Drink the Sweet KoolAid Cloud
February 7, 2014
The cloud assists businesses with users on the go as well as people who are dealing with the inevitable device crash. Amazon fully embraced the opportunities the cloud presented and debuted Amazon Web Services. Now, according to Maureen O’Gara of Sys-Con Media, “Mark Logic Leverages Amazon” with a new layer of cloud services.
MarkLogic Corporation adds a new level of cloud services, starting with its MarkLogic Server and it will allows customers to use its widgetry on a pay-per-hour basis.
Users will have the chance to take advantage of the features MarkLogic offers:
“The patented server, also certified on VMware’s virtualization platform, which lets users implement clouds on self-managed hardware, is generally used for custom publishing, search-based applications, content analytics, unified information access, metadata catalogs and threat intelligence systems.
It provides state-of-the-art features such as location awareness, real-time search and a shared-nothing cluster architecture that supports high performance against petabyte-scale databases.”
After uploading the cloud services, what will both Amazon and Mark Logic learn from the new cloud offerings? How will the clients learn to adapt the software for new uses? The sky is the limit and the clouds have hundreds of new experiences to try out.
Whitney Grace, February 07, 2014
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, developer of Augmentext
Out of Healthcare and Into Information Management
December 19, 2013
MarkeLogic has been working on the Healthcare.gov project (not going to touch that hotbed of live wires) and according to Database Trends and Applications the company has a new deal: “Applied Relevance Introduces Information Management Application Optimized For MarkLogic 7.” Applied Relevance developed Epinomy version 7 that is specially geared towards MarkLogic 7. CEO and founder of Applied Relevance George Everitt stated that Epinomy offers an advantage due to its tables, texts, and triples. This makes Epinomy prime for big data management, because of its approach to linking and tagging information, i.e. the tables and texts and then leveraging them with triple store technology for a high-speed experience.
“ ‘The table is the structured information, and it is the traditional BI kind” of information. Text is the traditional enterprise text kind of information. MarkLogic does both of those exceptionally well,’ said Everitt. ‘The third is triples – the metadata – the glue that holds those two together. What we provide with Epinomy is a way of creating and managing taxonomies, ontologies, and other data structures that are represented in linked data so that you can apply those to both the structured and unstructured environments, and get value from both of them using the triples as an underlying semantic mechanism.’ “
Information managers are given more control over their data by allowing them to build ontologies from scratch. Metadata and auto tagging will keep the data organized with quick retrieval and accurate search.
MarkLogic is mostly known in the publishing industry, which is riddled with unstructured data. The company has been gaining attention in financial services. Epinomy will give MarkLogic the boost it needs to prove that it can handle numbers as well as words.
Whitney Grace, December 19, 2013
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, developer of Augmentext
The Future of Search: Incomprehensible Visualizations?
November 24, 2013
I have watched time shrink in the last 50 years. I recall having time in my first job. I did not feel pressured to do the rush rush thing. Now, when I accept an engagement, the work has to be done in double time in half the time, maybe faster.
As a result, reports have to be short. Graphics have to point out one key point. Presentations have to be six or eight PowerPoint slides. Big decisions are made in a heartbeat. The go go years were the slow slow years.
I took a look at Kantar Information Is Beautiful Awards. I think I saw the future of search. Users want information presented with Hollywood style visuals. Does it matter that the visualizations are incomprehensible? I don’t think so. Style takes precedence over clarity. I can visualize senior managers telling their colleagues, “I want graphics like these Kantar winners in my next PowerPoint.”
Here’s a winning visual.
Source: http://www.informationisbeautifulawards.com/2013-winners/
The confusion of clarity with visual zing is interesting. As search vendors struggle to find a formula that generates top line revenue growth and yields net profits, are visualizations like the Kantar winners the future of search? I think the answer may be, “Absolutely.”
Vendors are not sure what they are selling. Whether it is BA Insight’s effort to get LinkedIn search group participants to explain the key attributes of search or other vendors slapping on buzzwords to activate a sales magnet, search is confused, lost maybe. Coveo is search, customer support and more. MarkLogic is XML data management, search, and business intelligence. Amazon, Google, IBM, and Microsoft search does everything one would want in the way of information access. Open source ElasticSearch, LucidWorks, and Searchdaimon are signaling a turn into the path that proprietary Verity blazed in 1988. Vendors do everything in an all out effort to close deals. Visualization may be the secret ingredient that gives search focus, purpose, and money.
