Over the years I've been part of many enterprise content management initiatives. I've seen each repository grow, usually isolated from the others. I've also seen countless unmanaged repositories, such as network drives, grow even faster. The result is often an ecosystem of different, disconnected enterprise knowledge assets. An emerging cross-vendor standard called content management interoperability services (CMIS) offers to connect some of those repository dots.

CMIS was proposed by leading enterprise content management (ECM) vendors in September 2008 and then handed over to OASIS for broader review and eventual release. It is now in technical committee, with its goal to use "Web services and Web 2.0 interfaces to enable information sharing across content management repositories from different vendors." Even if CMIS succeeds, it will take a long time before vendor products are released, and it will apply only to ECM repositories.

In the meantime, some organizations seem to be giving up about ever connecting their repositories. Instead, they are looking to enterprise search (ES) as a shortcut to their findability problems. A 2009 AIIM ECM survey noted, "The single ECM system concept is still alive in 35% of organizations, whereas ... 9% [stated] they will use Enterprise Search to solve this problem" of getting to information not using an ECM (italics added for emphasis).

Enterprise search to the findability rescue? This idea that you can install an enterprise search tool-or any enterprise application-and solve the findability problem is flawed. I believe Google's almost magical ability to find what we seek on the web has made findability inside the firewall look too easy. I consulted with three industry findability experts to get their take on enterprise search as an alternative to ECM systems. In summary, each expert says that ES has made great strides recently and that it provides real value. But does that mean you can give up on integrating your repositories and just search them all? No.

I spoke with Whit Andrews, Gartner VP, distinguished analyst, and author of Gartner's 2009 "Magic Quadrant for Information Access Technology" report (Gartner includes enterprise search as a part of "Information Access Technology"). I asked if you can really just buy the right ES and then find everything you want throughout the enterprise. Andrews said that with this strategy, you can get search that will be very effective, but it isn't the same as 100% success. Both ES and ECM systems require diligence and governance.

ECM systems don't work well without proper tagging and placing content in the proper folders. According to Andrews, "When enterprises are most successful is when they identify a specific business problem they need to solve and then establish the solution for that with a search platform for which they have established expertise." He also acknowledged that you cannot simply buy, install, and walk away from powerful ES systems. He even believes an alternative might be to buy two systems, a tactical 80% solution installed quickly while doing full life-cycle diligence in addition to a more comprehensive solution. I noted that many corporate customers think that when they've paid for an ECM license, they've covered all their costs, whereas I've seen full life-cycle ECM costs run 3-5 times the original license costs. I asked if there is a similar ratio with ES costs. He said that well-defined statements of work tend to consider full costs to be up to double those of license costs, although the cost for tactical solutions can be much less than that.

Leslie Owens, a Forrester Research analyst, is also skeptical about the likelihood of an ES quick fix, although she too is a strong proponent of targeted search applications. "If you think of one problem and you match it up with one search engine," says Owens, "it can be successful." She is less sanguine about tactical search solutions such as the Google Appliance because of "connectors," which are the software bridges that connect search engines with content repositories. Google can't search many legacy systems. Building those connectors can cause ES initiatives to fail, and costs can run far beyond the purchase or licensing price. She points out, "You have to work with the vendor to create connectors, and that is expensive," leading to scaled-back enterprise search visions.

Finally, SchemaLogic's Carol Hert, a consultant and taxonomist with whom I've worked, points out, "Out-of-the-box search may get you part of the way to findability, but [it] generally works best when enhanced with supporting semantic information-such as synonym or antonym dictionaries." Otherwise, searches won't yield expected results.

So is it ECM or ES? The answer is both-and then some.

There are not many things in life that get under my skin. Probably at the top of the list is the way in which Amazon cannot distinguish between composers of and performers of classical music recordings. Next comes managers in multinational organizations who state that the corporate language is English. Not in Paris! And English may be the language of transnational communication, but it's certainly not of personnel contracts in Frankfurt.

Currently, third on the list is poorly implemented faceted navigation. It is fast becoming the fix-all for search applications where users do more than skim the first 10 results from a list of 50,000. At one time, a "Best Bet" was the preferred solution until it became obvious that no one could agree on what it was. Now, people who should know better (which includes most search vendors) are offering some flavor of faceted navigation as the ultimate panacea to information overload.

