Open Source, SharePoint, Big Data and user experience take center stage at Enterprise Search Europe

Among the distinguished speakers, Oracle Endeca's Joe Lamantia will be sharing his recent work around ‘the language of discovery' . "It's a simple research-based vocabulary," he explains, "that describes how people make sense of information in service to goals like searching, comparing, and analyzing complex situations. It turns out that you can use a very simple vocabulary to spot and describe complex patterns in searching and sense making behavior, patterns that transcend typical boundaries like domain of use."

Nielsen Norman Group's Kara Pernice will present the results of a large scale study of intranet search usability in over 40 organizations. Case studies of enterprise search implementations include UK based financial services firm Legal & General, the UK's National Health Service, and open source implementations by the French city of Antibes and German shopping portal Shopping24.

The conference wrap-up will come from Lynda Moulton, who brings many years of experience in the software industry specializing in text management and information retrieval. She identifies a number of major trends in enterprise search. "Most enterprises are evolving in their understanding of search, how it works and when it does not," says Moulton. "This makes them smarter about their next selection of technologies and implementation. They are learning that one size does not fit all business problems and that much of what needs to be found in the enterprise does not need to be accessed by all employees."

The second major trend identified by Moulton is the diversity of options for making content searchable or findable. "Search vendors are specialising by packaging their search technologies for highly specialised solutions. For example, business development, finance or manufacturing may be turning to business analytics embedded in search applications, while R&D has a demand for e-discovery products with a topically rich and specialised terminology component."

Looking ahead, Moulton anticipates that people with subject and search expertise will be needed to integrate content management, terminology management and search engine tuning into a systemically robust architecture that actually delivers excellent results to meet searcher expectations and needs.

The conference also includes Pre-conference half-day workshops designed to offer in-depth, interactive learning in small groups and the workshop leaders are experienced professionals, all practising experts in their areas; excellent networking opportunities, and a chance to see a wide range of search applications in the accompanying sponsor showcase.

For view the full programme, visit the Enterprise Search Europe website and register here.