Yahoo and Semantic Search
March 14, 2011
I thought Yahoo was into Bing.com search. Bing.com, of course, has semantic functions galore. But Yahoo?
You can learn about Yahoo and its view of semantic search at “Be a Part of the Next Wave of Web Search.”
Unlike companies rolling out a new product or service, Yahoo is running a competition. The requirements? Here’s a snippet:
… the competition calls for participants to answer queries varying
in complexity, based on a set of structured data collected from
the Web. The results will be presented at the 4th International
Workshop on Semantic Search, co-located with the World Wide Web
Conference 2011 in Hyderabad, India.
Sounds good. Will Microsoft engineers enter? Will there be some Googlers?
Yahoo seems to think that semantics are going to help users cope with Web content and improve relevance. Semantic methods will help filter, cull, and hone information. Yahoo’s goal is to make search more useful. via semantics.
But what about that Bing.com tie up? What about Microsoft’s semantics from Powerset to Cognition Technologies?
Micheal Cory, March 14, 2011
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Protected: SharePoint Scalability Articles
March 14, 2011
Google Speeds Tweet Information
March 14, 2011
If you can say one thing about Google is that it likes to do things for itself. Soshable reports “Forget Indexing Tweets: Google Is Pulling Them Directly from the API.” Google launched Caffeine last year as a tool for real time web indexing with a heavy influence on social media.
Google used to display tweets from people’s accounts, but now we have learned the company is linking directly to Twitter’s API, thus reducing latency. Our source said:
“Most tweets are eventually indexed – some within minutes, some within hours or even days. These Tweets are being presented in their raw form prior to being indexed. The Tweets themselves are not being used in search results through this new method. They will be indexed separately and can then appear in searches as their own listings, but this is different. Just as with Google’s “Real-time” search, this feature is a fire hose.”
Once tweets are indexed they can be added to search results as individual listings. One might think this is a new endeavor, but it’s not. It’s only a quicker way for Google to provide real time information, but it is fact to keep in your frontal memory.
Google continues to make speed a differentiator. In addition to reducing latency for Twitter content, the Chrome Version 10 browser has been positioned as “faster” as well.
Whitney Grace, March 14, 2011
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Google Reinvents the Management Wheel
March 14, 2011
I used to work at Booz, Allen & Hamilton and I have done work over the years for other traditional management consulting firms. One thing about MBAs: Most of the folks from the top 20 schools have a shared base of business and management baloney. Mention a buggy whip and MBAs will shout, “Automobile seat covers.” Mention money and some will say, “Investment banking.” At Booz, Allen, at whatever level I was pegged in that pre-break up, blue chip outfit, I have to fly on a different plane. The idea was that if my plane went down, the project team would survive. Just slap in another person with the pedigree and the client would not know the difference. Think of replacing a Lego block when one goes missing.
I read in my hard copy of the New York Times the story “Google’s Quest to Build a Better Boss.” You can for a short time, I think, find a version of the story online at this link. (When I checked the link, I saw an ad for the Economist. Wow.)
What caught my attention was the verbiage about how Google applied its analytic method to figure out what makes a good boss. Now keep in mind that Google has lots of employees and is in the process of getting a new boss, Larry Page. I don’t think Mr. Page has worked at a sweat shop like a former blue chip management consulting firm, but that’s okay. The Googler human resources unit has generated a list of what a manager must do to be successful.
Surprise. A manager does not have to be a programmer. Got it. I have worked for some very astute managers over the years. None was a programmer. There was an aeronautical engineer, a retired three star general, a nuclear engineer, and a liberal arts major whose father founded a must-have magazine in the 1940s. Management is different from technology management in my opinion. Running an R&D operation that implements learnings from AltaVista.com experiences is one thing. Avoiding trouble with the European Commission, the Justice Department, and next door neighbors like Oracle and Apple is a different kettle of python scripts.
Now Google has identified that there are eight attributes that a manager has. Most of these fall into the buggy whip category, but for the New York Times and for Google, the eight are new. Please, read the eight tips and check off which of them you know. I particularly like the one that suggests one fit into a team and listen to colleagues. Helpful that one.
Several questions and comments from the goose pond:
- If Google had implemented these management tips, would the company have avoided the brain drain to Facebook?
- With a different management approach, would Google have been able to devise an approach to certain markets that would keep the company in China?
- Using the eight techniques, would Google be able to provide customer support to licensees of the Google Search Appliance to expand and extend that product’s reach? Someone told me that Google has placed upwards of 30,000 Google Search Appliances since the product’s launch? (I estimated that the actual GSAs in use was under 10,000, but what do I know? Competitors target GSA licensees as high potential prospects.)
My view is that the management method of “controlled chaos” does not work. The eight rules for management strike me as an admission that a different and more traditional approach to management is needed at Google. The big question, “Is it too late?”
If Google’s forthcoming Facebook competitor does not work, my hunch is that Google may need to rethink a number of processes. The methods of the MBAs might come in handy. Google does not have to go beyond this query. Just my opinion from Harrod’s Creek this fine morning.
Stephen E Arnold, March 14, 2011
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Google Android Malware Factoid
March 13, 2011
No idea if this is spot on. Fascinating example of what happens when controlled chaos blends with a Microsoft-like approach. The source is “The Walled Garden Has Won.” Here’s the factoid:
It [Malware] infected more than a quarter of a million devices before Google intervened.
I use a clumsy BlackBerry. No fear of malware. I bought one app, installed it, and it killed my phone. Now I check mail and use the phone as a phone. Life is simple in Harrod’s Creek, Kentucky.
