Information Management Is Key to Intelligent Search
December 31, 2012
Searching for information within an enterprise is often not simple, or even fruitful. A recent survey from MindMetre gives us the disturbing truth that over half of knowledge workers admitted they cannot find the information they are looking for using their company’s enterprise search system. The facts are detailed in a white paper from KMWorld titled “Best Practices in Intelligent Search,” which argues that under-management of information, not information overload, is to blame.
An overture to this white paper, “What Are You Looking For? An Overture to ‘Intelligent Search,’” is featured on Enterprise Search Center. The overture states:
“We set out to discuss “enterprise search” and “intelligent search” in this White Paper. And that we shall. But let’s get something straight: Enterprise search is not what you think it is. It is not a single unified piece of software that can magically scour through the dozens of business applications that contain that piece of information our hypothetical guy was looking for. And, much less, it is not a single tool that can seek, discover and deliver an important piece of information from the hundreds and thousands of repositories from which it may emerge.”
This article and corresponding white paper offer a lot of wisdom on enterprise search facilities and Intrafind can be a great resource as organizations seek to make the best of their investments. High-quality research surrounding the capabilities and necessary features of search applications is a focal point of the information retrieval specialists.
Andrea Hayden, December 31, 2012
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, developer of Augmentext
Information Management and Accessibility Promotes Fully Connected Enterprise
December 31, 2012
The end of the year always signals a time for reflection on past trends and projections for the future. Speculation on anything and everything big data is typical throughout the year, but even this already popular subject is seeing a spike. From Computer Weekly comes a countdown in regards to big data called the Top 10 Information Management Stories of 2012.
The article points to specific themes that popped up after sifting through articles that deal big data and information management.
According to this article, some big data solutions have been tough to get off the ground and to get up and running:
Open source big data technologies seem stuck in the sand pit of experimentation in UK corporate organizations. Experts say: experiment, but keep business value in mind. Speaking at a Computer Weekly roundtable on the topic, Bob Harris, chief technology officer at Channel 4, said big data initiatives will likely require organizations to adopt new technologies.
Of course open source big data technologies have the capabilities for continued experimentation. What else would any client want in this era of constant technological evolution? The point is that flexibility should not be interpreted as inability to operate in the current landscape. We see solutions such as PolySpot work for countless organizations in making information and insights accessible to the entire enterprise.
Megan Feil, December 31, 2012
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, developer of Beyond Search.
2012 Good Year for Open Source
December 31, 2012
This year, 2012, was a crazy year with lots of big news items and lots of interesting developments in the tech world. Open Source Insider provides a 2012 year in review with, “Video: a Good Year for Open Source in 2012.”
The article jumps into some startling statistics:
“ . . . Some serious development work has been going on in the open source arena. Where Google is there to remind us to search for pictures of cute polar bears, The Linux Foundation is on hand to remind us that…
Goldman Sachs reported late last week that Windows has gone from dominating 97% of the computing market to 20%.
Android leads while Apple takes up second place. The Goldman Sachs report reads as follows, ‘Microsoft faces an uphill battle (though not insurmountable) given it lacks meaningful share in either tablets or smartphones and as such will need to rely on its appeal to knowledge workers to help drive adoption as its complement ecosystem will remain behind the iOS and Android platforms at least over the next 6-12 months.’”
Just as Internet search engines and operating systems have moved toward open source, so has enterprise search. Enterprise search is almost entirely dominated by high-quality open source search offerings. One that we particularly like is LucidWorks. LucidWorks has longevity on its side, focusing on open source before open source enjoyed such popularity. LucidWorks Search is ready out-of-the-box to bring efficiency to an organization’s information architecture. An industry standard, LucidWorks has stood the test of time, but it is still nice to get a boost from open source’s recent surge in popularity.
Emily Rae Aldridge, December 31, 2012
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, developer of Augmentext
SharePoint Gets a Stricter Governance Tool
December 31, 2012
SharePoint is Microsoft’s glorified collaborative content management platform. It usually provides decent out-of-the-box solutions for managing projects and allowing users to work and share on content collectively, but sometimes it needs help from an IVP to make it better. Metavis is an add-on software solutions provider and according to Web Media 360 they have “Metavis Introduces New SharePoint Governance Enhancement Tool.”
The new governance tool is called Informant and is currently in its beta phase. It is supposed to help control the comings and goings of files outside of SharePoint. These actions hold a security risk for all enterprise-based companies:
“Metavis says it is the transfer of content beyond the confines of SharePoint which holds the gravest potential consequences in terms of undermining the integrity of an enterprise’s content management and security strategy. Such transfers, says Metavis, have become more frequent owing to the proliferation of file sharing platforms.”
