Christophe Dupriez wrote:
> I think we are here in a discussion about "Searching Use Cases".
> You seem to propose that the user may wish to say
> WHY (s)he searches and not HOW to search.
>
> Anyone has done a list of the Use Cases for a search engine ?
[...]
> This to say that it is may be more than a "general word index search"
> that people are asking for. They want a "Do what I mean" simple search
> completed with a more structured search form for advanced searches.
> It is not a question of "index", it is a question of purpose: many
> indexes and other automatic decisions may be involved in a "What are
> you looking for?" form.
Is there a way to return a "did you mean X" (spelling corrections,
similar temrs etc) or "narrow/broaden your search with Y" (drilldown,
expand...) in a search result in SRU? Such feedback mechanisms are
standard in information retrieval systems like Google and Amazon since
years!
Two answer my question: no there isn't :-( you can put stuff in
extraResponseData but that's it. How about adding an extra response
parameter "suggestedSearchRetrieveRequest" (optional, repeatable) that
contains parameters for another searchRetrieveRequest and (optional) the
number of records?
A response saying "you have 0 results" is dull but saying "You have 0
results but how about searching for X in the field Y then you will have
100 results" is smart (or the other way round "you have a lot of
results, how about narrowing your search with X or Y") - so do you want
your search engine to be dull or smart?
Greetings,
Jakob
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