Stephen E Arnold, March 13, 2011
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Topsy on Top for Real Time Search
March 13, 2011
Last year I was involved in several real time search projects. In 2009, I was writing about real time search in my Information World Review column. There were many players and quite a bit of excitement. However, the cost and challenges of coping with flows of information updated in a low latency work flow winnowed the field. I continue to use itPints.com and Topsy.com. Both are quite good. In “Topsy Raises Another $15M for Real-Time Search” we learned that Topsy – well – raised more money. Here’s the passage we liked:
Topsy isn’t just offering a consumer service. It recently launched Topsy Social Modules, which allow publishers to add real-time content to their websites (you can see a sample module above), and Topsy Social Analytics, which helps businesses see what’s becoming popular on social networking services.
With the real time thing and social, we rely on Topsy for some of our more interesting research. Think about individuals who work to keep a low profile. Topsy outputs some useful links. If you have not tried the system, give it a whirl. Highly recommended.
Stephen E Arnold, March 16, 2011
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Google: More on Reverse Engineering
March 13, 2011
In Harrod’s Creek, we don’t have much technology. The notion of reverse engineering is, therefore, not one talked about at the River Creek Inn. We have been thinking about Google’s interest in reverse engineering and are not sure how that discipline fits into some of Google’s initiatives. Google’s patent applications reveal a remarkable fertile range of innovations.
We revisited some of the write ups about Google’s purchase of Zynamics. We liked Search Engine Journal’s ”Google Buys German Reverse Engineering Company.” Here’s a key passage:
“Zynamics is a company specializing in…understanding and manipulating software that doesn’t have available source code. While this can technically mean closed-source software with hidden code, it far more commonly means malware. This is best shown in the Zynamics lineup of products, which includes BinDiff (dissects executable files), PDF Dissector (looks through PDF files for malicious software), BinNavi (looks through binary code), and BinCrowd (a database for reverse engineering data).”
We thought about science fiction. If any of our readers have watched Star Trek, Star Gate, or Dr. Who, they’re familiar with the concept of reverse engineering. Generally, it comes up on these shows when a piece of advance technology ends up in the past. The advanced technology is then reversed engineered and the bad guy uses it to his advantage. The heroes show up, save the day, and then continue with their adventures.
So does this make Google the good or the bad guy? Maybe they’ve assimilated Zynamics to help fight malware and install their research in the Chrome Browser and OS. Or have they simply run out of ideas and need reverse innovation? I know the “doing no evil” phrase is not used too much, and at lunch, my colleagues and I were not able to speculate with confidence. We did agree that tools are tools. Exciting, right?
Whitney Grace, March 12, 2011
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Aster Data Snagged by Teradata
March 13, 2011
The food chain is a metaphor that can be applied to the business world without much imagination. The Register’s story, “Teradata Snaps Up Aster Data for $263m” demonstrates how the larger predator eats the smaller. Teradata learned that it needed a company that would rein in its clustered parallel database. Aster Data Systems was sniffed out and after a swift, painless hunt involving $263 million, Teradata swallowed its prey.
Aster Data’s nCluster software is a hybrid row and column database that runs on parallel clusters. They also have a patent-pending SQL-MapReduce product that is a hybrid of normal data warehousing of structured data and organizer of unstructured data. (For some insight into Aster Data’s approach, you can read the September 22, 2010, interview with Quentin Gallivan in the ArnoldIT.com Search Wizards Speak subsite here.
The Register story stated:
“Aster Data has been peddling its big data analytics software on Dell’s cloudy PowerEdge-C boxes as an appliance. Teradata also uses Dell iron to build its flagship Enterprise Data Warehouse (EDW) clustered appliances, so Aster and Teradata already have that in common.”
The tie up should prove interesting for two reasons. First, Teradata has some traditional data management technology and methods. Aster Data is one of the new breed of data management companies. Second, large firms are slow to change so working out the social aspects may require some cycles as well. But the deal looks like a good one and is another indication that data management is a hot sector.
Whitney Grace, March 13, 2011
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Land Podcast
March 13, 2011
ArnoldIT.com sponsors a podcast by Dr. Tyra Oldham. The subject of the podcast is green engineering, technology and management. You can listen to the most recent podcast by navigating to http://www.landsds.com/podcasts . For more information about Dr. Oldham’s capabilities, navigate to http://www.landsds.com/.
Stephen E Arnold, March 13, 2011
Study of Enterprise Search
March 12, 2011
Research vendors, magazines owned by consulting firms, and dozens of “experts” just keep explaining why search is an issue. I find these reports fascinating because each purports to explain what enterprise search is, provide profiles to six, 12 or in this case more than 30 vendors’ products. The information involves opinion, surveys, and rehashes of previous reports. I am old enough (66) and jaded from more than three decades of laboring in the online vineyards to view these reports with a curious frame of mind and amusement.
You can get a synopsis of a longer report in the Information Week story “Go Rogue with Enterprise Search.” What? “Go Rogue?” Before I read the four part article I wondered how a key function like finding an electronic document or other information object is “rogue.” My understanding of rogue is “a deceitful or unreliable scoundrel” or the Australian horror film about tourists who are pursued by a giant crocodile.
Source: Graph Jam, where consultants often get their graphs. http://graphjam.memebase.com/upcoming/page/2531/
Search or finding needed information is too important to be slapped with the “rogue” moniker. But that is my opinion, and you may well find that “rogue” is the perfect description for what enterprise search has become in today’s marketing-centric world. Like other enterprise applications, the software system may be difficult to put under a simple, clear explanation of what happens upon installation.
Please, read the Information Week story and sign up for the full report.
Here’s my view of three key points in the write up.
First, here’s a factoid that I don’t understand.
Despite more than a decade of product development aimed at helping companies find information across their networks, a paltry 22% of the 433 business technology professionals polled in InformationWeek Analytics’ Search 2011 survey have purchased the technology. That’s down from 24% in our 2008 survey.
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