This short polemic was catalyzed by a consulting gig where I found myself looking at the search screen of one of those magical applications. The search term I typed in was one of the technical innovations that would be right at the center stage for this organization's future success. I was not surprised to find more than 4,500 results (earlier I had found 119,000 using "confidential" as the search term). To help me sort these, the left-hand side of the screen proffered a display that told me there were 3,200 results in the intranet, 600 in the document management system, and three in some specialized application with an acronym as a descriptor. Now, am I alone in finding that to be of no value at all in helping the user decide where next to search?

Another facet-based approach is to tell the overwhelmed searcher that there are 2,300 PowerPoint documents containing the keyword, 2,200 PDF files, 1,500 Word documents, and 357 Excel documents. This really does not help. If searching is like looking for birthday presents in Macy's, this is akin to being told that there are 5,230 presents in Home and Kitchen-not terribly useful.Before any organization turns to faceted navigation as the path to user satisfaction, I would strongly recommend reading Faceted Search (http://thenoisychannel.com) by Daniel Tunkelang, formerly chief scientist of Endeca and now technical lead/manager at Google. Tunkelang provides a very concise account of the development and practice of faceted search, both from the back end and the user interface. Reviewing his post and reading Marti Hearst's book, Search User Interfaces, reinforces how important it is to take a user perspective on this technology, which has its origins in the work on a Colon Classification developed by S.R. Ranganathan in 1933.

There is a larger issue here. Only rarely do I come across organizations that have done serious usability testing of their search interfaces based around work to determine not only types of questions that users are asking but also why they are asking them and, above all, what they are expecting from the search engine. Recently, the Royal Society of Chemistry (www.rsc.org) redeveloped its website with faceted navigation to over 500,000 journal articles. Extensive user research over several months resulted in a search interface which is optimised for research chemists, who are the primary users of this site. It takes that level of effort to get the best from faceted navigation.

Of course, even the most rigorous implementation procedures fail to cope with changing user demands. Returning to the first faceted example I gave in this article, I should note that, at that time, the technical innovation I used as my search term was one that was still new for the organization. However, that makes it even more important that those seeking information on this emerging technology within the organization be able to find not only some results but all of the results on any specific aspect of that technology.

To achieve this, the search team must work through the search logs, talk to experts, take some of the core documents and add in metadata to drive some specific (useful) facets, and test the results with users. Working out what might be the best facets for users has to start right at the outset of the decision to purchase, and not when it goes live. Unfortunately, too many organizations seem willing to spend perhaps more than $1 million on the search engine but fail to invest in the creation of a search team. Ignoring this critical success factor for successful search implementation will inevitably yield results that fail to meet user expectations.

Integreon has unveiled eView Document Review Platform 3.3, which includes new features and functionality that simplify the user experience and accelerate the document review process for litigation and regulatory response efforts. Integreon reports eView is a scalable and secure platform that provides critical support for all involved in the process, from reviewers to senior-level counsel responsible for meeting deadlines and ensuring the defensibility of evidence. The company highlights the following features:

• built-in analytics—enabling project leaders to assess data collections prior to the start of reviews to determine the most efficient workflow and approach for managing each project;
• intelligent review processes—offering project leaders their choice of workflow, rather than forcing them to conform to a preconfigured, one-size-fits-all approach;
• integrated privilege management—improving efficiency by automatically generating privilege logs while reviewers work;
• in-depth reporting—giving managers access to real-time progress of all of their document review projects, as well as the progress of specific teams and individual reviewers; and
• managed review services—an optional package to provide clients with experienced reviewers following ISO 9001-certified best practices from any of its secure review centers around the world or on site at the client’s premises.

EMC has announced the new EMC SourceOne for Microsoft SharePoint, which has been designed to enable organizations to adopt a proactive information governance strategy for content spread across multiple SharePoint sites and farms.

EMC adds SourceOne for SharePoint delivers operational control, compliance and e-discovery capabilities without impacting SharePoint users. As a result, IT departments can reduce costs, improve system scalability and performance, and ensure compliance. EMC explains that this new offering delivers a building block approach to help customers address their operational challenges. That includes reducing the costs of managing content in both active and inactive SharePoint sites. As their needs mature, customers can be confident that the right content is managed, retained and disposed of according to internal policies and external regulations, EMC claims.

