Exalead and JasperSoft
May 10, 2010
I found Matt Asay’s “Open Source Support: Can It Scale?” quite interesting. First, Jaspersoft is an open source business intelligence company. The article points out that Jaspersoft uses Exalead’s technology to deal with “documentation, internal and external wikis, [a] Salesforce.com case management system, and the JasperForge.org community site”. The write up said:
JasperSoft helped alleviate the problem by deploying Exalead CloudView. Geise [JasperSoft executive] was able to create a unified search box for JasperSoft’s support reps that examines all of JasperSoft’s disparate data sources. He estimates that the improved support boosted efficiency by more than 40 percent, a finding that is consistent with Aberdeen research. Not bad. So, maybe this is a way forward for open-source vendors that don’t want to sell proprietary extensions in an open-core model. I suspect, however, that improved support operations will remain just one piece of the overall story. No matter how efficient one can make support, there are still far more efficient and profitable models out there. (Google, anyone?)
I am not confident that Google delivers a commercial-grade service despite the firm’s continued investment in its enterprise products. Anyone try to call Google recently?
What struck me as important is that a large open source outfit tapped a commercial company for making disparate content accessible via a cloud service. I find the tie up interesting. The promise of Google after 11 years—well, it has been 11 years hasn’t it?
Stephen E Arnold, May 10, 2010
Exalead’s new business development specialist bought me a tea on Tuesday, May 4, 2010. I am such a deal.
Azure Chip Search Consultants and the Goose
May 10, 2010
Remember the seventh grade. Charles Dickens, his Tale of Two Cities, this quotation:
It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair, we had everything before us, we had nothing before us, we were all going direct to Heaven, we were all going direct the other way- in short, the period was so far like the present period, that some of its noisiest authorities insisted on its being received, for good or for evil, in the superlative degree of comparison only?
Setting: I am at a fancy reception, standing in a corner, tucking my tail feathers beneath me. I shivered in fear as I watched the attendees mingle. To my surprise, an azure chip consultant approached me. I had two additional azure chip encounters, but I will encapsulate my observations into this single ur-azure trope. I even have a logo I envision when I think about the azure chip search consulting crowd.
Source: http://media.photobucket.com/image/losers/lupe318/LOSER.jpg
Conflict: The topic was, “Why are you picking on me / us?” As readers of this * free * (and “free” is an operative adjective) Web log, I comment on the “findings” of azure chip consultants.
Quote to Note: Conan the Comedian on Google
May 9, 2010
Quite a quote in “Conan O’Brien at Google: The World Has Completely Changed.” Here’s the passage I jotted down:
“You guys are so power mad here at Google, You’re such entitled A-holes. Hey, Conan’s in the area, make him come by… Do a dance.”
I wonder if Sid Caesar’s observation is accurate: Comedy has to be based on truth. You take the truth and you put a little curlicue at the end?
Stephen E Arnold, May 9, 2010
Freebie from the humor vault.
UK Lags US in eDiscovery
May 9, 2010
Here’s my view from the mine run off pond: When products and services don’t sell, companies with alleged grievances can turn to litigation. The idea is that a court may produce some cash in tough times. Governments get in the game as well. Pile on some regulations and then cut the weak ones from the herd. There may be some revenues to squeeze from regulated outfits who get confused or stumble over the big letters of the law.
I read “Recommind Research Shows UK Companies Not Ready for e-Disclosure”. The key passage in the write up for me was:
As it happens, Simon Price was here in Oxford last Friday, showing me predictive coding in Recommind’s e-Disclosure product Axcelerate eDiscovery. I do not spend much time actually looking at applications, but the rate at which they advance on the problems means that even I am in danger of losing touch with what they are capable of doing. Who, you wonder, would court the risk and expense which appears from those recent judgments when applications like this exist to mitigate the risk? The answer appearing from Recommind’s survey is that most corporations of more than 1,000 employees court that risk.
Will Recommind’s data motivate UK organizations to hop on the eDiscovery bandwagon? I know that losing and paying are useful cattle prods. Are the data valid? I will leave that to you.
Stephen E Arnold, May 9, 2010
Unsponsored post.
