Box Adds Search
March 28, 2009
“Manage and Share Your Files at Box.net” was Box’s catchphrase. Now the company makes it easy to add search too. Box.net has debuted a full-text content search for a few select Box business customers. Plans call for a roll-out to all business customers over the next few weeks. You can see a screenshot of a search screen at https://enterprise.box.net/shared/msc75ujxxz. Files searched may include TXT, PDF, CSV, and Microsoft Word, Excel and PowerPoint files, as well as Box Web documents and file descriptions you wrote yourself. It’s a step up from search file and folder names and tags. You can learn more about Box at http://www.box.net/company/partners.
Jessica Bratcher, March 28, 2009
Google and Semantics
March 27, 2009
IEEE Journal has an unusual write up “The Unreasonable Effectiveness of Data” in its current issue here. The authors are an interesting crew and include three heavy hitters at the GOOG; namely, Drs. Halevy, Norvig, and Pereira. Second, the subject is semantics. Google’s view of semantics appears to be somewhat richer and more subtle than the semantics of Microsoft’s Powerset in my opinion. The authors begin with an equation, a somewhat light hearted one and conclude with a romp through disambiguation. In between these two slices of wheat, the Googlers cram a number of hints that the data management world is about to change. Is this an important write up? It sure is. How important? If you think the Codd database model is a bit long in the tooth, this essay hints that it may be put in the barn and turned into a collectible. What can one do with a resolution to the issues the good doctors touch upon? Reinvent the approach to data management perhaps? A happy quack to the reader in the UK who sent this item to me.
Stephen Arnold, March 27, 2009
Google: No Human Customer Service
March 27, 2009
Quite an interesting post and even more interesting sequence of comments about Google Checkout here. The headline is arresting, “Google Is Evil, Worse than PayPal: Don’t Use Google Checkout for Your Business.” For me the interesting point is that fully automated systems make decisions that Google cannot explain. My take on this issue is that if one depends upon Google Apps, for example, for a service, is a customer vulnerable to a unilateral and inexplicable termination of the business relationship with Google. If the allegations in this article “Google Is Evil…”, the GOOG may have to revisit its policies. Terminations are justified. Not knowing why a termination of service occurred is not in my opinion.
Stephen Arnold, March 27, 2009
SharePoint and Indexing a Business Data Catalog
March 27, 2009
SharePoint user? If so, you may want to read and save “Business Data Catalog (BDC) incremental Crawls and How to Test” here. The article understates the performance issues but provides some useful tips. For me, the most important comment was:
But how does the indexer know which BDC records have changed? For it to know this we have to implement a property in our Entity called the __BdcLastModifiedTimestamp. Nice name huh! Now a small admission also. Whenever we describe the IdEnumerator method we always say that it only returns the primary key fields for an entity. This is generally true – except for when you want to implement an incremental crawl. If you want to do this, your IdEnumerator method must also return a DateTime field that will indicate to the indexer when it was last modified. The indexer can then compare this to the previous LastModified value it holds and if it is different, it can index the entire row of data.
If this seems like a bit of extra work for a routine task your are correct. Updating an index should be a click or two, then the system happily ensures that the index is fresh. SharePoint is a work in progress. I assume that when Fast ESP is available, these strange manual workarounds will no longer be needed. One can hope for the basics.
Stephen Arnold, March 27, 2009
Edgios Emerges
March 27, 2009
For fans who keep a search scorecard, you can now add Edgios. Cnet reported today that the stealth company is moving to the sun light. The story “Search Startup Edging Close to Prime Time?” is here. According to Cnet, Edgios wants to reinvent search. For me, the most interesting sentences in the write up were:
Edgios is bringing you the future of search. This doesn’t just involve a bigger index. And it’s not just a way for us to deliver you the same old results more cheaply. We’re re-inventing web search, opening up the entire process, fundamentally democratizing the discovery of information. Do any of the big search engines let you control what goes into the search index? Do they rank search results according to what real people want? No, they don’t. But Edgios does.
