Page 1 of 25
Website search requirements and considerations
Contents
Website search requirements and considerations ...................................................... 1
Executive summary ................................................................................................ 2
1. Context ............................................................................................................... 3
2. Proposed objectives for the University and its website search ........................... 4
2.1 Benefits of meeting objectives....................................................................... 4
3. Proposed search results optimisation methodology............................................ 5
3.1 Impact on website user experience (UX) ...................................................... 5
3.2 Devolved responsibility ................................................................................. 6
References .......................................................................................................... 6
4. Considerations for University website search management ............................... 7
4.1 Strategic considerations ................................................................................ 7
4.2 Organisational considerations ....................................................................... 8
4.3 Editorial considerations ................................................................................. 8
4.5 Technical considerations ............................................................................... 9
4.6 Ongoing service cost estimates .................................................................. 10
5. Search engine procurement recommendation .................................................. 12
6. 2012 site search overhaul project - Recommendations & lessons learned....... 13
Appendix 1 – Current search experience.............................................................. 14
Appendix 2 – Potential future website user experience ........................................ 15
A prospective PhD student interested in game theory… ................................... 15
Appendix 3 - Search vendors engagement & investigation .................................. 19
Engagement with public sector networks .......................................................... 19
Questions posed to search engine vendors ...................................................... 19
Vendors engaged .............................................................................................. 20
Summary of vendor responses ......................................................................... 21
Appendix 4 – University user group personas ...................................................... 22
Appendix 5 – University data sources................................................................... 23
Neil Allison / Craig Middlemass
University Website Programme, Information Services
Website search requirements and considerations (UWS005)
Page 2 of 25
Executive summary
The UWS005 project was initiated to undertake research and make
recommendations for the future management of the University website’s search
functionality.
This paper outlines findings and recommendations arising from desk research,
search vendor liaison, internal consultation and a recent search engine
implementation project undertaken by the University Website Programme.
It is recommended that the University does not proceed to procure a new search
engine in the immediate future.
Instead, it is recommended that over the course of 2013, the University Website
Programme leads a search enhancement process with a report delivered to the
Website Governance Group in autumn 2013 outlining:


Progress made in delivering improvements to the website search experience
with the resources currently available
A recommendation on whether or not to procure a new search tool for
implementation during 2014-15
Acting in the role of Website Information Architect, the University Website
Programme would:





Propose a process for ongoing site search optimisation, based on the goals
set in the University’s Strategic Plan, for ratification by the Website
Governance Group
Undertake the ratified process of ongoing editorial improvements to search
results on a monthly basis
Investigate, and where possible implement, technical improvements to the
search experience utilising the features available within the Google search
tool currently in use
Feed search enhancement requirements into the development of business
requirements for the new Content Management System
Investigate, and if possible implement, rollout of management of the search
engine to schools and units, providing support and guidelines
As a priority, it is also recommended that the University Website Programme and
relevant stakeholders in IS give attention to the website’s contact search features as
a matter of urgency, to ensure it is as robust and well supported as all other aspects
of the website service.
Recent search engine work has highlighted a need for more formal support and
management of processes that have been in place for at least 15 years and are not
sufficiently documented and understood. This current situation presents a risk to the
smooth operation of University business, as contact search is the primary reason for
staff use of the website.
Neil Allison / Craig Middlemass
University Website Programme, Information Services
Website search requirements and considerations (UWS005)
Page 3 of 25
1. Context
A search is conducted on the University website at least every 13 seconds; on
average over 6500 searches per day and over 2.25 million searches per year1.
The website’s search engine results page is the second-most viewed page on the
website; after the homepage.
In recent years, the University’s website search has been delivered using a free
service from Google, with no optimisation of search results to support business
objectives or enhance user experience.
An audit in early 2012 identified that this free service was planting privacy-invasive
cookies on website visitors’ devices, in contravention of EU online privacy legislation.
As a result, it was agreed that the University would move to a paid Google service 2
as a short term measure, as this was identified by the University Website
Programme as the most straightforward step to deal relatively quickly with the
compliance issue.
This project (UWS005) was initiated to:
1
2

Investigate and propose a long-term model for search engine management
that takes advantage of the opportunities afforded by the use of a paid site
search service

Conduct initial liaison with search engine vendors to identify the range of
services available in the market and their potential costs (to support a
potential future procurement exercise)