Netflix, Cloud, and Search
May 9, 2010
I read “Netflix’s Movie Cloud Is Moving into the Amazon Cloud” and learned a couple of things and was unable to find one item of information I sought. The news, of course, that Amazon will host a competitor’s business. Not too surprising in these days when AOL hires a Google manager and a Microsoft person to be chief technology officer and when Google is imitating Bing’s user interface.
The two things I learned in the article were:
- The move apparently was a result of open information sharing. That’s a positive. But I wonder if those confidentiality agreements that Booz, Allen & Hamilton made grunts like me sign have gone the way of the dodo.
- The Amazon-Netflix system works.
What I wanted to find out was the answer to this question, “Has the search function been moved to the Amazon cloud as well?” If so, how does that work. I heard that Netflix used open source search technology. A cloud based open source search implementation is very big news. I will keep hunting and stay on the tips of my webbed feet when colleagues ask questions.
Stephen E Arnold, May 9, 2010
Unsponsored post.
ZyLAB, SharePoint, and XML Content Archiving
May 9, 2010
ZyLAB has been a frequent visitor to my newsreader in the last week or so. The company is hopping on the rich media bandwagon with podcasts. That’s okay, but I am not a rich media goose. The idea of a serial information intake session is not too appealing to this old waterfowl. I leave the videos to the much smarter, more agile wizards, the new masters of the financially-challenged universe.
What did catch my attention was a news item in German called “Microsoft SharePoint-Paket von ZyLAB unterstützt jetzt auch Wikis und Blogs”. The idea is that ZyLAB’s technology and Microsoft SharePoint mesh together. Of particular interest to me is that the ZyLAB product now supports wikis and blogs. ZyLAB has nosed into the XML space as well with its storage service. With ZyLAB an already happy SharePoint customer will be able to extend that goodness with:
- Search of scanned documents in different languages
- Tap the benefits of XML storage of SharePoint content.
- Eliminate the need for additional SQL Server licenses
One interesting feature is that in eDiscovery some SharePoint documents can go missing. The ZyLAB system can create a SharePoint archive with a comprehensive content set.
More information is available at www.zylab.com.
Stephen E Arnold, May 9, 2010
Unsponsored post.
Google Triggers Whines
May 8, 2010
Because Google is offering customers a great deal and they are responding, naysayers on the side are showing a little jealousy. eWeek’s Google Watch recently revealed this not so flattering side of their self in the article, “Why Google Is So Tough on the Competition”. Referring to Google as the “Google Creep” and charging that “traditional enterprise search products such as Vivisimo and Endeca are loaded on-premises and suck up a lot of computing resources”, it is obvious they aren’t huge fans. These comments were made from a very non-subjective standpoint with no evidence or facts to bear them true. The obstacles Google has to overcome to prove them wrong aren’t insurmountable and their customer base continues to grow. It will be interesting to see how this plays out over time.
Melody K. Smith, May 8, 2010
Note: Post was not sponsored.
Monitoring Google via Patent Documents, Definitely Fun
May 8, 2010
As soon as I returned from San Francisco, it was telephone day. Call after call. One of the callers was a testosterone charged developer in a far off land. The caller had read my three Google studies and wanted to know why my comments and analyses were at variance with what Googlers said. The caller had examples from Google executives in mobile, enterprise apps, advertising, and general management. His point was that Google says many things and none of the company’s comments reference any of the technologies I describe.
I get calls like this every couple of months. Let me provide a summary of the points I try to make when I am told that I describe one beastie and the beastie is really a unicorn, a goose, or an eagle.
First, Google is compartmentalized, based on short info streams shot between experts with sometimes quite narrow technical interests. I describe Google as a math club, which has its good points. Breadth of view and broad thinking about other subjects may not be a prerequisite to join. As a result, a Googler working in an area like rich media may not know much or even care about the challenges of scaling a data center, tracking down SEO banditry, or learning about the latest methods in ad injection for YouTube advertisers. This means that a comment by a Google expert is often accurate and shaped for that Googler’s area. Big thinking about corporate tactics may or may not be included.
