Beyond Search » Search

Survey Finds Trust in Governments Sharply Eroded

Stephen E. Arnold — Sat, 11 Feb 2012 14:23:27 +0000

From the “we don’t know if this is accurate” department:

If you’re a government and need a reason for censorship, look no further than RT’s “People Let Down by Government Turning to Social Networks.” The write up reveals:

The Edelman Trust Barometer has found that people around the world have lost trust in their governments over the course of the last year. . . . Among the main causes for such a downturn, [Edlelman CDO Robert] Phillips said, is the dispersion of authority and the rise of social media.

The annual survey asks residents of 25 countries about their feelings on government, businesses, and non-governmental organizations. This is the sharpest drop in trust in the US and European governments the company has found since beginning these surveys a dozen years ago. Instead, folks are placing their confidence in peer networks.

Could social media be a threat to the untrusted? If so, perhaps censorship is a comin’ round the mountain. Yep, here she comes. And one cannot search if the information is not in the indexes, right?

Cynthia Murrell, February 11, 2012

Sponsored by Pandia.com

Don’t Panic! Relax, SharePoint Is Easy with the Right Knowledge

Stephen E. Arnold — Sat, 11 Feb 2012 05:54:34 +0000

Let’s say you’re an IT professional, but you were just given your first SharePoint project. You have a general knowledge of the collaborative content platform, but not enough to tackle a project blindly. The most important thing is to not panic, take a deep breath, and check out CMSWire’s article, “Wrapping Your Head Around the SharePoint Beast.” The title rings true for many professionals who have never handled the content behemoth before. The article reads more like an advice column for handling personal problems than SharePoint, but then again you could apply the advice to your romantic relationship.

Moving on to the article’s meat, we are advised to learn SharePoint’s basic structure. Take a look at the code, visit the farm, and then migrate over to learning platform basics. You’ll be useless as a developer unless you know how the product works. Also don’t forget that the Internet provides a bevy of SharePoint communities willing and eager to provide support and talk shop.

Here’s what I take as the best advice:

Any developer who wants to stand above the fray will invest time and effort into learning the different options for SharePoint development and when to use each option. You don’t need to be an expert in every option, but you should at least know there’s a better way.

It’s true that there are many ways to arrive at the same solution and some of them are better than others. Learn what works best for different types of problems. Another thing that new SharePoint people won’t know is that the out-of-the-box search platform isn’t the best. SurfRay’s Ontolica Suite is an option if professionals are seeking a high-quality IVP search partner. It doesn’t require any programming. All you have to do is configure it in the administrator interface and it is automatically deployed to users with the options for custom searches, filters, search suggestions, and much more.

Whitney Grace, February 11, 2012

Superheroes and Sidekicks: PLM Implementation in Gotham City

Catherine — Sat, 11 Feb 2012 05:14:10 +0000

BAM! POW! BOOM! The most famous superhero with a sidekick certainly is Batman and Robin. Stephen Porter of Zero Wait State thinks there is a sidekick to the PLM superhero who is often forgotten. His blog post The PLM State: Don’t Sleep on Robin – the Hidden Value of Project Management focuses on the importance of the project management role.

Porter suggests that impeccable planning and project management is necessary for any successful PLM implementation.

“Marrying vision with discipline is the optimal approach for deploying strategic solutions like PLM. The marriage of purpose and goals with the pragmatism of execution keeps things from being too ambitious and ensures that the project will be completed in a reasonable amount of time.”

Without Robin – a.k.a. the project man – there is “no balance and things go awry.” He is the key to making sure everything goes as planned.

Attention to detail and precise planning are the keys to success – with or without superpowers. In fact, that is what PLM is all about. Some companies like Inforbix are taking it a step further. With their data access solutions, Inforbix offers manufacturers those details that make all the difference. Their software is quick to deploy, easy to use and affordable for all. Forget Batman and Robin, it sounds like Inforbix is Superman!

Jennifer Wensink, February 11, 2012

Learn How To Fix the Most Common SharePoint Mistakes

Stephen E. Arnold — Fri, 10 Feb 2012 05:54:45 +0000

It has been a while since I have written about a top ten list, ladies and gentlemen, but I am so glad that I found another SharePoint top ten list to share with you. The list comes from SharePointProMag.com, it is by Todd O. Klindt, and the title is, “Top 10 SharePoint 2010 Configuration Mistakes—And How to Fix Them.” What I like about this article already is that instead of simply listing the mistakes Klindt has given us the solutions, so we can also use this piece as a repair manual as well. It starts off with a basic mistake: “Scrimping on SharePoint’s RAM or Hard Disk Space.” We all know the solution for that one. Moving on we find the usual advice about only following basic setup models, using a single account, running apps in separate pools, and caching.

