Zoho Adds Search Function
June 2, 2010
Zoho offers a useful cloud service that delivers word processing, spreadsheet, and other business applications. If you are not familiar with Zoho, navigate to www.zoho.com and explore the service. You can sign up for free services and upgrade if you need additional features.
“Zoho Launches Zoho Search” caught our attention. Zoho has lacked a search service although there were work arounds. We would load a document and search for a string via the Firefox search function. Tedious, but it worked because we did not have many documents stored in the Zoho cloud.
According to the write up:
Zoho Search can search across user content in Zoho Mail, Zoho Docs, Zoho Writer, Zoho Sheet, Zoho Show, Zoho Notebook, Zoho Discussions and Zoho Accounts. Eventually, Zoho Search will let users search all Zoho applications. Zoho Search displays results from all applications in a single screen, grouped together based on their associated application. Users can view additional results from each application category. Zoho Search also categorizes the results based on commonly used or known facets — termed as “Guided Navigation” or “Faceted Search” — such as application name, document type, author, etc., enabling users to easily and quickly navigate to the exact result they are looking for. The results reflect Zoho Search’s deep knowledge of the applications searched. For instance, search results that include an email from Zoho Mail will include the email folder, date sent, sender information, etc. (Zoho Search lets users search multiple mail accounts, including POP accounts.) Zoho Search will also know if the sender is on the user’s buddy list and, if so, online and available to chat via Zoho Chat. Zoho Search completely understands the permissions and privileges that users have in each of the Zoho applications while searching. For example, documents shared with or by the user, forums the user belongs to, groups/organizations the user is a part of, and access rights to documents (i.e. read-only, read-write). This ensures only relevant data is shown to the user.
No word on whether the system is home grown, open source, or based on commercial software. As information becomes available, we will pass it along. One phrase suggests that Endeca may be involved. The phrase “Guided Navigation” is fiercely protected by Endeca’s legal eagles. Its use in a news story provides some food for thought. Either Zoho is using the phrase without permission, or Endeca is the third party provider.
Stephen E Arnold, June 2, 2010
Freebie
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