Second, Google management—the top 25 or 30 executives—are pretty bright and cagey folks. Their comments are often crafted to position the company, reassure those in the audience, or instruct the listener. I have found that these individuals provide rifle shot information. On rare occassions, Google will inform people about what they should do; for example, “embrace technology” or “stand up for what’s right”. On the surface these comments are quotable but they don’t do much to pin down the specific “potential energy” that Google has to move with agility into a new market. I read these comments, but I don’t depend on them for my information. In fact, verbal interactions with Googlers are often like a fraternity rush meeting, not a discussion of issues, probably for the reasons I mentioned in point one above.
Third, Google’s voluminous publicly available information is tough to put into a framework. I hear from my one, maybe two clients, that Google is fragmented, disorganized, chaotic, and tough to engage in discussion. No kidding. The public comments and the huge volume of information scattered across thousands of Google Web pages requires a special purpose indexing operation to make manageable. I provide a free service, in concert with Exalead, so you can search Google’s blog posts. You can see a sample of this service at www.arnoldit.com/overflight. I have a system to track certain types of Google content and from that avalanche of stuff, I narrow my focus to content that is less subject to PR spin; namely, patent documents and papers published in journals. I check out some Google conference presentations, but these are usually delivered through one of Google’s many graduate interns or junior wizards. When a big manager talks, the presentation is subject to PR spin. Check out comments about Google Books or the decision to play hardball with China for examples.
My work, therefore, is designed to illuminate one aspect of Google that most Googlers and a most Google pundits don’t pay much attention to. Nothing is quite so thrilling as reading Google patent applications, checking the references in these applications, figuring out what the disclosed system and method does, and relating the technical puzzle piece to the overall mosaic of “total Google”.
You don’t have to know much about my monographs to understand that I am describing public documents that focus on systems and methods that may or may not be part of the Google anyone can use today. In fact, patent documents may never become a product. What a patent application provides includes:
- Names of Google inventors. Example: Anna Patterson, now running Cuil.com. I don’t beat up on Cuil.com because Dr. Patterson is one sharp person and I think her work is important because she is following the research path explained in her Google patent documents, some of which have now become patents. In my experience, knowing who is “inventing” some interesting methods for Google is the equivalent of turning on a light in a dark room.
- The disclosed methods. Example: There’s a lot of chatter about how lousy Wave was and is. The reality I inhabit is that Wave makes use of a number of interesting Google methods. Reading the patent applications and checking out Wave makes it possible to calibrate where in a roll out a particular method is. For that reason, I am fascinated by Google “janitors” and other disclosures in these publicly available and allegedly legal documents.
- The disclosures through time. I pay attention to dates on which certain patent documents and technical papers appear. I plot these and then organize the inventions by type and function. Over the last eight years I have built a framework of Google capabilities that makes it possible to offer observations based on this particular body of open source information.
When you look at these three points and my monographs, I think it is pretty easy to see why my writings seem to describe a Google that is different from the popular line. To sum up, I focus on a specific domain and present information about Google’s technology that is described in the source documents. I offer my views of the systems and methods. I describe implications of these systems and methods.
I enjoy the emails and the phone calls, but I am greatly entertained by my source documents. My fourth Google monograph, Google Beyond Text, will be available in a month or so. Like my previous three studies, there are some interesting discoveries and hints that Google has reached a pivot point.
Stephen E Arnold, May 8, 2010
Sponsored post. I paid myself to write this article. Such a deal.
Google and Its iPhone Play
May 8, 2010
With the Nexus One’s weak initial sales, many have been tempted that Google, typically a steamroller in any area they take on, has faltered. But not so, says “Five Lessons for Google from Nexus One’s Sluggish Start.” It’s merely a test run, “a sort of inspired experiment, a laboratory for Google to get a taste of the mobile-handset business, up close and personal.” While Google has confirmed that it is the first of many Android handsets, the article does caution: you can’t sell phones like computers, and in the complex ecosystem of mobile phones, marketing is important. One thing the capital G did get right was “earning developer goodwill” – sales going to the programmers, handing out free handsets, and using the early adopter feedback to debug. Even Adobe employees get free Google phones. As Google tries to replicate the Apple ecosystem, the company finds itself trying to close the gap on a competitor with a significant lead. Despite the push into media, Google may face the “we can’t get there from here” pressure that has plagued other companies. Google has entered a new era. It is no longer competing in an space with little or no competition. Google is right in the thick of media initiatives where there are smart, strong, and aggressive market powers. Is Google’s management up to this challenge? Will the math club approach triumph over the theatre club? The other angle is that Google seems to be aiming its Hummer toward tracks worn in the consumer forest by others. Seem that was to you?
