SharePoint Jumpstart #3: Navigation, Metadata, & Faceted Search: Approaches & Tools

Copyright © 2009 Earley & Associates Inc. All Rights Reserved.

SharePoint Search & IA Jumpstart Series

June 18, 2009Call 3: Navigation, Metadata, & Faceted Search: Approaches & Tools

Hosted by Earley & Associates in partnership with Consejo, Inc.


About the Jumpstart call series

• Began educational call series in 2005

• Past topics have included Taxonomy and Metadata, Content Management, Search, Semantic Technologies

• Have had several thousand attendees over the years. Today’s call has over 900 registrants

• Calls will be recorded and available for download

• Be sure to fill in evaluation to let us know what additional topics you would like to learn about

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Community of Practice Calls

Taxonomy Group url: http://finance.groups.yahoo.com/group/TaxoCoPSearch Group url: http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/SearchCoP

Upcoming calls:

• July 15, 2009 – Metadata Maturity Model Survey Findings• August 5, 2009 – Conducting a Search Audit• September 2, 2009 – DITA• October 7, 2009 – Taxonomy Usability Testing• November 4, 2009 – Developing an Ontology• December 2, 2009 – Applications for Topic Maps

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Housekeeping

• Calls last from 60 – 90 minutes

• Email questions during the call to [email protected]. Questions will be taken at the end of the session

• You can also skype Rebecca.M.Allen

• Questions will be queued through the operator. Press *1 to ask a question

• If you are on twitter, you can follow the discussion and make comments using the hash tag #spjs

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Call 3: Navigation, Metadata, & Faceted Search

• Lars Fastrup, Fastrup Software– Turning SharePoint Search into a Better

Navigation Tool

• Paul Wlodarczyk, Earley & Associates– Approaches and Tools

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SharePoint Search & IA Series: Call 4

Call 4: SharePoint IA vs. The Real WorldThursday, June 25th

– Toby Conrad & Jeremy Bentley, Smartlogic

– Jeff Carr & Michael Shulha, Earley & Associates

As session recordings become available, you will receive

notification at the email address used at the time of

registration.

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SharePoint Products

Turning SharePoint Search into a Better Navigation Tool

Earley & Associates Webinar

June 18th 2009

Lars FastrupSharePoint Consultant, SharePoint Products

BLOG: blog.sharepointproducts.comE-Mail: [email protected]

My Book on SharePoint Search

Only dedictaed book on SharePoint Search.

Published April 2008

Published by MS Press

608 Pages

Written together with the late SharePoint Guru Patrick Tissegem

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Agenda

Introduction - Search Use Cases

Problems with SharePoint Search OOB

Five tips towards a better navigation experience with SharePoint Search

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Introduction – Search Use Cases Discover new information

Looking for a solution to a problem, searching for information to support a decision, researching existing work, finding employees by title/skill, etc.

Retrieve known information Looking up reference material, forgot where it is, find employee

contact info, etc.

Quick navigation to known information Save time & clicks retrieving known information. Good search is

usually faster than browsing you way down some site hierarchy.

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OOB Problems with Search Poor support for narrowing down the result set

Only possible by adding more keywords or using advanced search

Poor advanced search experience Not intuitive at all, poor metadata search.

No actionable results Only possible to open documents from the result list. No support

for edit, check-in, check-out, etc.

No document preview Often a need to download and open entire documents to assess

whether they are relevant.

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OOB Search Results

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OOB Advanced Search

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5 Tips Towards Better Navigation

Create actionable results by adding a ”Goto Document Library” action to the results

Add Faceted Search for more intuitive metadata search

Do not expose search scopes to end-users

Add seperate employee search box

Add Document Preview

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Actionable Results

Examples of action links on a single result: Send link by email Add to My Links Goto Document Library

The action links are added by customizing the XSLT template on the Core Results Web Part

See my blog (blog.sharepointproducts.com) for free code No code solution available from thirdparty vendor

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Goto Document Library Navigates to the document library item where user can

perform additional actions like Edit and Check Out Same as ”View Properties” from inside doc. library

