SurfRay: Catching the Crest of the SharePoint Wave
May 31, 2010
Editor’s Note: I participated in an email exchange with SurfRay’s management and technical team. I have been tracking the company’s technology for many years. First, I provided some competitive background to the team largely responsible for the Mondosoft product five or six years ago. Then, the Speed of Mind database acceleration and search technology became part of the SurfRay company. I have been tracking vendors who have addressed some of the needs that some Microsoft SharePoint customers discovered. My interests concern content processing, metatagging, and search and retrieval. Today’s SurfRay includes the Ontolica technology as well as the Web site search, analytics, and structured data technologies from Mondosoft and Speed of Mind. I wanted to make certain I was up to speed on what the Copenhagen-based company was doing. The following summary highlights the information I gleaned in my in-depth conversation with SurfRay executives.
SurfRay A/S, based in Copenhagen, has captured significant buzz for its Ontolica product. Microsoft offers many functions, but when it comes to making information easy to access, “basic” SharePoint falls short. Ontolica delivers search and content processing as a snap in. One day, SharePoint content is tough to find. The next day, after Ontolica has been installed, SharePoint content becomes available to users. In fact, installing Ontolica 2010 involved little more than clicking Next, Next, Next… Quite a different approach from the Lego block, assemble-it-yourself approach taken by other vendors.
Highlight shows one click filters for the user’s query.
Torben Ellert, my SurfRay contact point, told me:
Ontolica delivers a powerful solution that clicks into standard SharePoint without any difficulty and typically installing in minutes. Few companies are so focused on being pure Microsoft that they are willing to live with problems when a simple and effective solution exists.
Simple. And SurfRay is growing at a double digit pace.
Ontolica installs using SharePoint’s own deployment infrastructure, and is fully compliant with SharePoint’s architecture, which allows it integrate easily. I was able after considerable probing to identify what seems to be the SurfRay “secret ingredient.” Ontolica’s engineering implements a parallel query parser that allows it to operate alongside SharePoint in a coupled but non intrusive manner. Ontolica Preview uses its own services to avoid being overly dependent on SharePoint, which reduces Ontolica’s vulnerability to changes in the SharePoint platform. Ontolica is, however, dependent on SharePoint’s index-and-permissions structure.
I think SurfRay’s engineering approach is sounder than a number of the systems I have tested. I have encountered SharePoint search solutions that generate continuous bug fixing. I probed about Ontolica’s method for handling a problem that was unexpected. SurfRay said:
We operate an aggressive release pattern, and deliver our support and maintenance contracts to keep their systems online and meeting the users’ needs. We work very hard to eliminate search downtime.
Ontolica delivers a search interface that allows developers and users to make tap Microsoft’s functions. Upon installation, Ontolica’s default interface can be used by any SharePoint user. Ontolica delivers a preview function for over 500 document formats. No client plug ins are required. Ontolica, out of the box, offers search and business intelligence functions.
Ontolica Products
| Ontolica Search For SharePoint | Quick install. Enhanced search navigation and relevancy |
| Ontolica Preview | Provides page previews for 500 file types within a results list |
| Ontolica Intelligence | Basic and custom reports from search metrics to custom metrics |
| Ontolica for Search Server Express | Five minute install upgrades the Search Server and Search Server Express |
Several points jumped out of my conversation with SurfRay. First, the Ontolica product is mature. There are seven years of development behind it. The fast, easy installation is a key differentiator. I have written about the non intuitive and convoluted installation processes and custom scripting required to get other SharePoint text processing code to work as advertised. Finally, the interface makes it easy for a user to access needed information within the SharePoint system. There are key words, facets, entities, and suggestions. The user can run a Google-style query or explore the hyperlinks. In addition, Ontolica offers users these search options:
- Did you mean?
- Wildcard search
- Content type search
- Quick filters
- Results grouping
- Image search.
SurfRay’s engineers have worked to tap into user behavior to deliver “smart search.” User activity and patterns of behavior deliver search results tailored to each user. As users interact with the SharePoint system equipped with Ontolica, the system automatically adapts. SurfRay’s Tech Blog provides information for developers.
SurfRay seems to have a winner in its stable. The company is self-financed and profitable. Several years ago, there were management changes, but the company has moved forward. In the near future the company will be implementing document visualization within lists and document libraries.
At the end of our conversation, SurfRay’s managing director, Soren Pallesen, summed up his company’s product this way:
Ontolica is a suite of powerful and intelligent search-based products that install and improve search and document navigation quickly and easily.
My recommendation is that if you are looking to add functionality and reduce the administrative costs associated with Microsoft SharePoint search, take a look at Ontolica.
If you want to learn more about the product, the table below provides links to resources the Beyond Search team found useful.
For Further Reading
| Provisioning SharePoint Ontolica Search | Four steps and a sample style sheet. Useful. |
| Ontolica Search Tips | Useful overview in PDF format. |
| SharePoint Gets Search Intelligence | Good summary of how Ontolica adds “intelligence” to search |
| Search Solution for Microsoft SharePoint: Ontolica 2010 | SurfRay’s overview of Ontolica 2010. Balanced. Seven pages. |
Check out SurfRay at www.surfray.com.
Stephen E Arnold, May 31, 2010
When I am next in Copenhagen, SurfRay will provide me with a kringle.
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