[Sigia-l] Administering Search

[Mike.Steckel at sematech.org]

I would say you are in the "pond." Books, papers, etc. will help, but you need to stay focused on your specific, internal users (I am assuming this is an intranet). Outside information can only take you so far.

That being said, as far as regular maintenance of a search system, I would recommend the following:

1. Review search logs daily. This will allow you to update metadata regularly and stay focused on what people seem to be searching for. You are out of your mind if you don't review your search logs often. I often replicate several of the searches and review the results. Sometimes this reveals things that have gone wrong.

2. Talk to people who use the system. Do people see an improvement? Tell people you are working on search, ask if they use it and if it is working for them. 

3. Review your algorithms. I originally was only concerned with where the search box was and how results were presented. It was only after I started investigating how things were weighted that I felt like I really improved how our search works. I think a quick review of these periodically is helpful too.




-----Original Message-----
From: sigia-l-admin at asis.org [mailto:sigia-l-admin at asis.org]On Behalf Of
O'Neill, Todd
Sent: Thursday, February 19, 2004 7:53 AM
To: sigia-l at asis.org
Subject: [Sigia-l] Administering Search


OK.

So you justify the purchase of a search engine. You RFP and POC and
negotiate and buy. So now you have it, installed, up and running. You've
cleaned up your meta, made as many assumptions as you can to return good
results and, then what?

Our organization needs an approach for ongoing maintenance, tweaking,
business administration for an internal search engine.

There's no cool listservs like SIGIA, few valuable sites, except for
searchtools.com (Thanks Avi!), few really good whitepapers (at least
that I could google), much less actual books that deal with the "work"
of a search engine. And, sorry Avi, et al; we cannot hire a consultant.

So, I come to you, oh IA community, for direction. Is search
administration sort of like "Daddy threw me in the pond so I just had to
learn to swim"? Or is there somewhere I could take a lesson or two,
maybe do some book larning (sic)?

Any info morsel would be valuable.

Yours, humbly

Todd O'Neill Web Producer USAA Interaction Design and Architecture 
210-913-8312 todd.oneill at usaa.com 
These opinions mine not those of USAA. 
"The purpose of business is to create and keep a customer." Peter
Drucker
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