Called WebFocus Intelligent Search, the software was developed in conjunction with Google Inc and iWay Software, Information Builders’ data integration subsidiary.
Under the covers Google’s search algorithms drive the new component which works by linking unstructured data records (like HTML files) to structured relational data by leveraging the integration capabilities of iWay’s SOA-based software suite.
The iWay Enterprise Index monitors and transforms messages into data formats into an indexable metadata repository that can searched across by the Google Search Appliance which effectively front-ends the system.
WebFocus takes the search algorithms to connect the search terms with hit information, original indexed material, and the target to which the message was sent and includes this in a BI report.
Information Builders isn’t the only business intelligence software vendor to angle a strategy on bringing together structured and unstructured data analysis.
Rival Cognos Inc recently signed up for Google’s enterprise search appliance partnership program – presumably to extend Google’s search capabilities to BI and performance-related business content sourced from Cognos systems, including search-filtered reports, analysis, scorecards, and dashboards. However a co-branded Cognos-Google offering has yet to officially hit the market.
