Enterprise Search: How Do We Get There From Here? by Daniel Tunkelang (Head of Query Understanding, LinkedIn) Keynote at 2013 Enterprise Search Summit We've been tackling the challenges of enterprise and site search for at least 3 decades. We've succeeded to the point that search is the gateway to many of our information repositories. Nonetheless, users of enterprise search systems are frustrated with these systems' shortcomings. We see this frustration in surveys, but, more importantly, most of us experience it personally in our daily work life. We all dream of a world where searching any information repository is as effective as searching the web—perhaps even more so. A world where we find what we're looking for, or quickly determine that it doesn't exist. Is this Utopia possible? If so, how do we get there from here? Or at least somewhere close? In this talk, Tunkelang reviews the track record of enterprise search. He talks about what's worked and what hasn't, especially as compared to web search. Finally, he proposes some paths to bring us closer to our dream. -- Daniel Tunkelang is Head of Query Understanding at LinkedIn. Educated at MIT and CMU, he has his career working on big data, addressing key challenges in search, data mining, user interfaces, and network analysis. He co-founded enterprise search and business intelligence pioneer Endeca, where he spent a decade as its Chief Scientist. In 2011, Endeca was acquired by Oracle for over $1B. Previous to LinkedIn, he led a team at Google working on local search quality. Daniel has authored fifteen patents, written a textbook on faceted search, and created the annual symposium on human-computer interaction and information retrieval.

1. Enterprise
Search:
How
do
we
get
there
from
here?
Daniel
Tunkelang
Head
of
Query
Understanding,
LinkedIn

2. THERE
The
Dream
(Franz
Marc,
1912)

3. “Computer,
what
is
the
nature
of
the
universe?”

4. "a
web
of
data
that
can
be
processed
by
machines"

5. Mind
reading
is
now
possible!

6. HERE
Office
Space
(1999)

7. Google
VP
Udi
Manber
on
their
in-­‐house
search:
“It’s
not
that
good.”

8. Beyond
10
blue
links?
Not
so
much.

9. Meta-­‐utopia
or
Metacrap?
Cory
Doctorow’s
seven
straw-­‐men
of
meta-­‐utopia:
1. People
lie.
2. People
are
lazy.
3. People
are
stupid.
4. Mission:
Impossible
-­‐-­‐
know
thyself.
5. Schemas
aren't
neutral.
6. Metrics
influence
results.
7. There's
more
than
one
way
to
describe
something.

10. So
how
do
we
get
there
from
here?

11. Three
Baby
Steps
on
the
Path
to
Utopia
1.
Exercise
common
sense.
2.
Show
some
humility.
3.
If
all
else
fails,
cheat.

13. Remember
what
the
Dormouse
said:
Feed
your
head.

14. From
2012
Google
Zeitgeist
Monitor
your
top
queries.
Nail
them.

15. 15
15
for i in [1..n]!
s ← w1 w2 … wi!
if Pc(s) > 0!
a ← new Segment()!
a.segs ← {s}!
a.prob ← Pc(s)!
B[i] ← {a}!
for j in [1..i-1]!
for b in B[j]!
s ← wj wj+1 … wi!
if Pc(s) > 0!
a ← new Segment()!
a.segs ← b.segs U {s}!
a.prob ← b.prob * Pc(s)!
B[i] ← B[i] U {a}!
sort B[i] by prob!
truncate B[i] to size k!
Long
tail?
Structure
and
segment
your
queries.

16. Eneees
and
categories
are
your
friends.

17. Even
the
eneees
for
which
you
have
no
results.

18. Idenefy
unsuccessful
searches.

19. Use
analyecs
to
drive
triage.
“Sorry,
no
results
containing
all
your
search
terms
were
found.”
Analyzed
representaDve
random
sample
of
name
searches.
Leading
causes:
1) Misspelled
names.
2) Correctly
spelled
name
of
someone
not
on
site.
Combine
automated
analysis
with
human
judgment.

20. Triage
drives
and
validates
agile
development.
Misspelled
name?
Correctly
spelled
name
of
someone
not
on
site?

22. You
just
ask
them?

23. vs.
Recognize
ambiguity
and
ask
for
clarificaeon.

24. Clarify,
then
refine.
Computers
Books

25. It’s
2013.
Please
use
faceted
search.

26. Make
your
best
guess,
but
hedge
your
bets.

27. Claudia
Hauff,
Query
Difficulty
for
Digital
Libraries
[2009]
Not
all
queries
are
created
equal
in
difficulty.

28. “It's
ok
to
cheat,
as
long
as
you
cheat
your
way
to
the
top."

29. Design
an
experience
that
doesn’t
require
search.

30. Crowd-­‐source
curaeon.

31. Unstructured
data?
Beg,
borrow,
or
steal.

32. Solve
an
easier
problem:
re-­‐finding.

33. Invest
in
type-­‐ahead,
especially
instant
results.

34. “Good
arests
copy.
Great
arests
steal.”
-­‐-­‐
Picasso
/
Jobs

36. Three
Baby
Steps
on
the
Path
to
Utopia
1.
Exercise
common
sense.
2.
Show
some
humility.
3.
If
all
else
fails,
cheat.

37. It’s
the
economy,
stupid!
Warning:
technology
alone
is
not
a
solueon.

38. The
future
is
on
the
way.

39. But
the
present
doesn’t
have
to
be
so
bad.

40. Email:
dtunkelang@linkedin.com
Connect:
hmp://linkedin.com/in/dtunkelang