The Cognos Go capability, which indexes all of the metadata in a report, will allow a non-technical user to dig out information embedded within a report. According to Dan Vesset, research director of analytics and data warehousing at IDC, this is not typical of business intelligence search engines. Recently Oracle launched a product in the same space.

"Before this you could search by report titles only. All the BI vendors have pretty much the same thing," said Vesset.Similar to a Yahoo or Google search, the search results are ranked by relevance.What all of the new enterprise search capabilities appear to be about is the integration of both structured and unstructured search capability. With Cognos Go, the BI vendor will be deploying the same kind of search technology used by the major search vendors for unstructured data and applying it to the structured world of data warehouse information."The algorithm we designed looks at keywords used in reports, descriptions, [and] titles and ranks it by relevance," said Paul Hulford, product marketing manager at Cognos.Cognos Go uses so-called fuzzy matching and word stemming to fine-tune searches, added Hulford.

That optimization includes the ability of Cognos BI to natively go after data inside SAP's Business Warehouse. Instead of relying on SAP to manipulate the data, the information can now be manipulated within the Cognos solution which gets around any limitations the SAP Business Warehouse may have created, said Hagerty.Cognos is also standardizing on the SAP portal to make Cognos capabilities accessible within that portal environment.Cognos Go will ship in May. The Cognos 8 BI MR1 is shipping now.

Cognos Go! Search Service delivers:

Easy search : While users easily search for BI content using simple keywords, Cognos Go! works behind the scenes to search the full data content of reports, not merely titles, descriptions, or metadata. Cognos Go! uses fuzzy matching and word stemming to help users automatically fine-tune search terms. In addition, Cognos Go! leverages the Cognos 8 BI open architecture to publish BI information to XML.
Most relevant data : Through its sophisticated ranking and contextual support of search criteria, Cognos Go! delivers the most relevant data. In addition, users through their own familiar language can search for relevant information and then narrow results further by refining the search context. Users can also find related BI information directly within reports using contextual search prompts.
Fast results : Cognos Go! fully indexes existing BI content and supports the ability to specify search criteria using industry-standard tips and tricks to help customers quickly find the right information.

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Prashanth Rai