Informant will help SharePoint users monitor and control transfers in their SharePoint environment as well as tagging, archiving, and placing permissions on files. Securing data is a big part of any information governance. Technology makes it so easy to steal information, but it also makes it easier to lock it down. Take precautions to monitor your data.
Whitney Grace, December 31, 2012
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, developer of Augmentext
Gannett Wants Better Content Management
December 31, 2012
Gannett is a media and marketing company that represents USA Today, Shop Local, and Deal Chicken. One can imagine that such a prolific company has a lot of data that needs to be organized and made workable. Marketing and media companies are on the forefront of the public eye and if they do not get their client’s name out in the open, then it means less dollars in the bank for them. One way this could happen is if they do not centralize a plan for information governance. The good news is “Gannett Chooses ITM for Centralized Management of Reference Vocabularies,”as reported via the Mondeca news Web site. Mondeca is a company that specializes in knowledge management with a variety of products that structure knowledge in many possible ways. Its ITM system was built to handle knowledge structures from conception to usage and the maintenance process afterward. ITM helps organize knowledge, accessing data across multiple platforms, improved search and navigation, and aligning/merging taxonomies and ontologies.
Gannet selected Mondeca for these very purposes:
“Gannett needed software to centrally manage, synchronize, and distribute its reference vocabularies across a variety of systems, such as text analytics, search engines, and CMS. They also wanted to create vocabularies and enrich them using external sources, with the help of MEI. Gannett selected ITM as the best match for the job. At the end of the project, Gannett intends to achieve stronger semantic integration across its content delivery workflow.”
Gannett is sure to discover that Mondeca’s ITM software will provide them with better control over its data, not to mention new insights into its knowledge base. Data organization and proper search techniques are the master key to any organization’s success.
Whitney Grace, December 31, 2012
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, developer of Augmentext
Unstructured Information Has Many Possibilities and Dangers
December 31, 2012
Unstructured information has been piling up for years and it was not until the Big Data boom of early 2012 did people really begin to see its hidden potential. Like a huge boulder rolling down hill, unstructured information uses have taken off and businesses are doing their best to take advantage of the new information streams. There are many cases, however, where businesses do not know the first place to begin. OpenText has caught onto this need and they have started a new series: “Introducing the OpenText CEO White Paper Series.” The first paper was only recently published (talk about fresh) and OpenText’s CEO Mark J. Barrenechea wrote it. Here is a brief explanation about what to expect from the new series:
“’Each corporate information asset represents both risk and value to today’s organization. Every email is a potential smoking gun and every contract the potential solution to a costly litigation. At the same time, unstructured information is today’s oil, and being able to capture, preserve, manage, and capitalize on it is the next frontier of competitive business. EIM acts as a force multiplier in helping organizations unlock the untapped value of unstructured information, while complying with regulatory requirements and ensuring that corporate data is safe.’”
OpenText, we are waiting for more to come out. People need this information for their Big Data projects. Think of it as structured and unstructured information for dummies.
Whitney Grace, December 31, 2012
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, developer of Augmentext
Media Mogul Ribs Google Over Original YouTube Content
December 30, 2012
When can a $100 million investment be considered “cute”? When compared to an investment of billions, it seems. ReadWrite declares, “Time Warner CEO Thinks YouTube’s $100 Million Content Investment ‘Cute’.” At Business Insider’s recent Ignition conference, Time Warner CEO Jeff Bewkes downplayed Google’s efforts, comparing them to his company’s $5 billion per year. D’oh!
Though Google‘s venture into original programming for YouTube has garnered a lot of attention in the tech community, big media players can be forgiven for seeing their investment as a paltry sum. Indeed, the coup Google is trying to pull off here would, upon close examination, seem nigh impossible. Writer Fruzsina Eördögh recalls the words of an anonymous “LA-based YouTube-centric executive”:
“This executive explained Google’s current funding comes out to ‘$1,000 a minute’ but ‘$1,000 a finished minute is not enough’ and requires you to pull ‘favors every time you do a shoot. If you’re just pulling a location permit in L.A., it’s going to cost you $900.’
“In order to produce the quality content Google wants – or at least quality the masses on YouTube want, the cost per minute needs to be ‘around $2,100,’ the exec said.
“To put things into even clearer perspective: Each episode of Showtime’s hit show Homeland costs $3 million to produce, roughly $50,000 a minute. Is Google really ready to compete with that?”
