Business Objects and Search

Transcription

1 White Paper Business Objects and Search Intuitively Find Insight in Structured and Unstructured Data

2 Author: Jason Kuo Contributors: Adam Binnie, Jennifer Meegan, David Nguyen Audience: IT managers interested in BI, search, and information access Business Objects Business Objects and Search

3 Contents Introduction iv Today s Challenges iv Combining BI and Search iv BusinessObjects Search Capabilities BI Content Search Search on Data Data Exploration Text Analytics with BI Enterprise Search with BI Conclusion Business Objects Open Search Intiative Business Objects Business Objects and Search iii

4 Introduction Today s Challenges For almost two decades, organizations have been using business intelligence (BI) to better understand operations and improve business decisions. With advancements in technology and organizational adoption, BI has gone from being used in a limited fashion by a handful of data analysts in finance and one-off departments, to being used broadly by hundreds and thousands of users across all organizational departments. While the evolution of BI continues today, there has been explosive growth of data volumes. According to Gartner Group, seven million web pages are added every day 1. And organizations generate terabytes of data internally from their disparate operational applications. This explosive growth of data challenges the current information access paradigms in many ways. It takes too long to find information. According to analyst firm IDC, Knowledge workers spend from 15% to 35% of their time searching for information. 2 Most data isn t being leveraged. Information is often trapped in silos leaving user communities examining only a limited portion of operations. While some unstructured data such as text files, s, and notes may occasionally be referenced, they re not typically contextually accessed or aggregated and combined with structured data as part of the decision-making processes. Only some workers have BI. According to a 2005 TDWI survey, only 41% of employees use BI. 3 The majority of these workers are casual or extended enterprise users who cannot seek out information for themselves, and rely on having predefined reports delivered to them, often by . Combining BI and Search Organizations interested in maximizing employee decision-making productivity are searching for ways to reduce the time it takes to answer questions and increase the breadth of information available to information workers. These organizations need to have smart search and data exploration capabilities that can quickly find and combine all digital assets, both structured and unstructured. Business Objects recognizes these customer needs and is releasing a set of new products and partnerships to provide customers with integrated BI and search capabilities. This paper discusses the advanced search capabilities included as part of the BusinessObjects XI Release 2 Productivity Suite and capabilities planned for mid We have also launched the Open Search Initiative (OSI) a partner network of leading text analytics, enterprise search, and consulting companies. With these partners, Business Objects will extend its leadership in helping customers find critical business information across structured and unstructured data. 1 White, Colin. Consolidating, Accessing, and Analyzing Unstructured Data. B.eye.network, December Feldman, Susan. IDC Report. Portals Magazine, December Eckerson, Wayne W. Volume 20. Eckerson TDWI.com, November iv Business Objects Business Objects and Search

5 The table below summarizes search capabilities coming from Business Objects and our partner integration. BI Content Search Search on Data Data Exploration Text Analytics Enterprise Search Description Quickly search and find desired BI reports and metrics Intuitively search directly on data without prior preparation of BI content Navigate and browse data to discover trends and insights Combine unstructured and structured data for BI analysis and visualization Complement BI content with search of all other digital assets Benefits Increase information worker productivity by making content more feasible Make reuse of existing BI content easier, thereby raising the value of existing content Increase range of information accessible for BI use Allow answers to questions not already provided in existing BI asset Reduce reliance on IT content preparation Find answers in new and unfamiliar data sources quickly and efficiently Provide mechanism for problem discovery Prevent harmful events from impacting the organization before they happen Find opportunities before the competition Increase information worker productivity by providing a single point of entry to all key information assets Product/ Integration BusinessObjects XI Release 2 Productivity Suite BusinessObjects XI Release 2 Productivity Suite New capability planned for Mid 2007 Via integration with Text Analytics partner solutions Via integration with Enterprise Search partner solutions Key Capabilities Security High relevancy Results navigation Fast index-based search Auto-generate reports Guided exploration Zero-training interface Discovery sharing Unrestricted meaning extraction Data Quality/ integration intuitive visualization and analysis Expansive data source connectivities Custom BI connectors Advanced search Business Objects Business Objects and Search 1

