Commonsense Conclusions from Azure Consultant

June 26, 2014

An azure chip consultant explains that enterprise search is just what the doctor ordered for big data; Gartner declares that “Enterprise Search Can Bring Big Data Within Reach.” Um, it seems that search is kind of implied in the term. What good are data and data analysis if there is no way to find and use the information? Actually, research director Darin Stewart is talking about gaining the benefits of big data without the cost and turmoil of “overhauling the data center,” which, apparently, some folks don’t understand is an option. He writes:

“Providing big data functionality without overhauling the data center is achievable with a two-pronged approach that combines augmented enterprise search and distributed computing. Search is very good at finding interesting things that are buried under mounds of information. Enterprise search can provide near-real-time access across a wide variety of content types that are managed in many otherwise siloed systems. It can also provide a flexible and intuitive interface for exploring that information. The weakness of a search-driven approach is the fact that a search application is only as good as the indexes upon which it is built….

“Distributed computing frameworks provide the environment necessary to create these indexes. They are particularly well-suited to efficiently collect extremely large volumes of unprocessed, individually low-value pieces of information and apply the complex analytics and operations that are necessary to transform them into a coherent and cohesive high-value collection. The ability to process numerous source records and apply multiple transformations in parallel dramatically reduces the time that is required to produce augmented indexes across large pools of information.”

The article goes on to point out that cloud-friendly open-source tools to support such a framework are readily available. Stewart shares a link to his Gartner document on the topic (registration required), and is scheduled to speak about it at Gartner’s Catalyst Europe conference, held in London in mid-June.

Cynthia Murrell, June 26, 2014

Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, developer of Augmentext

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