Here’s one I haven’t considered, however:

Mistake #10: Not Pointing Your SharePoint Servers at Themselves

When SharePoint works, it is magnificent. When it doesn’t work, it can be a nightmare to fix. For this reason, anything you can do to ease troubleshooting is time well spent. To that end, I make sure that every server in the SharePoint farm points to itself for all web apps. If I get sporadic reports about SharePoint not responding, I can easily use RDP to log into each server and try to pull up SharePoint. If this attempt works, then I know that the server is working. If SharePoint does not come up, then I know in exactly which Microsoft User Location Server (ULS) logs to look for the relevant errors.

It makes sense when you think about it, but the logical answer isn’t something we usually think about first. It reminds me about telling end users to restart their computer to fix a problem. It’s the easiest thing to do, but not many do it. I am surprised that Klindt didn’t mention augmenting SharePoint’s out-of-the-box enterprise search with a heftier product. SurfRay’s Ontolica Enterprise Search is a SharePoint search enhancement that can be deployed across many departments and configured to each department’s individual needs. Similar to the impracticality of using only one SharePoint account to administer all activity, Ontolica can be altered to fit any and all search and permissions structures.

Whitney Grace, February 10, 2012

When Disaster Strikes – Loss of a SharePoint Farm

emily — Fri, 10 Feb 2012 05:14:35 +0000

Most SharePoint developers and administrators have nightmares about losing their content. Any number of things can go wrong when one deals with fragile electronic data storage and retrieval. Quite frankly, it is a miracle that data disasters do not strike more often. Our blog author, Paul, describes his terrifying account in “Five Things I Learned From Losing My SharePoint Farm.”

He recounts his thoughts and actions immediately after the loss:

I went home and made the first sensible decision of the evening. I went to bed. Partly I thought I should stay up and work on the problem but I was shattered and I wasn’t going to solve anything in the state I was in. When I woke up – at 5:00AM, screaming – I got to work and thankfully by midday I had the farm back in a working state and all the data accessible. During those painful hours I learned 5 valuable lessons that I thought were worth sharing for relative newcomers – like me – to SharePoint.

Paul goes on to suggest some practical solutions so that others do not suffer his same loss. Ideas include regular SQL backups and details documentation that is stored outside of the SharePoint installation itself, outside being the operative word there.

Many organizations are turning to smart third party solutions to help make the backup and restore process much simpler. Add automatic backup to the features of the Cloud and SharePoint administrator nightmares could be greatly reduce in frequency and severity.

One alternative that many organizations are turning to is Fabasoft Mindbreeze. Their comprehensive suite of solutions can stand alone or compliment an existing SharePoint infrastructure. Particular attention is given to their backup and restore options here.

Emily Rae Aldridge, February 10, 2012

Sponsored by Pandia.com

Oracle’s PLM Summit Focuses on Profitability

Catherine — Fri, 10 Feb 2012 05:14:16 +0000

The 3^rd Annual Oracle Agile Product Lifecycle Management Summit just wrapped up in Santa Clara, California. The focus this year was to Optimize Your Product Value Chain for Increased Profitability.

The attendees were introduced to “trends, challenges and best practices that are helping organizations to:

Accelerate innovation through ideation management and collaboration, product portfolio management and analytics, data consolidation and cleansing, and a rich enterprise product record.
Design for supply with product cost management, outsourced manufacturing and product collaboration, product supply risk analytics, and spend consolidation.
Align the value chain through integrated portfolio and business planning, enterprise quality management and analytics, accurate and clean product data publishing, and rapid product commercialization

There were general sessions discussing everything from profitability to optimization; as well as break out session and industry focus groups.

Oracle is not the only company “turning innovation into a competitive advantage.” Technology companies like Inforbix may not be as big, but are offering companies, big and small, the same advantages. Inforbix is designed to simplify data access, increase profitability, and yet be affordable for manufacturing companies of all sizes. Who knows – may be next year Inforbix will be holding a summit of their own!

Jennifer Wensink, February 10, 2012

A Corner for Helpful SharePoint Info

Stephen E. Arnold — Fri, 10 Feb 2012 05:06:41 +0000

Johnny’s RIA Corner publishes some valuable information, like “Fast Tips for FAST for SharePoint #2.” However, we have to say that the site wins the Hard-to-Read-SharePoint-Information Award. The inverted colors are really hard on the eyes, especially in articles with multi-colored code. Please, Johnny, consider fixing this trendy problem.