6 BusinessObjects Search Capabilities BI Content Search Delivered with the BusinessObjects XI Release 2 Productivity Suite, enhanced search capabilities empower users to securely find existing BI content with smart searching capabilities from within the BusinessObjects InfoView BI portal. These capabilities are enabled by a high-performance BusinessObjects Enterprise Index Service that proactively indexes BI repository content, including reports, metrics, and universe-based metadata. With the following enhanced BI content search capabilities, users looking for specific answers gain productivity by quickly finding the right reports or metrics. Securely Access All BI Content The full BusinessObjects security applies to searches so users can only access the BI content they are authorized to view. Customers can search for critical business information across their BI content including via Crystal reports, BusinessObjects Web Intelligence and BusinessObjects Desktop Intelligence documents, and performance management metrics. Return Relevant Results with Smart Search InfoView s search is not simply word counts within documents, but consists of deep understanding of the source data, universe metadata, and report structures to ensure the most relevant documents are returned first. For example, when a user searches on Asia Pacific product sales 2005, InfoView can identify Asia Pacific data as belonging to the "Region" dimension of the Geography hierarchy, that product is a dimension, sales is a measure, and 2005 is data from the year dimension within the Time hierarchy. The following features also contribute to ensuring relevant results: Documents that employ terms in titles and descriptions will appear first, followed by documents that employ multiple terms in the same areas of the report Based on the indexed content of the user s environment, the search will offer suggestions that hone in on the exact piece of information requested product will be suggested if product is searched and there is no such entry Content search employs stemming allowing users to not only find exact matches to their terms but to also discover linguistically related terms searches for sales will also return revenue Users do not need to be aware of these nuances, and can simply key in the relevant terms they re looking for. Refine Search with Results Navigation It is not uncommon for external web searches to return an unexpectedly long list of results. With hundreds of thousands of reports and metrics deployed in enterprise BI environments, this can also be true with intranet searches. New results navigation can help. Similar to ecommerce sites like Amazon or ebay, for each search a list is created of the most relevant key terms within the set of documents returned. These categories can be used to quickly refine the list of documents. The Asia Pacific product sales 2005 search might present industry, company size, and more detailed product grouping category lists. Clicking on any one of the category items filters the list and brings back a more specific set of reports. 2 Business Objects Business Objects and Search

7 Search on Data Delivered with BusinessObjects XI Release 2 Productivity Suite from the same InfoView search, key word searches also directly query data sources and return answers. No existing BI reports are required for this to work. Results are dynamically returned in an auto-generated Web Intelligence document. This remarkably simple way to answer questions brings the power of BI to any employee who knows how to use Google and other intuitive key word searches. For existing BI users, this also provides a very fast way to start creating reports. Figure 2: BI content search improves user productivity via secure, relevant, searching of all BI content. Text search results can be refined by navigating context-relevant categories. Search Directly on Pre-indexed Universes and Data With the universes and their contents already efficiently indexed by the BusinessObjects Enterprise Index Service, direct searching avoids SQL intensive performance bottlenecks and is predictably fast. Even users in deployments with large numbers of universes can quickly initiate ad hoc query searches with no training or universes. Business Objects Business Objects and Search 3

