Hi All,
This is a SRU/W for MetaSearch Engines (MSEs) question. It occurred during
internal discussions in MuseGlobal and then again at the ELAG meeting last
week.
As far as I can tell from the documentation and from searching this thread
there is no preferred/recommended/allowed method of asking a server to
search more than one target database. Obviously with "real" SEs this is not
a problem as they only have one database (well, the vast majority of them),
but for SRU/W to be used to connect TO an MSE it is obviously a bit of a
problem. From the MSE to the SEs is no problem.
In the message from the client to the MSE we're, obviously, not talking
about real database, but what we call Sources which are a particular
database (or other Data Service) at a particular Host. However they have IDs
just like any internal database for an SE, so the semantics of the "database
name" is not a problem, only the number of them allowed in the SRU string.
We have a couple of methods in mind, (just stringing the IDs together as one
long 'database name' string is one way which would be sort of legal, but not
very elegant) but they would be 'non-standard'. It's a problem which would
be much better addressed now rather than later.
Ideas? suggestions? modifications to standards?
Peter
Dr Peter Noerr
Chief Technical Officer
Museglobal, Inc.
tel: +1 801 208 1880
fax: +1 801 208 1889
cell:+1 801 910 4912
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www.museglobal.com
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