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Faceted Search A search facet is a Metadata value

Applying a facet filters results by that Metadata value

Relevant facets are automatically suggested from analyzing the top 500 relevant results

Users get relevant suggestions how to narrow their search in an intuitive way

Great alternative to Scopes & Advanced Search

Free add-on developed by a Microsoft consultant http://www.codeplex.com/FacetedSearch

Thirdparty solutions also available17

Search Center with Faceted Search

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PowerPoint Facet Selected

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Do not expose Search Scopes

OOB with scope picker

Without scope picker

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Separate Employee Search Box

This is a more intuitive solution than a scope picker The employee search box directs searches to the People

search tab in the search center The other search box directs searches to the All Sites

search tab Requires .NET development efforts to implement. My

book includes detailed tutorial on custom SB21

Document Preview

Features to look for In-browser preview of document pages with

formatting and images intact Hit highlighting of keywords List of relevant document pages

Currently only available from thirdparty vendor Microsoft has demoed Silverlight enabled

preview solution for FAST search Currently unknown if SharePoint 2010 will come

with document preview OOB22


Questions

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Navigation, Metadata, & Faceted Search: Approaches & Tools

Paul WlodarczykDirector Solutions ConsultingEarley & AssociatesJune 18, 2009

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SharePoint Jumpstart Series Session 3


• Recap of Native SharePoint Capabilities• Integration of Taxonomy with SharePoint Search• Approaches to SharePoint Search• Vendor Landscape:

– Tagging and Auto-classification– Search and Navigation

• Key Findings

Agenda

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• Tagging– Out of the box: just keywords– Can be extended to hierarchical controlled vocabularies

with third party extensions

• Search and Navigation– Search out of the box: no faceted search, but advanced

search can behave in a faceted way– Navigation out of the box: based upon the site structure– Can be extended to use hierarchical taxonomies for

facets, search suggestions, and navigation with third party extensions

– Wealth of third party extensions, ranging from free plug-ins to enterprise-class

Tagging/Search/Navigation in SharePoint

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SharePoint Search Integration

There are several points of integration for tagging and search technologies that use taxonomy:1.Content Metadata: Tags as basis for metadata search2.SharePoint Thesaurus: Equivalent terms can be extracted from taxonomy3.Query API: Custom Search UX calls SharePoint Search, customizes results display4.Content Index: Some technologies use taxonomy and user behavior to tweak the relevancy ranking in the index

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SharePoint Search Integration

There are several points of integration for tagging and search technologies that use taxonomy:1.Content Metadata: Tags as basis for metadata search2.SharePoint Thesaurus: Equivalent terms can be extracted from taxonomy3.Query API: Custom Search UX calls SharePoint Search, customizes results display4.Content Index: Some technologies use taxonomy and user behavior to tweak the relevancy ranking in the index5.Replacement: Some technologies replace SharePoint Search altogether

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3rd Party Query Engine

3rd Party Index Engine

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Third Party Application Scope

• Applications vary in depth, breadth, and complexity– Tagging plug-ins– Search UX plug-ins– Taxonomy

management suites– Search engines with

user experience toolkits

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TAGGING

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• Keyword tagging– Users can generate keywords for specific SharePoint

columns, either as free text, or as controlled vocabularies defined during configuration of the column.

• Taxonomy-driven manual tagging– Taxonomy is source of preferred terms for tagging metadata.

Third-party tools provide a user experience for manual tagging, based upon a hierarchical taxonomy.

• Auto-classification– Third party classification engine uses taxonomy and/or other

methods to inform a rules-based classification of documents. Metadata are generated, usually as a flat list of terms in a keyword column that can be manually revised, often with a hierarchical view of the vocabulary.