Why not skip requiring a user to read, analyze, and synthesize? Boring. Why not present a predigested special effect? Exciting. Everyone will be happier.
Decisions making seems to be in a crisis. Pictures instead of works may improve senior managers’ batting averages.
Relying on incomprehensible visuals to communicate will be more fun and prove to be more lucrative. I assume audiences will applaud, cheer, and stomp their feet. Conferences can sell popcorn and soft drinks to accompany the talks.
Go snappy graphics. Will I understand them at a glance. Nope.
Stephen E Arnold, November 24, 2013
Database Ranking Includes Search Engines
November 24, 2013
I read “DB-Engines Ranking.” What struck me is that search engines were included in the list. More remarkable, some of the search systems are not data management systems at all. One data management system bills itself as a search engine. I was surprised to find the Google Search Appliance listed. The system is expensive and garners only basic support from the “search experts” at Google.
Let me highlight the search related notes I made as I worked through the list of 171 systems.
- At position 12 is Solr. This is the open source faceted search engine that can be downloaded and installed—usually.
- At position 21d is ElasticSearch. The person who created Compass whipped up ElasticSearch and made some changes to enhance system performance. With $39 million in venture funding, ElasticSearch can be many things, but for me the company does search and retrieval.
- At position 27 is Sphinx Search. This system makes it easy to retrieve information from MySQL and some other databases without writing formal SQL queries.
- At position 38, MarkLogic is the polymath among the group. The company bills itself as enterprise search, XML data management system, and business intelligence vendor. The company also enjoys some notoriety due to its contributions to the exceptional Healthcare.gov project.
- In position 44 is the Google Search Appliance. The system is among the most expensive appliances I have examined. Is the GSA an end of life project? Is the GSA a database system? My view is that it is a somewhat limited way to get Google style results for users who see Google as the champion in the search derby.
- At position 104 is Xapian. Again, I don’t think of Xapian and its enthusiastic supporters as card carrying members of the database society. For me, Xapian evokes thoughts of Flax.
- At position 124 is CloudSearch. Amazon’s somewhat old fashioned search system. Frankly I think of Amazon as more of a database services outfit than a search outfit.
- At position 127 is the end of life Compass Search. This was the precursor to ElasticSearch. There are those who are happy with an old school open source solution. Good for them.
- At position 149 is SearchBlox. Now SearchBlox uses ElasticSearch. Interesting?
- At position 163 is SRCH2. This vendor is one that has some organizational challenges. The focus of the company seems to be shifting to mobile search.
Quite an eclectic list. Some of the systems mentioned are search engines; for example, Basho Riak. In terms of list “points”, ElasticSearch looks like the big winner. Shay Bannon made the list with Compass. ElasticSearch is moving up the charts. SearchBlox uses ElasticSearch in its product. What happened to LucidWorks and reflexive search?
Which of these systems would you select for data management? My thought is that one should check out the software before taking a list at face value.
The confusion about search is evident in this list. No wonder the LinkedIn discussion groups want to do surveys to figure out what search means.
Stephen E Arnold
ISYS Search Morphs into Content Management
October 2, 2013
I received a PRatronizing email today from an outfit called PRWeb. I get quite a bit of baloney, cheese spread, and faux butter from this outfit. The write up has a darned amazing title:
I suppose this is the influence of the PR savvy folks who want a high Google ranking. With relevance blown out of the water by Fiverr-type operations, I think I understand the wordiness.
Several items jumped from my screen:
- An azure chip consulting firm has rigorously reviewed, tested, analyzed, and tweaked dozens of enterprise content management systems and named ISYS Search Software’s owner (Lexmark, the printer outfit) as a “leader” in a “magic quadrant.” No problemo. I understand “objective” analyses and consultant reports.
- The angle is not “enterprise” as I understand the concept. The “enterprise” narrows to health care. I find this interesting because health care is much in the news, heavily regulated, and a sector under some scrutiny via the MIC RAC and ZPIC initiatives. I won’t go into these US government efforts because the links are not working due to the shut down of the super efficient US government. So I suppose I am to understand that what works in health care will work for Allied Van, JetBlue, and Google. I suppose MarkLogic will assert that its system serves JetBlue reasonably well. Googlers are probably not focused on internal document management in quite the way a hospital in rural Kentucky is.
