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The keystone

Doug Turnbull,

CTO OpenSource Connections

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Who are we?

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We struggle with the toughest problems

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But what's important

to us?

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Skin in the game

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Such Core

Wow

Core

Secondary

Google

Average Google Site Search Customer

We are here: Search/IR important to our business!

Nearly Secondary

… We have skin in the 'search game'...

"If it’s a core business function — do it yourself, no matter what." - Joel Spolsky

Corevalueness

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We're sorta stuck together

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FREEEEEEEEEDOM!!!!

We needs ta control oaaour destiny!!

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Google

Average Google Site Search Customer

Us

… Most of us have skin in the 'search game'...

Freedom requirements

Customization: complete

Licensing: certain

Mindshare: static

Customization: some

Licensing: certain

�Mindshare: broad community

Customization: little/no

Licensing: who cares

Mindshare: doesn't matter

(aka 'bus factor')

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Hi my name is...

ONE VENDOR TO BUY THEM ALL

AND IN THE DARKNESS BIND THEM

UR search tools

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Hi my name is...

...Alexa vs early web...

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Hi my name is...

HOW DARE YOU QUESTION THE ALMIGHTY SEARCH ENGINE

PUNY MORTAL

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Empowerment

"Always be yourself, unless you can be batman. Then always be batman"

Actually having the tools to do our job

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Wasted $$ when we don't have good tools

Ideation

Industry

Plunger Invented

(1850-1900)

Plunger, a fancy plumbers tool

Out of box 'open source'

Out of box 'open source'

Table Stakes

Table Stakes

Secret Sauce

Secret Sauce

Wasted time: every plumber reinvents the wheel/plunger

Faster time to market, more opportunity to differentiate

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We need to commoditize repeat/busy work

Ideation

Industry

Commodity

Plunger Invented

(1850-1900)

Anyone can plunge their toilet

Plunging, a plumber's method

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LTR building blocks getting easier

Academia

Industry

Commodity

LambdaMART

(2010)

Solr LTR Plugin (2015)

ES LTR Plugin (2017)

Siloed LambdaMART wheels reinvented

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Two ways to solve these probs

VS

Product

Open Source

  • Innovates faster / specific focus

  • Less freedom (mindshare, license, extensibility)
  • Innovates slower / broader focus

  • More freedom (mindshare, license, extensibility)

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Open source isn't giving us tools we need

Ideation

Industry

Plunger Invented

(1850-1900)

Plunger, a fancy plumbers tool

Out of box 'open source'

Out of box 'open source'

"Table Stakes" Grunt work you have to do

"Table Stakes" Grunt work you have to do

Secret Sauce

Secret Sauce

~2010?

Today

Stand up Solr, index data, throw a UI in front of it!

Significant gaps in what we need from open source

Let's see why...

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10

?

Is modern search?

OR

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ical?

Is modern search?

OR

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Analytics

Is modern relevance?

search

refine

click

Judgments

OR

Knobs & dials

Knobs & Dials https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:USS_Bowfin_-_Dials,_Valves_and_Knobs_(8326504403).jpg USS Bowfin - Dials, Valves and Knobs, Daniel Ramirez

LTR

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Whatcha get:

Search Analytics

Store

Enrich

Whatcha need:

App/Browser

Telemetry

Serving Search System

Learn

Content

Stage

Content

Features

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Modern serving search system reqs

  • Match beyond the Lexical

  • Arbitrary tensor/vector math

  • Built-in intent classification

  • Aware of the user

  • NLP-first query/doc analysis

Are Solr/ES up to the task?

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Lack of cohesive relevance community

  • Lack of perspective on commonly solved problems

  • Beyond tech to techniques and strategies

  • We keep reinventing the wheel over and over and over...

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...Baby open source proj…

...we want it to grow up…

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...many threats…

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Building this rounded rolly thing!

If only someone would build 'Connections' in 'Open Source'

Building this rounded rolly thing!

Building this rounded rolly thing!

Building this rounded rolly thing!

Building this rounded rolly thing!

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Our mission: empowering relevance teams

Our BHAG: In 10 years, we want open source to be solution for the best relevance teams

YOU can do this, without vendors, including US!

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Our perspective: turn silos into plungers

Protect Sea Turtles

What wheels do we see reinvented?

Who can we partner with to fund/build open source?

How can we market/community build?

How can we add product vision for broader adoption?

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Partners Needed

TO BUILD OPEN SOURCE

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Most common gaps we see in OSS

  • Search Analytics
  • Standard ways of interpreting/using clickstream
  • Search beyond tokens
  • Diversity & Serendipity, not just relevance
  • Vector / Tensor math

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OSC co-sponsoring...

CFP due April 22!

http://mices.co

TomTom ML Thursday

KEEP THIS COMMUNITY GOING!

See you in Berlin!!

#haystackconf