8 Figure 3: Search on data makes answering questions easy with fast pre-indexed searches that auto-generate reports. Auto-Generate Reports Existing report and query creators will appreciate this new search directly on data capability because it provides them with a short-cut to defining new reports. Employing the terms used in their search to create a query, the auto-generated Web Intelligence document can either be viewed or further edited with query refinements and formatting additions. Data Exploration Key word searching provides an intuitive way to answer known questions. In mid-2007, Business Objects will release a new capability to help data thirsty information workers find answers to questions they previously unasked questions. Discover Insights with Intuitive Guided Exploration After initial search results return, users are presented with related categories of data. Guided exploration allows users to browse data by navigating through related dynamically generated categories. Users do not need to be familiar with the contents of the data or know it is structured. Instead, the guided exploration experience provides valid paths for users to navigate and browse. The context and scope for exploration and discovery is always maintained so users do not get lost. No training, query creation, or data familiarity needed. The zero-training interface with interactive speeds ensures new and occasional users can understand the data, fast. Share Discoveries via BI Reports Finally, after exploring the data, Figure 4: Data exploration complements text search by finding answers to questions users previously never asked. Guided exploration lets users browse and navigate through unfamiliar data and areas of the business. the query context can be passed to a Web Intelligence or Crystal report. This allows a user s discoveries to be shared with a broader audience. 4 Business Objects Business Objects and Search

9 Text Analytics with BI Text analytics solutions provide meaning to unstructured data. When combined with BI, these solutions can be very effective at identifying critical, previously undetectable events and relationships undetectable events that can represent great harm or opportunities for your organization. Without text analytics and its BI integration, organizations are missing critical insight on events and relationships that could have profound negative affects on organizational performance. Text analytics software begins by extracting meaning from unstructured data. Then information management capabilities clean the data, combine it with unstructured sources, and provide a consistent view of all data to the organization and their user-facing BI and visualization tools. Extract Meaning from Unstructured Data By partnering with leading text analytics vendors, we help organizations extract meaning from unstructured data such as s text files, note fields, and more. Text analytics solutions use sophisticated linguistic-aware extraction techniques to identify concepts, names of people, places, and things, opinions, and the relationships among them in text. For example, entity extractors recognize names of people, places, or things. They know Walter is a name and Jordan is both a name and a place. In the following example, we see a record from an automobile warranty system. Besides the requisite fields capturing the date, customer, and other common structured information, a notes field captures a free-hand description of the event. The notes field contains the following comment, The bolt on the underside of the transmission case was cracked due to heat. Using text analytics capabilities, distinct facts from this notes field entry can be extracted. Now the existing structured data can be complemented by additional structured information fields such as event type, part affected, area on vehicle, and cause. Below, you can see how these complementary fields can be populated with the new attribute values extracted from the text. Original Database Record from Warranty System DATE CUST# PROD# DEALER ID NOTES FIELD CA The bolt on the underside of the transmission case was cracked due to heat. Same Record with Relational Facts Extracted from Notes Field EVENT TYPE PART AFFECTED AREA ON VEHICLE CAUSE crack bolt transmission case heat Business Objects Business Objects and Search 5

10 Unify Unstructured and Structured Sources with EIM After text analytics techniques have completed their extractions, it is critical that dirty data be cleaned and integrated with the broader organizational structured data, most likely a data warehouse or mart. Without these vital data management processes, organizations cannot fully trust the unstructured data and wont have a single, consistent view of all operational activities. Our enterprise information management (EIM) products address these challenges with solutions around data quality, data integration, and semantic reconciliation. Unstructured data is even more susceptible to dirty data issues than structured data. You can use BusinessObjects Data Quality to improve information for enhanced decision making, improved BI, and increased confidence in data driving compliance reporting. Organizations then need to integrate all structured and unstructured data into a common place and format. BusinessObjects Data Integrator combines all traditional structured content with text analytics extracted unstructured data and unifies both in a common warehouse or mart. Without Data Integrator, organizations can only look at structured or unstructured data in isolation and without understanding the mutual context and relationships. With all the data unified, BusinessObjects universes and metadata management capabilities provide a single, unified view of the business with a sophisticated understanding about the crosssource relationships and dependencies. Provide Unstructured Data Analysis and Visualization to All Users The analysis tools provided by text analytics solutions are used almost exclusively by a limited number of linguistic and statistic experts focusing on deep investigation of the unstructured text sources. BusinessObjects XI Release 2 combines the output of text analytics extractions with the core structured information managed by BI and delivers this to a wide audience to employ in their decision-making processes. Traditional data analysts can use Web Intelligence and Desktop Intelligence to include unstructured source data with existing structured data analysis. Executives and line managers can use highly visual dashboards and performance management tools to manage warranty claims, monitor consumer opinions, bolster intelligence analysis, and expose other vital, previously undetectable events and relationships. 6 Business Objects Business Objects and Search