- There is a link to download the azure chip consultant’s report. I find this interesting because most consultants sell analyses. The right to offer unlimited downloads comes at a price. So if a firm pays for a license to give away a report, I wonder if the report is one of those Fiverr.com-type services with a price tag higher than five bucks.
You will not find too much information about ISYS, the search system which was coded by some Australians in 30 years ago.
Navigate to the “story” and learn about how a printer company is able to deliver a wide range of services to companies struggling with paper and findability. I recall that the new book about McKinsey by Duff McDonald had some harsh words for the simplification that the original Boston Consulting Group’s diagram brought to stressed managers. I suppose the derivations from the BCG model are much better than the original cash cows, dogs, question marks, and stars.
And search? I suppose in the midst of the enterprise content management solution, ISYS and maybe Brainware are chugging along. Lexmark, a printer company, is about one hour from my modest cabin in a hollow in rural Kentucky. Keep that in mind when you tell me I have misunderstood the PRWeb information, the content management thing, and my lack of sensitivity to a square with a plus sign in the middle.
Stephen E Arnold, October 2, 2013
Will Unbundling Work for Enterprise Search
September 23, 2013
I read “Unbundling: AOL, Facebook and LinkedIn” and reviewed the nifty diagram about Craigslist. I ignored the comments about Mr. Newmark, who stood next to me at a Google event, a while back. I am not sure he knows me as anyone other than a person as eager to leave as a couple of other “guests” at the function in Washington, DC. Young people make me nervous, and I wanted to take my Geritol and watch reruns of “I Love Lucy.”
Based on my understanding of Craigslist, I am not sure if the fancy diagram represents unbundling of Mr. Newmark’s idea or just a natural evolution of online opportunities crated by the consumerization of surfing. Craigslist went live in 1995, two years after the Point service, which Chris Kitze and I started with a couple of other clueless but intrepid Internet chance takers.
That makes Craigslist more than a decade old. The service has not changed too much in my opinion. The disruption of various sectors and the growth of the various topics or categories has been a consequence of user behavior, not part of a predestined grand plan. At Point we had zero idea that a large firm would want to buy our service. We were just trying to cope with traffic growth, technical issues, and advertisers who were contacting us.
Nevertheless, the Unbundling article suggests that innovation occurs because big outfits do not seize the many opportunities which their successful services offer up. Here’s the passage I noted:
There are a swarm of services, often mobile first or mobile only, trying to peel off parts of the Craigslist offer, or do things Craigslist should have been doing. AirBnB is only the most obvious. Chris Dixon has a good note about this here, and Andrew Parker produced this great graphic back in 2010.
I understand the viewpoint. However, I think there are a number of factors operating to make it possible to show, as the graphic in the article does, that Craigslist has been a gold mine of ideas.
First, many of the services which take a component of a successful service and elaborate it require bandwidth. A big outfit like AOL, Facebook, or Google for that matter has bandwidth which may be cluttered with noise. The problem becomes “Which opportunity?” which can produce some wild and crazy decisions.
A second factor is personal motivation and capability. The economy motivates some people to look around for ways to make money. Examples which come to mind is the shared ride service disrupting traditional taxi services in some cities. When people need to make money and have a car, an opportunity is perceived. Using an online existing service to build a ride share service is indeed possible. Some innovators may have time and resources to create a purpose-built system free of big company baggage.
Third, customers may be skeptical of new services from big outfits. I have been reading allegations about misbehavior at LinkedIn. I posted a test write up to see what would happen. Do I use LinkedIn for “real” work? Nope. Will I in the near future? Nope. I want to determine for myself if I can “trust” a big outfit. So, a new company offering a specialized service like those on the Unbundling graphic will get a more positive reception than another service from a giant online outfit. I may be in the minority with this approach, but it works for me.
My broad interest in online information access. One of my particular interests in enterprise search. Will the big enterprise search systems be dis-aggregated or “atomized” as the Unbundling article suggests?
This is an interesting question. Enterprise search is not a consumer service. The giant “one size fits all” solutions have been acquired by even larger enterprise solutions providers. Other large scale enterprise search solutions have just gone out of business like Convera, Delphes, Entopia, Siderean Software, and others. Enterprise search has spawned a free and open source solution set as well.