Access Innovations has christened Data Harmony 3.7. The latest version of the company's popular data management software suite contains taxonomy management, automatic categorization and metadata management tools, and incorporates user-suggested upgrades that enhance the software's functionality and features. The user documentation is also fully revised and updated.

All modules of the new version of Data Harmony—Thesaurus Master, M.A.I. (Machine Aided Indexer) and XIS (XML Intranet System)—are 100 percent Unicode UTF-8, thereby supporting all languages, all character sets and integrated multilingual applications. They also support scientific nomenclature without special coding.

Unicode allows the user to choose the language desired for the interface to appear for interaction. The commands can be mapped to the language and character set of the user's choice. A new filter in the Import Module identifies and converts characters whose encoding doesn't conform to the UTF-8 standard, and the exports maintain the UTF-8 encoding to ensure appropriate display and successful use in receiving applications.

PaperThin has released a significant new version of CommonSpot, its Web content management solution. Version 6.0 combines a new user interface with a suite of marketing and development solutions designed to improve Web site effectiveness, improve productivity and help organizations easily adapt to changing demands for better business results. Also new is a community site called "The Commons," where customers and partners can leverage the shared knowledge, expertise and open source code developed by PaperThin and members of the CommonSpot community.

PaperThin reports the release includes:

• brand management, campaign optimization and community-building capabilities that help marketers increase Web site effectiveness and achieve a tangible return on marketing investments;
• an open source application development framework (ADF) and hundreds of APIs that help IT shorten development time by as much as 60 percent, enabling organizations to adapt more quickly to change;
• a user interface and dozens of enhancements that dramatically improve efficiency and productivity for users at every desk, including a customizable personal dashboard, My Content views, saved searches, saved shortcuts, favorites, advanced search, in-context info panes, WYSIWYG pasting, drag and drop, integration with the PaperThin community site and more;
• a new community site where CommonSpot customers and partners can leverage the shared knowledge, expertise and open source code developed by PaperThin and the community; and
• a new suite of free apps that can be downloaded from the community site, including Article Editing, Blog, Calendar, Content Import, Facebook, Forum, Multimedia, Photo Gallery, Portal, Profile and Navigation, etc.

Web-based productivity suite Zoho announced the launch of unified search for its full suite of applications, eliminating the need to search individually in each of the suite's several applications. The unified search functionality allows users to search the entirety of the Zoho suite with a single search query, letting companies find content regardless of whether it resides in Zoho Mail, Docs, Writer, Sheet, Show, Notebook, or any of the other Zoho apps.

The new search functionality will be available both in individual apps and in a new, independent Zoho search portal.

(www.zoho.com)

Yippy, Inc. announced its new company name and a stock symbol change. Previously known as Cinnabar Ventures, Inc., Yippy, Inc. will henceforth use the stock symbol YIPI. The company will continue to provide parents with a family friendly "cloud" environment through the company's Application Service Environment (ASE) and Web Operating System (WOS).

The company also announced that it has completed stage one of its two-stage integration plan for Clusty and Yippy. Following the completion of phase 2, the company plans to implement a Clusty Classic view, based on the features of the recently acquired metasearch engine of the same name.

(www.yippy.com)

Endeca Technologies, Inc., a search applications company, announced that it has joined the PTC PartnerAdvantage Program to provide a direct integration between PTC Windchill and the Endeca Information Access Platform (IAP).

With Endeca, PTC Windchill customers will be able to leverage the broad information visibility provided by Endeca Search Applications to support the many daily decisions required as part of their workflows. Endeca's manufacturing solutions are built on an architecture that simplifies the integration of data from numerous source systems into a single unified index, regardless of format, structure, and underlying data models.

Powered by Endeca's MDEX Engine technology, it enables the navigation, aggregation, querying, and analysis of data from PLM, ERP, Spend Management, supplier relationship management product catalogs, and other business critical data systems. Endeca's solutions are already in use by such leading global manufacturers as Harris Corporation, Ford Motor Company, Raytheon, Toyota Motor Corporation, and Whirlpool Corporation.

(www.endeca.com, www.ptc.com)