Re: Gossip Digest, Vol 38, Issue 4

my 2c worth:

just as important as decent search functionality is the ability to 
quickly review the results for relevance.

one of the things I like about Google is the keywords being *bolded* in 
the search results (like mail-archive.com already does) but in using 
Google's "cached" link, shows the item in full with the keywords 
highlighted. It makes it brilliant to see the keywords in context, 
allowing quick scanning of the item for relevance - down to a couple of 
seconds. Additionally, seeing the keywords in full context is far more 
useful to me than some indicator saying the item has "75%" relevance...

 >A tutorial would be helpful.

can I respectfully suggest that if a tutorial is needed then it's not 
intuitive enough anyway? At least not without a bit of experimentation 
to see what makes it tick...

just some polite suggestions, nothing more

cheers
barry.b



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>Today's Topics:
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>   1. Re: search library battle royale (Jeff Breidenbach)
>   2. Re: search library battle royale (Mac Oglesby)
>
>
>----------------------------------------------------------------------
>
>Message: 1
>Date: Wed, 6 Sep 2006 21:01:09 -0700
>From: "Jeff Breidenbach" <[email protected]>
>Subject: Re: [Gossip] search library battle royale
>To: "Mac Oglesby" <[email protected]>
>Cc: [email protected]
>Message-ID:
>	<e03b90ae0609062101h42a3bd95k5b572f6dc732bc16-JsoAwUIsXosN+BqQ9rBEUg@public.gmane.org>
>Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed
>
>  
>
>>I don't understand a lot of what's been said about evaluating these
>>search engines, but I'll comment anyway.
>>    
>>
>
>Thanks, appreciated. Much of what's been said is just me having fun.
>
>  
>
>>Since, for me at least, easy to use but full-featured search software
>>is a vital part of any archive, the ideal search engine should be
>>powerful, yet intuitive to operate, or come with good instructions. A
>>tutorial would be helpful.
>>    
>>
>
>That's a great point. Once we've settled on which search
>software to use, I promise to make sure there's a "help" link
>leading to some examples. In the meantime,  here's some
>documentation from the two vendors. To my eye, they are both
>offer ridiculously overpowered. Kind of like monster trucks. :)
>
>PyLucene:
>http://lucene.apache.org/java/docs/queryparsersyntax.html.
>
>Xapian:
>http://www.xapian.org/docs/queryparser.html
>
>  
>
>>I'd like to be able to search the results of an earlier search.
>>    
>>
>
>Here's an example of two searches. The second will return a
>subset of the first.
>
>   "Mac Oglesby"
>   "Mac Oglesby" AND machines
>
>Xapian even has a super fancy algorithm that tries to figure out
>subtopics within search results. It is way too confusing for my taste,
>but you can see it action below. Apparently the software thinks
>you are into dipleidoscopes and ebay. Are you?
>
>http://www.mail-archive.com/cgi-bin/omega/omega?P=%22Mac+Oglesby%22&DEFAULTOP=or&DB=sundial%40rrz.uni-koeln.de&FMT=query.orig&xP=Rmac.Roglesby.machin.&xDB=sundial%40rrz.uni-koeln.de&xFILTERS=--O
>
>
>
>------------------------------
>
>Message: 2
>Date: Thu, 7 Sep 2006 09:26:04 -0400
>From: Mac Oglesby <[email protected]>
>Subject: Re: [Gossip] search library battle royale
>To: [email protected]
>Cc: [email protected]
>Message-ID: <a06230900c125ca798176@[192.168.123.138]>
>Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" ; format="flowed"
>
>Hi Jeff,
>
>  
>
>>Once we've settled on which search
>>software to use, I promise to make sure there's a "help" link
>>leading to some examples. In the meantime,  here's some
>>documentation from the two vendors. To my eye, they are both
>>offer ridiculously overpowered. Kind of like monster trucks. :)
>>    
>>
>
>
>
>Thanks for your time and the examples you developed. And thanks for 
>your promise to post a help link. Please keep in mind that when those 
>of you who already know a process try to explain it to those of us 
>who don't, the result, far too often, is about as clear as mud.
>
>
>
>  
>
>>Xapian even has a super fancy algorithm that tries to figure out
>>subtopics within search results. It is way too confusing for my taste,
>>but you can see it action below. Apparently the software thinks
>>you are into dipleidoscopes and ebay. Are you?
>>
>>http://www.mail-archive.com/cgi-bin/omega/omega?P=%22Mac+Oglesby%22&DEFAULTOP=or&DB=sundial%40rrz.uni-koeln.de&FMT=query.orig&xP=Rmac.Roglesby.machin.&xDB=sundial%40rrz.uni-koeln.de&xFILTERS=--O
>>    
>>
>
>
>
>Well, just about everyone is into eBay. And if you aren't into 
>dipleidoscopes yet, what's holding you back?    ;-)
>
>It's almost frightening how much information we voluntarily put out 
>there for anyone to see!
>
>It's beyond frightening to see what that Xapian search string looks like!
>
>On the other hand, it seems as though you intend to improve our 
>archive search tools and help us understand how to use them.
>
>Thank you.
>
>Mac
>
>
>
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