The present enterprise search market is characterized by a frenzy of consolidation, repositioning, and buzzwords. I track the sector on a daily basis, and I am not sure from point to point what strategies and tactics are actually working.
In terms of dis-aggregation, enterprise search has been supporting big solutions like those offered by Dassault (aerospace services!) and Hewlett Packard (yep the PC maker) to specialized solutions offered by Lexmark (printers!) and Xerox (yep, the copier folks).
There are dozens of specialists offering very specific search-related subcomponents which are like a clutch plate on a Lamborghini Urraco. The cost and availability are likely to wreck havoc for the novice’s budget. Some of the vendors of these highly specialized components (Marklogic’s XML technology or Sail Labs’ natural language processing technology) struggle to connect a problem with a solution that makes sense to potential customers. XML fuzzes into databases and databases mean Oracle or Hadoop. NLP blurs into search and search becomes Google. In short, life can be difficult for a provider of an atomized component.
I would assert the following:
- Enterprise search is neither a giant aggregated solution with a couple of big providers nor a sector characterized by on-going disaggregation. Enterprise search is more like one of those weird compounds like ketchup. Sometimes ketchup works like a homogeneous semi-solid. Other times, ketchup is a runny mess. In short, enterprise search is a polystate market. (Technically ketchup is a non-Newtonian fluid.)
- Vendors are never certain what problem their software solves. Take the examples of XML or NLP. What specific value can be delivered to a company looking to cope with Big Data? I am confident that each of the vendors in these two niches can provide me with a webinar that explains the value of their product. But the problem is, “Can an organization get enough value to buy the company’s solution?” And, a more important question, “Are their enough customers to make one or two of these companies generate $200 million or more in profitable revenue today?”
- Customers often do not know what problem they have to solve. Unlike a person who wants a cheap ride to Palo Alto, an organization’s problems are difficult to pin down. More sales means what? Enterprise search vendors talk about customer support and extracting value from information assets. The decision makers at different levels of an organization cannot explain “more sales” one way. Not surprisingly, enterprise search vendors marketing seem to fix a remarkably wide range of problems. Do these systems deliver “more sales”? Usually not in a direct way. Search engine optimization, on the other hand, does deliver measurable results. Maybe SEO will just “take over” enterpriser search at some point.
Let’s assume my assertions are partially correct. Enterprise search is a market space which may be more difficult to crack than seeking inspiration from Craigslist. Perhaps this is one reason why enterprise search has in fifty years produced only one firm which generated more than $800 million in revenues from search technology. Google, please, keep in mind, is in the advertising business. Search is plumbing which helps the company make money.
Conflating findability with the ketchup of enterprise search and its subcomponents delivers one big disconnect in my opinion. Vendors are finding it more and more difficult to demonstrate value delivered by search solutions. Making money with enterprise search is not impossible. I just think it is difficult and getting harder.
Getting inspiration from AOL, Facebook, or whatever big online service one picks may be an easier way to make a buck.
Stephen E Arnold, September 23, 2013
Oracle Focuses On New Full Text Query
August 26, 2013
Despite enterprise companies moving away from SQL databases to the more robust NoSQL, Oracle has updated its database to include new features, including a XQuery Full Text search. We found an article that examines how the new function will affect Oracle and where it seems to point. The article from Amis Technology Blog: “Oracle Database 12c: XQuery Full Text” explains that the XQuery Full Text search was made to handle unstructured XML content. It does so by extending the XQuery XMLDB language. This finally makes Oracle capable of working with all types of XML. The rest of the article focuses on the XQuery code.
When the new feature was used on Wikipedia Content with XML content as well the test results were positive:
“During tests it proved very fast on English Wikipedia content (10++ Gb) and delivered the results within less than a second. But such a statement will only be picked up very efficiently if the new, introduced in 12c, corresponding Oracle XQuery Full-Text Index has been created.”
Oracle is trying to improve its technology as more of its users switch over to NoSQL databases. Improving the search function as well as other features keeps Oracle in the competition as well as proves that relational tables still have some kick in them. Interestingly enough Oracle appears to be focusing its energies on MarkLogic’s technology to keep in the race.
Whitney Grace, August 26, 2013
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, developer of Beyond Search
InetSoft Ramps Up Marketing
July 25, 2013
My Overflight system alerted me to a PR spike from InetSoft, a business intelligence software vendor which opened for business in 1996. One unique selling proposition for InetSoft is its small footprint. The idea is that some of the newer systems consume significant resources.
