Word smatter

Solr 1.4 released!

Tue, 10 Nov 2009 14:21:38 -0500

Official announcement of the release of Solr 1.4:

Apache Solr 1.4 has been released and is now available for public download!
http://www.apache.org/dyn/closer.cgi/lucene/solr/

Solr is the popular, blazing fast open source enterprise search platform from the Apache Lucene project. Its major features include powerful full-text search, hit highlighting, faceted search, dynamic clustering, database integration, and rich document (e.g., Word, PDF) handling. Solr is highly scalable, providing distributed search and index replication, and it powers the search and navigation features of many of the world’s largest internet sites.

Solr is written in Java and runs as a standalone full-text search server within a servlet container such as Tomcat. Solr uses the Lucene Java search library at its core for full-text indexing and search, and has REST-like HTTP/XML and JSON APIs that make it easy to use from virtually
any programming language. Solr’s powerful external configuration allows it to be tailored to almost any type of application without Java coding, and
it has an extensive plugin architecture when more advanced
customization is required.

New Solr 1.4 features include:

Major performance enhancements in indexing, searching, and faceting

Revamped all-Java index replication that’s simple to configure and can replicate config files

Greatly improved database integration via the DataImportHandler

Rich document processing (Word, PDF, HTML) via Apache Tika

Dynamic search results clustering via Carrot2

Multi-select faceting (support for multiple items in a single category to be selected)

Many powerful query enhancements, including ranges over arbitrary functions, and nested queries of different syntaxes

Many other plugins including Terms for auto-suggest, Statistics, TermVectors, Deduplication

Getting Started
New to Solr? Follow the steps below to get up and running ASAP.

Download Solr at http://www.apache.org/dyn/closer.cgi/lucene/solr/

Check out the tutorial at http://lucene.apache.org/solr/tutorial.html

Read the Solr wiki (http://wiki.apache.org/solr) to learn more

Join the community by subscribing to solr-user@lucene.apache.org

Give Back (Optional, but encouraged!) See http://wiki.apache.org/solr/HowToContribute

For more information on Apache Solr, see http://lucene.apache.org/solr

Blacklight 2.4 released

Tue, 10 Nov 2009 08:02:00 -0500

From the Blacklight team -

Release 2.4 of Project Blacklight is now available in our new Git flavor!

You can find the new improved flavor of Blacklight at http://github.com/projectblacklight/blacklight/tree/v2.4.0

In addition to our move to Git, we have listened to community feedback and have changed the installation process. Instructions for installation are at http://github.com/projectblacklight/blacklight/blob/v2.4.0/README.rdoc . In broad terms, Blacklight now uses a template to get required gems at installation time rather than bundling them in with the code. Besides our debut in Git and the move to a template, here are the changes for release 2.4:

Release Notes - Blacklight Plugin - Version 2.4

Bug

[CODEBASE-54] - rake gems:install does not work (using template now)

[CODEBASE-111] - Ae and Oe ligature characters are not normalized correctly

[CODEBASE-131] - Getting error from rails on startup that VERSION is already defined

[CODEBASE-134] - Authlogic error

[CODEBASE-135] - Fall back on net_http when curb gem is not present when using RSolr

[CODEBASE-138] - A copy of ApplicationController has been removed from the module tree but is still active

[CODEBASE-160] - why isn’t the email and SMS working on demo.projectblacklight.org

[CODEBASE-170] - Blacklight logo cannot be over-ridden

[CODEBASE-178] - 3 specs fail when run with rake solr:spec … no idea why

[CODEBASE-187] - bookmarking seems to be broken in the latest code

Improvement

[CODEBASE-87] - Gracefully handle solr errors

[CODEBASE-172] - demo - solr config - only build spell dictionaries on optimize, not on newSearcher / firstSearcher

New Feature

[CODEBASE-3] - exporting to Zotero

[CODEBASE-109] - sort by pub date in demo

[CODEBASE-182] - Rails “Template” installer instead of ./script/plugin

[CODEBASE-183] - Add cursor focus to the search box on the home page

[CODEBASE-190] - Cursor focus in search form on home page

Task

[CODEBASE-51] - Design a basic advanced search UI - see Stanford SearchWorks

[CODEBASE-70] - Need a plugin release as well

[CODEBASE-114] - demo index should have vernacular displayed [CODEBASE-146] - Change stylesheet link in the HTML to media=”all”

[CODEBASE-151] - get some dublin core test data

[CODEBASE-159] - get test data with call numbers

[CODEBASE-173] - marc_mapper.rb - no longer in synch with solrmarc; its presence is confusing.

[CODEBASE-176] - get continuous integration working again

[CODEBASE-177] - update demo app and readme at projectblacklight.org

[CODEBASE-186] - Implement Google Analytics on the main blacklightopac.org site

Easy Solr types for library data » Robot Librarian

Tue, 27 Oct 2009 13:55:31 -0400

Easy Solr types for library data » Robot Librarian:

A great blog about configuring some standard types of data in the library domain.

I wonder if the new trie fields would be useful with the numerics, though that would require preprocessing on the client currently. Depends on how range queries are used.

"Q: Will this work with the Mac? A: Unfortunately, it will not. Since nearly all business presenters..."

Tue, 20 Oct 2009 09:30:00 -0400

“Q: Will this work with the Mac?
A: Unfortunately, it will not. Since nearly all business presenters use PowerPoint on Windows PCs, we are focusing on the largest presentation market.”

- wtf? from a big name company’s FAQ on one of their (admittedly older) wireless mouse products that I happen to own. Though it works on a Mac, or at least it did. That is why I was looking at the FAQ, to refresh my memory on how to sync it up.