Samuel Hartman, May 8, 2010
Note: Post not sponsored.
Walls: Their In and Out Functions
May 8, 2010
In college, one of my courses featured lectures by a fellow named Smythe, Daniel Smythe, I believe. He was a Robert Frost scholar and had spent time with the poet doing odd jobs. I was never sure whether he cleaned the pasture spring or shoveled out the barn. I do recall having to read and discuss a poem about a stone wall that kept falling over or was shoved out of the way by my neighbors who wanted to shoot small animals with their weapons in the adjoining field.
After 40 years I recall
Something there is that doesn’t love a wall,
That sends the frozen-ground-swell under it,
And spills the upper boulders in the sun,
And makes gaps even two can pass abreast.
My thought as an addled goose was, “Apple, the New York Times, and Rupert Murdoch are obsessed with walls. Pay walls, registration walls, and walled gardens are among the types about which I hear much chatter.
After some dancing around in synonym and metaphor weeds, the Bobster[my name for Mr. Frost] concludes:
“Good fences make good neighbors.”
I think T shirts with this slogan will be distributed by Apple, the New York Times and Rupert Murdoch. I definitely will want one. (Do you think the T shirts will have a footnote pointing to the Bobster’s support of the wall thing?)
I read the UK Telegraph article “Adobe: Apple Wants to Turn the Web into a Walled Garden.” For me the hot passage was:
[Kevin Lynch, Adobe CTO] went [on] to say: “We’re facing a time where there are some who want to wall off parts of the web and need to have approval. I don’t think that’s the role of a company. Apple is playing this strategy where they want to create a walled garden.” Lynch compared Apple’s decision to put up technological barriers to railroads in the 1800’s. “It’s like railroads in the 1800?s. People were using different gauged rails. Your cars would literally not run on those rails. That’s counter to the web. The ‘rails’ now are companies forcing people to write for a particular OS, which has a high cost to switch. We need people to compete on the merits of the things they do, not on the gauge of the rails.”
The old addled goose is tired from inputs from 20 somethings, one of whom regaled me with enough baloney to keep a Chicago school lunch room in sandwiches for a decade. Let’s think about this wall angle.
First, walls mean control. Prisons mostly rely on walls. What happens in prison can be pretty exciting. I have watched a couple of the prison reality shows with titles along the line “Prison Tattoos for You” and “Street Gangs and MBAs: A New Male Bonding Opportunity.”
Walls are good if you own the prison, control the toll road, or have enough lawyers to frighten a Las Vegas street gang with a fondness for spray paint. For those who don’t own walls or have “wall power”, walls can be annoying.
There can be bad stuff behind walls. Examples range from control of the TV set, the color of the prisoners uniform (an Arizona sheriff allegedly likes pink overalls), and a chance to make friends with the delivery people. That is really good friends with the delivery people. Walls, therefore, don’t mean safe, clean, crime free, or fair. Walls mean an attempt at control. Other operative terms include lock in, lock down, lock up, and the hole. The “hole” is a bit like being at Google and not having any access to MOMA I have heard.
The interest in walls is one more step toward the Middle Ages of Information. I would not be surprised that in order to protect revenue, content, or jobs executives adopt some new clothing styles. I was thinking armour, tasers, and iPads would complete the outfit. Togas could be used to keep these goodies out of sight but close at hand.
Will the Middle Ages of Information override the Wild West along the Internet superhighway? Some folks are going to try.
Control and money are tasty chunks of kibble in my opinion. Search is easier too. Put a wall around your world and you have a shot at knowing who enters, what is there, and who does what. Oh, power. I forgot power. Did I mention money? Oh, money. And don’t forget the hendecasyllabic verse. The Bobster was into rhyme, not crime. Fences. Ambivalent maybe?
Stephen E Arnold, May 8, 2010
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