words, hitting the enter key, and accepting the first three or four Google results as pretty darn good.
Semantic technology is very important. Martin White and I are working on a new study, and at this point it appears that semantic technology is something that belongs out of site. Semantic technology can improve the results, but like my late grandmother’s girdle and garters, the direct experience is appropriate only for a select few. Semantic technology seems to share some similarities with this type of best-left-unseen experience from my childhood.
An Amazon Connection?
My interest in a Microsoft Powerset deal pivots around some information that I believe to have a kernel of truth buried in it. Earlier this year, I learned the Microsoft had a keen interest in Amazon’s database technology. Actually, the interest was not in the Oracle database that sites, like a black widow spider in the center of a Web, but in the wrapper that Amazon allegedly used to prevent direct access to the Oracle tables from creating some technical problems.
Amazon had ventured into new territory, tapping graduate students from the Netherlands, open source, specialist vendors, and internal Amazon wizards to build its present infrastructure. Amazon has apparently succeeded in creating a Google-like infrastructure at a fraction of the cost of Google’s own infrastructure. Amazon also has fewer engineers and more commercial sense than Google.
In the last 18 months, Amazon has pushed into cloud computing, Amazon Web services, and jump starting a wide range of start ups needful of a sugar daddy. I recently wrote about Zoomii.com, one innovator surfing on the Amazon Web services “wave”. You can read that essay here.
Microsoft needs a NASCAR engine for its online business. Microsoft is building data centers. But compared to Amazon and Google, Microsoft’s data centers are a couple of steps behind, based on my research work.
At one meeting in Seattle, I heard that Microsoft was “quite involved” with Amazon. When I probed the speaker for details, the engineer quickly changed the subject.
Powerset–if my sources are correct (which I often doubt)–is using Amazon Web services for some its processing. If true, we have an interesting possibility that Microsoft may be pulled into an even closer relationship with Amazon.
I am one of the people who thought that Microsoft would be better able to compete in the post-Google world if Microsoft bought Amazon. Now let me get to my thinking, and, as always, I invite comments. First, Microsoft would gain Amazon’s revenue and technical know how. Arguably these assets could provide a useful platform for a larger presence in the online world.
Second, Microsoft gains the cloud-based infrastructure that Amazon has up and running. From my point of view, this approach makes more sense than trying to whip Windows Server and SQL Server into shape. The Live.com services could run on Amazon or, alternatively, the whopping big Microsoft data centers could be used to provide more infrastructure for Amazon. An added benefit is that Microsoft–despite its spotty reputation for engineering–seem to me to be more disciplined than Amazon’s engineers. I have heard that Amazon pivots on teams that can be fed with a pizza. While good for the lone ranger programmers, the resulting code can be tough to troubleshoot. Each team can do what it needs to do to resolve a problem. The approach may be cheaper in the short run, but in my opinion, may create the risk of a cost time bomb. A problem can be tough to troubleshoot and then fix. Every minute of downtime translates to a loss in credibility or revenue.
SharePoint Life Saver… And It Is Free
June 27, 2008
If you love SharePoint but want to choke the life out of its native search features, take a deep breath and navigate to MSDN Web logs here and the article “Tuning SharePoint Search.” Ian Palangio earns a happy honk from the Beyond Search goose. He identifies a Microsoft document “SharePoint Search Evaluation Guide” and provides the magic page number which provides a starting point for some useful SharePoint search information. One useful example is forcing certain results to the top of a results list. He writes:
This allows administrators to define Best Bets for a specific keyword. For instance if somebody uses the search term “Leave” – then a best bet result that will be the top relevant one is the Leave Form. Keywords can also have Synonyms associated – so that Leave, Vacation, Holiday and Annual Leave all mean the same thing for search results.
Useful write up.
Stephen Arnold, June 27, 2008
Sirsi Dynix: Nudging Libraries toward Enterprise Search
June 27, 2008
Sirsi Dynix provides technology solutions to libraries. On June 25, 2008, Sirsi Dynix issued a news release that features a number of new features, including:
- Fuzzy search technology
- Improved search index updating
- Support for forthcoming community/social networking capabilities.
- such as user reviews, rankings and tagging and more in future releases.
One feature puzzled me. Sirsi Dynix asserts that it has a “search widget,” which provides a code snippet that can easily be cut and pasted in order to present an enterprise search box within existing Web pages. When I see the phrase “enterprise search” I do not think of library systems. Sirsi Dynix says that these functions will be available to users of the Sirsi Dynix online public access cataloging systems. Enterprise search systems have been, in my experience, segregated from enterprise search or behind-the-firewall search systems.