According to my goslings in Kentucky, Edgios is a distributed, peer to peer search engine. You can get a bit more detail here. Now on the watch list.
Stephen Arnold, March 27, 2009
Yahoo: To Catch a Google
March 27, 2009
Yahoo wants to leverage its technology and serve its users. To improve on both points, Yahoo—according to PaidContent.org here—has tested 141 versions of its home page. Advertisers may wonder if 141 variants are necessary. I would be happy if I could read the text and get to my email without the unnecessary news display. My view: too much clutter and unnecessary cycles. Improving search would be helpful too.
Stephen Arnold, March 27, 2009
Microsoft and the Secret Cloud
March 27, 2009
I am in Houston and several people asked me about the story “Microsoft Criticizes Drafting of Secret ‘C loud Manifesto’”. I looked for the document and located a version here. If something is secret, I find it hard to get excited about a secret that has been exposed. The secret document is now in the wild. This is a matter for the company and its own controls. My view: irrelevant matter to me.
Stephen Arnold, March 27, 2009
Google Glitch Rationalized
March 27, 2009
Google has become a chatty Cathy of late. An interesting and insightful l example is “How Google Routes Around Outages” here. Writing in Data Center Knowledge, Rich Miller’s summary of a conversation with Googler Urs Holzle provides some information about the recent Gmail outage. For me, the most interesting comment by Mr. Holzle was:
There are several different layers of “routing around” problems – a failing Google File System (GFS) chunkserver can be routed around by the GFS client automatically, whereas a datacenter power loss may require some manual intervention. In general, we try to develop scalable solutions and build in the “route around” behavior into our software for problems with a clear solution. When the interactions are more complex and require sequenced steps or repeated feedback loops, we often prefer to put a human hand on the wheel.
There are other interesting factoids in the write up. Useful information. However, Gmail went down. This is the issue, not what Google does to stay online.
Stephen Arnold, March 27, 2009
Knowledge Management and the Royal We
March 26, 2009
Here in the hollow, the goslings and I don’t have a knowledge management system. Without knowledge, the effort to implement document repositories and collaborative information sharing systems seems silly even for a goose.
I was interested in a Harvard Web log post called “When Knowledge Management Hurts” by Freek Vermeulen. You can read the knowledge-infused essay here. The core of the article is research by academics about the value of having a knowledge management system. For me the big idea in the write up was this passage:
But they proved themselves wrong; to their surprise they found that the more internal electronic databases were consulted by these teams the more likely they were to lose the bid! Likewise for seeking advice from colleagues. This effect was especially pronounced for very experienced teams. These consultants were much better off relying on their own expertise than trying to tap into experiences by others, whether it was in the form of electronic assets or external advice.
I wanted to point out that the present business and financial crisis may suggest that in some MBA fueled organizations common sense seemed to be in short supply. Sure why not play hunches. Guessing seems to be a bit of an about face because business schools have chanted data for many years. I wanted to point out that costs are indeed an issue.
I won’t. I will call attention to the royal we the author uses. I feel suitably surflike.
Like the economists whose thoughts complement academics who consult, the present financial climate speaks more eloquently than I can honk like a black swan.
Stephen Arnold, March 27, 2009
Independent Not Googley
March 26, 2009
I find this story difficult to process. On one side is the adorable Google. On the other is the dead tree outfit, The Independent. The bone of contention is expressed in “Google ‘Trying to Smear Street View Critic’”. You may be able to read here. The argument was:
Simon Davies, director of Privacy International, believes Google is trying to discredit the complaints he has registered about Street View by briefing against him to journalists.
The article mentions a couple of firms who might be pounding the salt shaker. Interesting turn of events for Google’s implementation of the A9 store front service, which seems to have disappeared.
Stephen Arnold, March 27, 2009
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