To which I submit, they very well might be! Google’s forte is finding novel ways of doing things. Sometimes their attempts work out, sometimes they don’t, but that try-it-and-perhaps-it-will-work spirit has elevated the company to its current lofty position. Google’s YouTube experiment might crash and burn, but it might also become a humongous success. Only time will tell.
Cynthia Murrell, December 30, 2012
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, developer of Augmentext
In Defense of Open Source Software
December 29, 2012
In its Government section, OpenSource.com declares that “Open Source Software Policy is Better Without Open Source.” The confusingly titled article is actually a strong defense of open source software. Writer and self-proclaimed “huge nerd” Gunnar Hellekson of Red Hat believes that special policies for open source software are redundant and unnecessarily prejudiced. He writes:
“When the OMB [the White House’s Office of Management and Budget] and DOD [Department of Defense] declared open source software to be ‘commercial software,’ it wasn’t a bureaucratic trick to legitimize open source. They meant it quite literally: software is software, and whether it was developed by open source, a proprietary company, or a team of monkeys, all the same rules apply.”
Taking the IRS’ guidelines for using open source software as an example, Hellekson explains, section by section, why policies aimed at open source might just as well cover all software. My favorite example pertains to a clause charging that open source developers “don’t typically follow security best practices.” Hellekson retorts:
“When I read this, my jaw dropped. . . . We can’t summarily declare open source developers ‘typically’ less concerned about security. That’s silly. Some of the most-reviewed, most-secured software is open source. Some of the finest minds in security are open source developers.
“Also, it’s not like proprietary software is magically more security-conscious. Proprietary developers can be sloppy, companies can have poor development practices, and it’s just as likely that a bad actor will work for a proprietary software company as contribute to an open source project.”
Touché. The write-up goes on to similarly examine concerns about product support, reckless code contribution, and the IRS’s required FIPS 140-2 compliance. Hellekson’s revised version of the guidelines, with every instance of “open source” crossed through, completes the article. If curious, take a look and see whether you agree that his version is the better one.
Cynthia Murrell, December 29, 2012
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, developer of Augmentext
Effective Search Technology Is Business Critical in 2013
December 28, 2012
This has been the year of “big data” and search acquisitions, and we have tracked the changes closely. CMSWire has also noticed the trend, making note in the recent article “Search in 2013 Will Become a Business Critical Application.” The article comments on the emerging trend of search implementation and argues that information and actionable insights from big data are critical to business. The need has never been greater for effective search technology and support.
The article continues:
“The Findwise survey […] indicates that less than 20 percent of organizations have a strategy for search even though many of them will be supporting multiple search applications. I expect this figure to improve markedly by the time the 2013 Findwise survey is presented [in May].
The 2011/2012 search vendor acquisition frenzy took out most of the mid-range vendors. In 2013 we will find out whether smaller commercial vendors can attract the investment they need to bring their technologies to a wider market or whether the space will be taken by open-source applications.”
We believe search will be critical to successful business operations in 2013. Secure search and the use of metatagging will lead to improved business processes and enterprise decisions driven by content. The article mentions Intrafind as a potential option for a blend of open-source and proprietary modules and we believe this software has the necessary offerings to help integrate business-critical search.
Andrea Hayden, December 28, 2012
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, developer of Augmentext
PolySpot Enables Efficient Information Dissemination and Analysis in the Enterprise
December 28, 2012
Bruno Aziza has two titles for his position at data analytics company SiSense. One is the Vice President of Worldwide Marketing…and the other: Data Geek. He comes out as such in a recent MIT Sloan Management Review article called, “The Big Deal About a Big Data Culture (and Innovation).”
In a conversation with their contributing editor, Aziza talks about the developing role of data analytics and offers insight into how to successfully utilize data and analytics effectively.
Aziza raises the awareness of the context surrounding the surge of interest in big data:
Secondly, I think the term analytics has raised the awareness of the problem. Before we used to call this business intelligence, and it’s funny how just the change of a term to business analytics made other people want to be interested in it. Also the financial crisis has helped people realize that you can be doing business in the old fashioned way, or you can be trying to be smarter than the other guys.
Whether it is called big data analytics or business intelligence, the important part of the evolution is that businesses know how important having efficient access to big data is to gaining a competitive advantage over other companies. One solution we have seen translate into ROI for organizations extracting value from big data is PolySpot. Their technology allows for information dissemination and analysis to happen quickly and effectively.
Megan Feil, December 28, 2012
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, developer of Augmentext
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