My recollection is that Sirsi Dynix uses technology from Brainware. An interview with one of Brainware’s senior managers appeared in ArnoldIT.com Search Wizards Speak series. The description of the Brainware system is interesting because Brainware’s system pivots on pattern matching. You can read the interview here.
A number of search-centric vendors are adding collaboration and social functions, which is standard operating procedure in the search business. Each new trend gets “bolted on” to the basic engine. Some vendors’ systems have become quite complex, and it is not clear how collaborative and social functions will mesh with basic search functions.
Stephen Arnold, June 27, 2008
Google: Big Rice Machine
June 27, 2008
To say that Google is really big is like saying New York City is a little seaside village. It’s a complete oversimplification. Posted in a blog at Managed Networks, the following analogy helped me get a better handle on a number too large to comprehend. Think of a single piece of data as a grain of rice. Google cooks 20 Petabytes of rice a day. That’s enough rice for every person on the planet to have 1,600 bowls each of the white stuff for dinner. Now that’s a San Francisco treat. You can read the original rice analysis here.
Jess Bratcher, June 26, 2008
Oracle: Girding for A Niche War
June 26, 2008
Superplatforms like IBM, Microsoft, Oracle, and two or three other firms with big ambitions have been drifting in the last three or four months. Oracle, fresh from record profits, seems to be lining up an assault force to go after the insurance segment of the financial services industry.
Oracle acquired Skywire Software, according to an Oracle news release dated June 23, 2008 here. Oracle did not disclose the terms of the deal, and in its official statement said:
Oracle announced it has entered into an agreement to acquire Skywire Software’s application software business. Skywire Software is a leading provider of insurance and document management business applications. With Skywire Software and the pending acquisition of AdminServer, Oracle is expected to accelerate the formation of the most complete software suite for the insurance enterprise to include Oracle’s database and middleware for technical infrastructure, Oracle applications to support general business and insurance-specific functionality, plus Skywire Software and AdminServer to further support insurance policy life cycle management. In addition, Skywire Software’s customer communication management and document automation capabilities will expand Oracle Enterprise Content Management.
Skywire makes “glue software”; that is middleware that hooks together people and information working for an insurance company. Some of Skywire’s products touch upon enterprise publishing, a domain that begs for a search-and-retrieval solution. The company also offers various analytic components, which brushes against the text analytics business. Agents, brokers, actuarial consultants, and employees use many different communication media, and the idea is to get a common system to minimize the inefficiency that is rampant in most insurance companies. You can learn more about Skywire’s content management, business process, and business intelligence systems here.
The company bought AdminServer in May 2008. This company provides management systems to help insurance companies herd ducks; that is, policies that could return more profit with better administrative tools to manage them. You can learn more about AdminServer here. Timothy Morgan does a good job summarizing the technical nightmare that many insurance companies face when trying to manage their policy data and then trying to figure out what opportunities or liabilities certain paper presents. (I know what you are thinking, “How can an insurance company not know about its policies?” The reason is that large carriers have dispersed and fragmented data sets, and most don’t have a way to look at the big picture quickly.)
These acquisitions add to the mind-boggling range of products and services already in the Oracle stable. When I read the announcement, several thoughts crossed my mind; specifically:
- Oracle, like IBM and Microsoft, seems to be moving toward offering tightly focused solutions that do not necessarily drag the Oracle database and Oracle applications along with them. My hunch is that these niche companies provide Oracle a way to call on a company and make a sale. An upsell to more Oracle products and services will come along later in the sales relationship. If this is true, Oracle’s overhead is going to go up. Most sales professionals with many products in their carpet bag sell what generates commissions. Specialty products require a dedicated sales force, and it may be tough to get high margins in a niche that other companies will sure chase.
- Confusion is likely to be an issue. Oracle’s marketing has, in my opinion, not done a good job of explaining what the company offers, the benefits of the often overlapping products, and how the different pieces of the Oracle puzzle fit together. Oracle runs the risk of diluting its brand and confusing its customers. IBM and Microsoft face this problem now, and I think both of these companies are better at marketing than Oracle.
- The price hikes that Oracle announced give the company room to negotiate. Intense pricing pressure is evident in the market, and I am not sure how niche products can priced to pay for the R&D, the marketing, and the sales work that is going to be needed to keep niche firms growing quickly. Niches run out of cash gas pretty quickly, and a cloud based solution seems a more practical way to address some of the wacky data management problems that shackle insurance companies.
Oracle has an opportunity to bundle search, analytics, and data management with Skyline’s and AdminServer’s products. The company has to prove that it can do more than collect niche companies the way my mom used to gather figurines of girls with flowers.
Agree? Disagree? Use the comment section to set me straight.
Stephen Arnold, June 27, 2006
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