11 Enterprise Search with BI With such a large and growing amount of digital assets within organizations, it is no surprise users are having trouble finding the files and information they need. Enterprise search solutions can complement BI by allowing workers to search and find the information they need from across all digital assets including the web, files, repositories, and applications. Enterprise search empowers users with highly productive ways to quickly find and bring meaning to information. Without enterprise search, your employees can expect to lose time looking for information and making decisions with insufficient facts. By integrating enterprise search with BI, workers can find BusinessObjects content and initiate and exploit many of the search capabilities previously discussed from their enterprise search solution. Figure 5: Enterprise search with BI provides all information workers with a simple way to fully leverage allstructured and unstructured digital assets for highly productive decision making. Connect to All Digital Content Including BI Where previously enterprise search users could connect to the web, hundreds of file types, enterprise repositories and applications, recently, they have been able to find BusinessObjects content as well. Business Objects and leading enterprise search vendors have released or will soon release custom connectors that provide joint integration. Employ Sophisticated, Personalized Enterprise Search Queries initiated from enterprise search interfaces can take advantage of the sophisticated search capabilities inherent to enterprise search solutions as well as those provided by BusinessObjects XI. Enterprise Search solutions provide much more than simple results retrieval. Along side the prioritized search results, users can view summaries of what concepts are discussed in the returned documents. Meanwhile, all documents are categorized by common context. Results are then personalized, taking into account user roles, profiles, and interests. Enterprise search also employs multilingual support so a search on software company will return documents containing the French translation, societé logiciel, and the Chinese translation,. Enterprise search engines can optionally exploit many of the previously mentioned BusinessObjects XI search capabilities including indexing, relevancy, results refinement, and more. Reports from structure and/or unstructured sources can be returned as well. Business Objects Business Objects and Search 7

12 Conclusion The combination of business intelligence from Business Objects and search can distinctly improve the way information workers access information. New BI content search, and search on data capabilities in BusinessObjects XI Release 2 Productivity Suite, increase information worker productivity and can bring relevant information to those who are infrequent BI users today. Guided exploration can help information workers find answers to previously unasked questions. Text analytics can identify critical, previously undetectable events and relationships. And finally, enterprise search with BI leverages all an organization s digital assets to empower a more productive information-based work force. Search features in the BusinessObjects XI Release 2 Productivity Suite will be available during the first half of Other search features will be available by the end of Business Objects Business Objects and Search

13 Business Objects Open Search Initiative Business Objects has created the Open Search Initiative (OSI), a partner network dedicated to providing customers with intelligence from both unstructured and structured sources. These partnerships include the leading enterprise search and text analytics vendors, as well as global and regional consulting companies to help implement BI and search solutions. Business Objects and the OSI partners are committed to joint product development, technology integration, and ensuring customer success. The OSI partners include Accenture, Attensity, BearingPoint, Clarabridge, ClearForest, Endeca, Fast, Google, IBM, Inxight Software, Oracle, and others. To learn more about Business Objects search and the OSI visit Business Objects Business Objects and Search 9

14 10 Business Objects Business Objects and Search

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16 Printed in the United States October 2006 PT#WP3058-A. For a complete listing of our sales offices, please visit our website. Business Objects owns the following U.S. patents, which may cover products that are offered and licensed by Business Objects: 5,555,403; 6,247,008 B1; 6,578,027 B2; 6,490,593; and 6,289,352. Business Objects and the Business Objects logo, BusinessObjects, Crystal Reports, Crystal Enterprise, Crystal Analysis, WebIntelligence, RapidMarts, and BusinessQuery are trademarks or registered trademarks of Business Objects SA or its affiliated companies in the United States and other countries. All other names mentioned herein may be trademarks of their respective owners. Copyright 2006 Business Objects. All rights reserved.