The company issued a news release in late June 2013 which explains the firm’s market approach for the balance of 2013. What’s interesting is that many business intelligence vendors do not articulate a strategy. When my goslings (colleagues) and I talk about the companies which once showed promise and seemed to fade after the venture funds hit the bank account, there are some “strategies” which manifest themselves. For example, some business intelligence vendors keep a low profile and pursue government funding; for example, Agiliex, Digital Reasoning, etc. Other business intelligence vendors go where the Wall Street money is; for example, financial services solutions from MarkLogic, Palantir, etc. Other firms sell out and the acquiring firms sell business intelligence to existing customers; Oracle Endeca, Microsoft Fast Search, etc.
So what is InetSoft announcing. Let me highlight a few of the items from “Business Intelligence Pionee4er InetSoft’s Chief Strategy Officer Discusses Results, Strategy, and Outlook”:
- Leverage the InetSoft reputation for being a good partner
- Emphasize the importance of finding out if the client has a budget for business intelligence software
- Focus on business intelligence, not certain operations such as real-time monitoring
- Delver dashboarding, reporting, and data mashups
- Emphasize ease of use
- Improve forecasting
- Keep balance between lease based contracts and outright purchase contracts.
The write up reported that the InetSoft’s Rajiv Bala Subramanian allegedly said:
I think we are positioned as a niche vendor in the business intelligence market with three core strengths: we offer real-time web-based dashboards that can be built by end users, on-demand publishing-quality reports, and a patent pending data mash up platform that does not require a data warehouse of any kind. Our team is also highly skilled in web and end-to-end portal technologies, making us quite a unique outfit. Practically every business intelligence vendor in the market right now claims to have invented visual analytics. The fact is, visual analytics is simply business intelligence with a different sales and marketing hat on. It has been around for years, and all business intelligence vendors do a very good job at it. But there are these three things that InetSoft is great at, and our goal is to continue to be great in those three areas.
For more information about InetSoft navigate to www.inetsoft.com.
Stephen E Arnold, July 25, 2013
Sponsored by Xenky
Advances in Search Drive Big Data Future
June 4, 2013
Big Data is getting the lion’s share of attention in the enterprise search market. As the cost of data storage continues to plummet, even smaller organizations are interested in capturing the meaning that may exist in massive amounts of routine data, or Big Data. So the Big Data market is exploding. Smart Data Collective is tracking the trends in their article, “7 Big Data Trends That Will Impact Your Business.”
The article highlights trends that will impact the average business. The third trend noted is advances in search and LucidWorks is a standout contender in this category:
“Sifting through massive amounts of data to find that preverbal needle in the haystack is no simple task. Over time we will likely see more big data solutions injecting search support into their solutions. Leading the way in this endeavor are LucidWorks, IBM, Oracle through the acquisition of Endeca (full disclosure, I’m a former Endeca employee), Autonomy and MarkLogic. LucidWorks combines an open source stack of Lucene/Solr, Hadoop, Mahout and NLP.”
So for those who are interested in capturing and using Big Data, but want an interface they can negotiate, LucidWorks is a great choice. Their LucidWorks Big Data is an application development platform that incorporates the power of Lucene, Solr, Hadoop, Hive, and other major open source powerhouses into a usable, efficient platform. Try it and see.
Emily Rae Aldridge, June 4, 2013
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, developer of Beyond Search
A Whatever Happened To… HP and TeraText
May 3, 2013
My Overflight for search vendors generated an odd “recent” update. The item originated from Chrlettestuvv’s Blog. The story pointed to an item called “SAIC’s TeraText Solutions Signs Strategic Alliance Agreement with HP.” The source was an “article from Software Industry Report, August 1, 2005.
HP apparently needed something more than TeraText, which shared some similarities with the now forgotten iPhrase and anticipated features in MarkLogic Server today. I find these search- and content-processing related tie ups interesting.
Each time I recall one or some glitch in the Internet surfaces a partner factoid, I am more confident that search vendors and some growth hungry large corporations move from speed dating to speed dating activity. Do the engagements lead to marriages? Sometimes I suppose. Other times the companies, like boy friends and girl friends in high school, the couples just drift apart.
Search, however, remains mostly unchanged.
Stephen E Arnold, May 3, 2013
Sponsored by Augmentext
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