Erik Hatcher on Apache Lucene and Solr Search Applications » The Bitsource®: Technology's Premier Source of Information

Mon, 19 Oct 2009 08:29:45 -0400

Erik Hatcher on Apache Lucene and Solr Search Applications » The Bitsource®: Technology's Premier Source of Information:

interviewed regarding upcoming ApacheCon

After Losing Users in Catalogs, Libraries Find Better Search Software - Technology - The Chronicle of Higher Education

Tue, 29 Sep 2009 06:02:37 -0400

After Losing Users in Catalogs, Libraries Find Better Search Software - Technology - The Chronicle of Higher Education:

Blacklight featured

Tue, 15 Sep 2009 13:50:30 -0400

10 Unusual Playgrounds From Around the World

Tue, 15 Sep 2009 04:29:11 -0400

10 Unusual Playgrounds From Around the World:

I’ve been to one of these playgrounds, Yerba Buena. The others have been added to the TODO list.

Well, I was.

Sun, 13 Sep 2009 12:14:26 -0400

Well, I was.

Scandinavia Apache Lucene/Solr September Meetup

Sat, 05 Sep 2009 23:25:00 -0400

Click here to check out
The Scandinavia Apache Lucene/Solr Meetup!

I’m going to fill my slot with ramblings about various projects I’ve worked on over the past couple of years, including Solr, Flare, Blacklight, The Motley Fool, etc. The Findwise folks will present “Migrating from commercial search engines to Solr”,Tobias Larsson Hult and Eskil Andreen, Findwise SE

Lucid Imagination Selected as "2009 Trend-Setter" by KMWorld Magazine | PHP Developer's Journal

Wed, 26 Aug 2009 22:09:48 -0400

Lucid Imagination Selected as "2009 Trend-Setter" by KMWorld Magazine | PHP Developer's Journal:

Sweet!!!

AT&T plans update to area cell service | Charlottesville Daily Progress

Wed, 26 Aug 2009 09:27:00 -0400

AT&T plans update to area cell service | Charlottesville Daily Progress:

It’s here, it’s here!!! I thought the day would never come where I had more than 1 bar (at best) at my house. This morning the endearing “3G” logo appeared with several bars. Just in time to entice the Mac/iPhone fanatics here in town to invest in a new Apple tablet soon ;) Kindle/ebook reader killer?

Dan Pink on the surprising science of motivation | Video on...

Tue, 25 Aug 2009 22:33:08 -0400

Dan Pink on the surprising science of motivation | Video on TED.com

"Lucid Imagination made extra efforts to make LucidWorks for Lucene easy to install and use..."

Tue, 25 Aug 2009 21:58:09 -0400

“Lucid Imagination made extra efforts to make LucidWorks for Lucene easy to install and use everywhere Lucene is used. We assumed no prerequisites other than Lucene, and insisted on zero search application code changes in order to serve every stack configuration out there, to allow existing Lucene applications to readily benefit from it.”

- Lucid Imagination » Lucid Gaze for Lucene

SFBay Apache Lucene/Solr September Meetup - SFBay Apache Lucene/Solr Meetup (San Mateo, CA) - Meetup.com

Thu, 20 Aug 2009 17:20:14 -0400

SFBay Apache Lucene/Solr September Meetup - SFBay Apache Lucene/Solr Meetup (San Mateo, CA) - Meetup.com

EdUI Conference – Solr Flair: Search User Interfaces Powered by Apache Solr

Thu, 20 Aug 2009 15:29:53 -0400

EdUI Conference – Solr Flair: Search User Interfaces Powered by Apache Solr:

I will be presenting “Solr Flair: Search User Interfaces Powered by Apache Solr” at the upcoming EdUI 2009 Conference. I’m honored to be finally speaking at the same conference as my great friend and UI mentor, Molly Holzschlag. I’ve got my work cut out for me to come up with a presentation worthy for a “UI” conference with folks of this caliber headlining – I’m even looking forward to the goodies I’ll try pull out of my hat. Here’s the abstract:

Solr powers library, government, and enterprise search systems in thousands of applications. This talk will showcase the various technologies and techniques used to build effective user search, browse, and find interfaces on top of Solr. Several of the full featured open-source library Solr front-ends will be shown, including Blacklight and VuFind. We’ll also demonstrate several front-end frameworks including:

• SolrJS – a JavaScript widget library
• Solr Flare – a Ruby on Rails plugin featuring Simile Timeline integration, Ajax suggest, and more
• Solritas – a builtin lightweight UI templating framework

Who’s who: Martin Porter - indeed!

Fri, 14 Aug 2009 11:46:18 -0400

Who’s who: Martin Porter - indeed!

Haikus are easy

Wed, 12 Aug 2009 19:19:51 -0400

Haikus are easy

DigTheDirt

Mon, 10 Aug 2009 13:50:07 -0400

DigTheDirt:

A friend of mine is working on this site. Dig it!

Grant's Solr Webinar

Mon, 10 Aug 2009 11:37:00 -0400

Grant Ingersoll is presenting a webinar on August 13th, 2009 ~ 11:00 AM PDT / 2:00 PM EDT

You can sign up @ http://www2.eventsvc.com/lucidimagination/081309?trk=WR-AUG2009-AP

He will present:

Getting started with LucidWorks for Solr
Getting better, faster results using Solr’s findability and relevance improvement tools
Deploying Solr in production, including monitoring performance and > trends with the LucidGaze for Solr performance profiler