Approaches to SharePoint Tagging

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• Key capabilities:– Ability to ingest a hierarchical taxonomy from outside of

SharePoint– Use tags from the hierarchy as preferred terms /

controlled vocabularies– Map vocabularies to SharePoint columns– Ability to display a hierarchy to the user in tagging

interface– Persisting the taxonomic relationships in the metadata– Auto-classification against a taxonomy

Tagging with Taxonomy in SharePoint

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Manual Tagging: WordMap

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Custom columns created by SharePoint Admin – Department, Product, Locations

Custom columns created by SharePoint Admin – Department, Product, Locations

Controlled vocabulary from taxonomy mapped to columns

Controlled vocabulary from taxonomy mapped to columns



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Creating new columns and pointing them to controlled vocabularies in Facet XML files

Creating new columns and pointing them to controlled vocabularies in Facet XML files



Hierarchy is preserved in the metadata (can be viewed on

hover) and is available for search

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Controlled vocabulary presented for selection, then shown in view


• Plug-in that manages taxonomy & tags in easy interface– A-Z browse, tag cloud, tree view

• Taxonomy can be imported from a taxonomy management system

• Admin can opt-out of letting users create own tags

Manual Tagging: KWizCom

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Manual Tagging: SharePart XXL

• Tag documents based on a hierarchical taxonomy

• Tag based upon rules, last used, or inheritance

• Taxonomy tree can be displayed in the tagging dialog as well as in the site navigation

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Auto-tagging Example: Smartlogic

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Documents can be auto-classified in SharePoint based upon policies



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Documents can be auto-classified using a manual trigger



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Auto-classify results shown in Edit Properties

dialog

Can be manually edited using Add or Remove



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Tagging interface enables multiple terms to be selected from a taxonomy-driven CV to edit the automatically applied terms


• Concept Searching– Taxonomy management and concept search– Classifier is concept-based, not taxonomy driven, but

can manually tag from a hierarchical taxonomy– Stores metadata as flat keywords in one column

• Dow Jones Synaptica– Taxonomy management and tagging– Can serve multiple CVs from taxonomy, each mapped to

its own column– Terms are flat lists, no hierarchy in UI or in metadata– Auto-tagging available from Data Harmony

Other Tagging Applications for SharePoint

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SEARCH AND NAVIGATION

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• Key capabilities:– Ability to ingest a hierarchical taxonomy from outside of

SharePoint– Use tags from the hierarchy as preferred terms /

equivalent terms in search– Use taxonomic relationships to drive navigation (e.g.

tree browse) and faceted search– Use taxonomic relationships to suggest related searches

Search and Navigation with Taxonomy in SharePoint

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• Taxonomy Mapping

• Concept Mapping

• Schema Mapping

Three Approaches to Searching SharePoint Content using Taxonomy

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• Taxonomy mapping– Taxonomy is source of preferred terms for tagging

metadata (SharePoint columns). SharePoint provides metadata search. Third-party tools provide a search user experience based on taxonomic relationships. Example: Smartlogic

Approaches to SharePoint Search

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Search on non-preferred terms

Tag with preferred terms

Refine / Suggestwith preferred terms and relationships

Index on preferred terms (metadata) and non-preferred terms (full text)using ET / BT / NT relationships

orAuto-classify via rules-base to the taxonomy


Taxonomy-mapping: Smartlogic

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• Related terms in Smartlogic Semaphore. The user searched for “rights” in the SharePoint search box. Smartlogic shows related terms on the right for “rights” from the taxonomy. Search term highlighting is native MOSS functionality, showing search terms, not taxonomy terms.


Taxonomy-mapping: Smartlogic

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• Faceted search in Smartlogic Semaphore. The user refined their search for “rights” by selecting “Employment Rights” in related terms.

• A facet is added for “Employment Rights”; the suggestion box changes to show Related Categories. Multiple facets will be shown if the user drills down, and facets can be removed by clicking the X on the facet


Taxonomy-mapping: BA Insight

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• “Refine your search” for faceted search and tag clouds

• Facets can be hierarchical based upon taxonomy (not shown here), and can show calculated ranges (e.g. dates – shown here).



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• Document preview - User interaction with the ribbon affects relevancy rankings.



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• Note the customized search results showing popularity and key concepts for results that have been indexed by Longitude.