The article mentioned above shares a couple of query tips. The write up states:

When trying to query for a document that has a question mark (?) in its name or address as part of a FQL query, you may notice weird behavior from FAST. . . . Sending the query as is, will cause FAST to automatically evaluate the question mark as a wildcard character that will match any single character. Since this is not our desired result, we need to tell FAST not to use wildcards in our specific string.

The code changes for achieving this feat is included in the post.

Cynthia Murrell, February 10, 2012

Sponsored by Pandia.com

Managing an Online Reputation

Stephen E. Arnold — Fri, 10 Feb 2012 05:01:26 +0000

Zimbio calls our attention to the judgment of the Web with “Monitoring Tools for Management Reputation Online.” (As evident in the title, the piece seems to have originally been written in a language besides English, one in which the adjectives come after the nouns. Keep that in mind when reading it.)

The freewheeling nature of the Internet, at least for now, means that anyone can go online and say anything about any person or company. It is the wise business that monitors and manages its online reputation. Besides working to remove or bury negative information, companies should make the effort to promote their brands online in a positive light.

The write up asserts:

Thus management reputation Internet, reputation web or reputation online with the help of e-reputation enterprise and cleaner nets not only saves the name from being violated on the Internet but also has the tendency to create business for those who have their e-reputation handled very carefully.

This is a very brief piece, with imbedded links that point to French online reputation management company Zen-Reputation. (Ah ha, French! That explains the sentence construction.) Whether through this company or a competitor, though, paying attention to their Internet image is a good idea for many companies. What happens if someone posts something unfavorable and links aggressively to that write up? Good question.

Cynthia Murrell, February 10, 2012

Sponsored by Pandia.com

Lucid Imagination Dives into the Cloud

Stephen E. Arnold — Thu, 09 Feb 2012 21:02:17 +0000

Continuing to reap the benefits of investment in open source, Lucid Imagination has just launched its cloud contender. Marketwire reports, “Lucid Imagination ‘Search-as-a-Service’ Powers Flexible, Cost-Effective Enterprise-Wide Data Discovery.” Like the company’s enterprise version of LucidWorks 2.0, the cloud-based version builds on Apache Lucene/Solr. The write up explains:

“LucidWorks Cloud helps businesses of all sizes conquer even the most daunting data and business quandaries by rapidly firing up cost-effective, flexible, and scalable enterprise search applications that help users find the information they need, when they need it. More than 30 companies used the pre-release version of LucidWorks Cloud, shaping the new product to meet even the most rigorous demands of cloud-based enterprise search.”

Both versions of LucidWorks add a lot of features to their open source foundations, like an improved user interface, monitoring and reporting tools, and an open connector framework that bridges to alternative data sources.

Founded in 2007, Lucid Imagination focuses exclusively on Apache Lucene/Solr search technology. Eight out of the 30 core committers to that open source project work for Lucid. The company also offers free developer software. Many of its clients around the world are huge household names, like AT&T, Ford, and The Smithsonian, to name just a few.

Cynthia Murrell, February 9, 2012

Sponsored by Pandia.com

Bing on Social Search Controversy between GOOG and Facebook

Stephen E. Arnold — Thu, 09 Feb 2012 05:15:56 +0000

Bing finally speaks up about its social search advantage; surprising, since the company has somehow been flying under the radar recently with the controversy surrounding Google privacy and social networking.

Liz Gannes from AllThingsD.com interviewed Bing Search director Stefan Weitz regarding social data and search results in the article, “Bing–Which Has Deals With Facebook and Twitter–Finally Speaks on Social Search Controversy.” In the interview, Weitz states that social search has positively impacted the Bing experience and attributes that impact to the company’s attention to people. Weitz also comments on capitalizing on the debate around Google’s privacy and social settings. The article states:

“They [Google] are doing a nice job on their own of handling this problem. But they are learning just like we are. They did what we didn’t want to do, which was make the user experience peppered with this stuff, with +1s everywhere, the Google+ content in the top corner. I think [Google] realized we were ahead and they overextended. But I know a ton of guys there and they’re smart and they’re reacting to what has been said.”

I struggle to see exactly how Microsoft is different than Google on this issue. Instead of pressing the company’s own network (like Google using Google+,) Microsoft is using Facebook and Twitter in the same regard. Bing has just been a little slower about incorporating social data into its search results—according to Weitz, this is because making sense of social signals is complex.

I think making sense of this social search contention is possibly even more complex. Is there too much ego and testosterone in the social locker room?

Andrea Hayden, February 8, 2012