• Search term highlighting in the preview and in the abstracts is done by Longitude

• Key concepts are search terms used like folksonomic tags



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• The Longitude Search Center in “Edit Mode” showing the web parts that constitute the interface in the demo


• Concept mapping– Third party search engine bases index on Concepts

(naive multi-term phrases that are likely to occur as search terms), mapped to a formal taxonomy for equivalence and / or faceted search UX. Tagging with preferred terms for metadata search. Example: Concept Searching


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Manually tag with preferred termsor

Auto-classify to the taxonomy via concepts that are related terms in taxonomy (“clues”)

Index on concepts (non-preferred terms)

Refine with preferred terms (metadata)

Browse with taxonomy structure


Concept-mapping: Concept Searching

• Concept Searching is its own search engine – concept-based searches look for compound search terms (e.g. water quality)

• Related topics are based upon coincident concepts, not taxonomy• Separate view for taxonomy browse

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• In the Taxonomy Browse view using the SharePoint search engine, the user can narrow the search to a sub-tree within the taxonomy.

• Here they will search for the concept “Science technology” within the “Environment” sub-tree of preferred terms (and their clues).


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• Concept Searching can leverage the Codeplex web part for faceted search, and utilize the taxonomy from the Concept Searching Taxonomy Manager to set the Classifications. Everything else you see is core SharePoint functionality.


• Schema mapping– Third party search engine bases index on “dimensions”

that can be related to the taxonomy and metadata (for unstructured content) or fields (for relational data). Metadata is mapped to dimensions and properties, which in turn are mapped to UX for facets and navigation. Example: Endeca


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Tag with preferred terms


Index on dimensions and properties(which are mapped to taxonomy)

Refine / Suggestwith dimensions that are derived preferred terms and relationships

Relate structured content thru dimensions


Schema-mapping: Endeca

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• Faceted search in Endeca – the user experience is 100% customized

• SharePoint is just a search source• Document metadata is mapped to Endeca dimensions (facets)

and properties – used both for the UX and search indexing• Taxonomy can be used for both document tagging and as basis for facets

• Taxonomic relationships can be used to inform related searches

• Search weighting for metadata


• With so many options, it can be daunting to know where to begin

• Our advice: Choose Search technology first…– Recall and relevance drives business results– User experience drives adoption

• … Then decide on tagging tools … • … Then decide on taxonomy management.

– Only required for large / complex taxonomies, volatile taxonomies, or to support auto-classification rules-base development

How to decide?

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How much do you need?

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SharePoint OOB

Basic Faceted Search

Taxonomy-DrivenFaceted Search

Advanced Faceted Search

Use advanced search for filtering on metadata fields. Navigation is based on site architecture / folder structure

Expose facets on main search screen, basic tree view (Codeplex, KWizCom, SharePart XXL)

Related search suggestions, broader/narrower, thesaurus relates search terms to preferred terms, tree browse (BA Insight, Concept Searching, Smartlogic)

Facets span content types, fully-flexible UX,deep indexing, relate to structured data (Endeca)

Faceted Search in SharePoint


Earley & Associates SharePoint Services (in Partnership with Consejo)

• SharePoint Assessment • SharePoint Strategy• SharePoint Design (Information Architecture,

Workflow, UI)• SharePoint Implementation• SharePoint Integration with Enterprise Search

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We help organizations succeed from an enterprise-wide perspective, ensuring findability of content through effective document tagging, metadata management, and search

http://www.earley.com/SharePointServices.asp


SharePoint Search & IA Series: Call 4

Call 4: SharePoint IA vs. The Real WorldThursday, June 25th

– Toby Conrad & Jeremy Bentley, Smartlogic

– Jeff Carr & Michael Shulha, Earley & Associates

As session recordings become available, you will receive

notification at the email address used at the time of

registration.

62


Please fill out the survey that should be in your inbox.

Let us know what topics you are interested in and how we can improve the series.

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Seth [email protected]

SharePoint Jumpstart #3: Navigation, Metadata, & Faceted Search: Approaches & Tools

Technology

Transcript of SharePoint Jumpstart #3: Navigation, Metadata, & Faceted Search: Approaches & Tools