Conduct initial liaison with internal data source owners, website managers
and business representatives to establish the range of current practice and
the appetite for engagement in more proactive use of site search tools.
Google Analytics data, October 2011 to October 2012. Does not cover all schools and data sources.
See Appendix 1 for a screenshot
Neil Allison / Craig Middlemass
University Website Programme, Information Services
Website search requirements and considerations (UWS005)
Page 4 of 25
2. Proposed objectives for the University and its website search
It is proposed that the University aspires to:
-
Empower website users to achieve more useful results, more quickly
-
Prioritise results to promote University strategic objectives
-
Inform content development and curation priorities, based on user demand
illustrated in search term logs
These objectives should be actively monitored through a range of metrics, and
reported upon regularly.
2.1 Benefits of meeting objectives
Meeting these objectives would:
-
Focus the website to more coherently support University strategic objectives
(for example, prioritising staff research profiles or postgraduate programmes
over other content)
-
Bring greater efficiency in University business (for example, website users
empowered to greater self-service will generate fewer unnecessary queries
and fewer unsuitable applications)
-
Encourage editors to better content management practices; informing content
creation and curation priorities (again bringing greater efficiency to an aspect
of University business)
Neil Allison / Craig Middlemass
University Website Programme, Information Services
Website search requirements and considerations (UWS005)
Page 5 of 25
3. Proposed search results optimisation methodology
The underlying process of optimising site search results is a fundamentally simple
one:
1. Identify top terms typed into the website search box
2. Map these terms to authoritative content3, informed by University strategy and
perceived website user goals at particular points in the site
3. Repeat this process regularly
This methodology needs to be repeated on a number of fronts:

At regular intervals – to monitor and address changes in user demanded
content through the academic cycle

On a devolved basis – top search terms for a sub site such as a school can
be significantly different than for the whole, and the most appropriate result
depends on the context of where the user was when they initiated the search

Focusing also on University priorities – because some content may not be in
high demand, but be critical to strategic goals.
3.1 Impact on website user experience (UX)
As with many aspects of website management, we see a ‘long neck’ in search term
popularity. Focusing on this across a number of fronts will have a disproportionately
high impact on the website’s ease of use.
For example, across the website as a whole, during 2011-12:


The top 20 queries account for 11.6% of all searches.
The top 200 queries account for 25.8% of all searches.
Figure 1 A small number of search terms is disproportionately popular
3
The means by which we map content to results depends on a number of factors. Search engine
management tools provide a range of options. See Section 4.5 for core functionality list.
Neil Allison / Craig Middlemass
University Website Programme, Information Services
Website search requirements and considerations (UWS005)
Page 6 of 25
So if we assume that 50% of website users are search-dominant, some relatively
elementary site search improvements have a significant impact on the user
experience:
50% of all users are search dominant
x 26% (best bet results for top 200 queries)
13% improvement to the UX
And this principle applies to other areas of the search experience, for example
misspellings:
50% of users are search dominant
x 5% of all queries are typos, fixed by spell checking
2.5% improvement to the UX
3.2 Devolved responsibility
To be able to undertake this process across the website, local website content
knowledge is required. Staff responsible for optimising search results for sub-sites
should also be the staff responsible for managing these sites.
Appendix 2 outlines a possible user experience were search results to be prioritised
according to user demand and business objectives.
References
-
Search analytics for your site by Lou Rosenfeld:
http://rosenfeldmedia.com/books/searchanalytics/
-
Search Patterns by Peter Morville & Jeffert Callender
http://searchpatterns.org/
-
Analytics, site search and understanding user behaviour blog post:
http://bit.ly/OCHAmD
Neil Allison / Craig Middlemass
University Website Programme, Information Services
Website search requirements and considerations (UWS005)
Page 7 of 25
4. Considerations for University website search management
Proposed governance of website search, and the relationships
between an Information Architect and content managers
4.1 Strategic considerations
Achieving the proposed University objectives for website search require a sufficiently
skilled person – an Information Architect – working to a strategy (derived from the
University’s Strategic Plan) ratified by the Website Governance Group.
The role of Information Architect needs to encompass both search and navigation
strategy; a holistic approach which in turn contributes to the development of
University web-related guidelines and the underlying Content Management System
(CMS).
Content attributes assigned by web publishers (and potentially website visitors)
across the University have the potential to influence search engine results, so the
Information Architect’s input into CMS development in features such as content
weighting, taxonomy and user feedback/rating is important.
Integrating and prioritising content from key University systems (for example, Phone
and Email Directories, the Degree Finder, Edinburgh Research Explorer etc) is also
an important consideration. The Information Architect should maintain strong
relationships with relevant service owners to ensure results are integrated
appropriately and system developments include the considerations of a holistic
search service).
Neil Allison / Craig Middlemass
University Website Programme, Information Services
Website search requirements and considerations (UWS005)
Page 8 of 25
Regular reporting on search engine performance and website users’ search
behaviour should in turn be used to inform strategy and web editorial guidance.
4.2 Organisational considerations
An individual (or team) working at the centre would be unlikely to know enough about
the business priorities of specific schools and units to be able to optimise search
results to any great degree.
Optimal search results for a particular school site or data source would be achieved
through local web managers including site search optimisation activities in their role.
The specific tasks would be exactly the same as those undertaken by the lead
University Information Architect, only applied to a greater level of detail.
In some areas of the institution, resource is not available for such a task (as with
other aspects of website management). This lack of resource would not result in
reduced search functionality but the unit would not benefit from opportunities arising
from more closely managed site search activity.
At the most basic level (in much the same way as the central Polopoly CMS service
looks after occasional site admin tasks for units without the necessary resource)
local site search would be managed centrally.
This requirement for devolution of control for local site search optimisation presents
considerations for system procurement. Specifically, the search system must:
-
Enable a central resource to administer permissions to specific users to
manage search for specific areas of content
Be sufficiently user friendly to enable non-technical staff to undertake priority
tasks on an occasional basis with minimal user support
4.3 Editorial considerations
As with management of a school or unit website, effective management of local
search requires the web manager to:
-
Have a clear understanding of the objectives of the business and how the
website helps to achieve them
Have sufficient time and resource to iteratively appraise and improve it,
measured against performance indicators derived from business objectives
As with website management, these prerequisites are not always in place in every
school and department. However, their absence would not prevent a web manager
from taking over responsibility for search management.
As with the management of a website, the impact of decisions made around search
optimisation would be local; restricted to ‘Just this site’ results. (See Appendix 1)
Based on trials of the methodology outlined in Section 3 by the University Website
Programme, we estimate that significant enhancement of the performance of top
search terms could be achieved for a school or unit site with a commitment of 2-4
Neil Allison / Craig Middlemass
University Website Programme, Information Services
Website search requirements and considerations (UWS005)
Page 9 of 25
hours per month. There are a number of variables that would increase or decrease
this figure on a site-by-site basis:
-
The size of the site and website users’ demand for search
How well the website manager knows the content and business objectives
How often the website manager undertakes the optimisation task
Whether part of the process could be shared or devolved within the school or
unit.
4.4 Content management considerations
An actively managed search engine and an Information Architect role also provide
opportunities for transparency about how the search engine ranks results.
This means that website editors can make more informed decisions in their content
management practices to ensure particular pages are more highly ranked (or
demoted) in results pages.
Involving the Information Architect in the development of existing and future Content
Management Systems will help ensure that well informed decisions are made about
content attributes such as metadata and taxonomy.
The ideal scenario involves the functionality of the University search engine and the
corporate CMS evolving in a coordinated fashion, with the strategy and operational
decisions available to managers of all other CMS publishing University content.
4.5 Technical considerations
Site search technical trends
The search providers that responded to our investigation4 for an alternative search
engine all have a similar core to their search product.
The core functions that each offer relate to:
1. How the search engine acts in relation to the website user experience, via
features that allow searches to be
a. pre-empted (auto population, correction)
b. assisted (filtering and faceting)
c. or, influenced (context sensitive search, spotlighting).
2. How the search engine reacts to or interprets content:
a. Ranking of results when searching for an associated term
b. Separating content types (videos, images, documents)
c. Separating content attributes (research, study, course)
In addition to the core functions, providers try to differentiate themselves by offering
a variety of tools to try to make them unique in the market. Given the University’s
content management practices and the current level of sophistication in its approach
to search management, it’s recommended that these be discounted.
4
See appendix 3 for a log of vendor engagement and responses
Neil Allison / Craig Middlemass
University Website Programme, Information Services
Website search requirements and considerations (UWS005)
Page 10 of 25
A complete list of terminology and functionality is included in the Glossary of Terms
(http://bit.ly/TYNHz3) on the UWS005 project website.
Best fit for the University
Most vendors cover all the core functions which the University is likely want to adopt
in order to improve the website user experience and to control the search results.
However, while the core functionality across the vendors considered is very similar,
the level of control for fine tuning (via, say, meta data management or search engine
configuration) varies.
Therefore, the level of resource the University is willing to invest to take advantage of
such controls, and to steer their use through strategic planning and user group
liaison, should be established prior to procuring a new search engine.
Criteria for selection
Assuming resource is made available to manage the search function as outlined in
Section 3, the procurement will need to be weighted in order to expose the main
differentiating factors of importance to the University. These are:
-
Cost of ownership
Ability to devolve editorial responsibility (to undertake the activity outlined in
Section 3)
Usability of the tool (bearing in mind the likely users at school and unit level –
see personas in Appendix 4)
4.6 Ongoing service cost estimates
Beyond the initial project that would be required to procure, install, configure and
pilot rollout of a search service, there would be a number of ongoing service costs as
outlined in the proposals above.
Activity
Search engine licence, plus hosting
Apps Support
Information Architect role
2nd line service support
1st line service support
School-based search management (as
outlined in the methodology in Section 2)
Resource commitment estimate
£90K - £200K5, plus server up to £20K
(for 5 years)
6-18 days per year
0.5FTE
0.2FTE
IS Helpline
6 days per year
Potentially additional projects could be initiated to focus on enhancing the search
experience of specific data sources6 such as PURE or the degree finders.
5
6
See Appendix 3 for breakdown of costs by vendor
See Appendix 5 for list of data sources engaged with during project
Neil Allison / Craig Middlemass
University Website Programme, Information Services
Website search requirements and considerations (UWS005)
Page 11 of 25
Roles involved
-
Technical resource managing – this role would mainly be fulfilled by IS
Production Management, essentially providing the infrastructure for running
the search engine including the day to day system management including:
o Hosting (if in-house hosting is the chosen approach)
o Application management
o Website integration
o Vendor liaison
-
Information Architect – this role could be integrated into the University
Website Programme team, effectively working as service provider and
business lead engaging on strategy and support for community. The role
should include:
o Overarching website search strategy development & implementation
o Service reporting
o Indexing management
o User group consultation & liaison
o CMS & other system liaison
o Interface development management
-
Service support – IS Helpline would be expected to handle first line support
with backup from the UWP if an unscripted problem was encountered (as is
the case for Polopoly and other associated services).
o User administration
o User training & support
o Service liaison with IS Production Management
-
Unit-based web managers
o Local website search strategy implementation
o See appendix 4 personas
Neil Allison / Craig Middlemass
University Website Programme, Information Services
Website search requirements and considerations (UWS005)
Page 12 of 25
5. Search engine procurement recommendation
It is recommended that the University does not proceed to procure a new search
engine to deliver its website search at this stage.
Given the University’s current level of active site search management, it is not
considered to be cost-effective to undertake a procurement exercise at this stage.
Instead, it is recommended that over the course of 2013, the University Website
Programme (acting in the role of Website Information Architect) proceeds to
implement the strategic and editorial recommendations made in Sections 2 & 3 of
this paper, and investigates (implementing where feasible) new search features
available within the Google service currently in use.
During the autumn of 2013, a review point should be set with a report produced for
the Website Governance Group that outlines the progress made (both with regard to
improvements in the search user experience and in the devolvement of
management) and the case, if appropriate, for procurement of a new search tool for
implementation in 2014-15.
Neil Allison / Craig Middlemass
University Website Programme, Information Services
Website search requirements and considerations (UWS005)
Page 13 of 25
6. 2012 site search overhaul project - Recommendations & lessons
learned
It was identified early in 2012 that the current website search, powered by the free
Google search service, was not a viable option for the future. The key driver for
change at this point was that this free search planted privacy invasive cookies on
website users’ devices, in contravention of new EU privacy legislation.
The decision was made to make an interim move to the paid Google-hosted search
service while the project generating this paper (UWS005) was undertaken to
propose a longer-term approach.
What had been anticipated to be a relatively straightforward switch uncovered a
number of issues, resulting in the changeover being delayed and additional
considerations being added to this proposal document.
The key issues arising:
-
Phone and email searches are largely unmanaged, and rely on code
developed in the late 1990s.
Limited understanding existed of their hosting and integration into website and
MyEd. Minimal work was done to enable the search engine changeover
project to proceed, but further work is required to ensure a more robust and
actively managed service in future.
It is recommended that regardless of decisions on a website search management
model and search tool, a project be undertaken to:
-
Fully understand how phone and email search work
Develop the searches sufficiently to be able to handover to a service
management team
Identify a service management team to take responsibility and resource
appropriately to undertake this role
Neil Allison / Craig Middlemass
University Website Programme, Information Services
Website search requirements and considerations (UWS005)
Page 14 of 25
Appendix 1 – Current search experience
New site search from January 2013
The introduction of a paid Google search, and limited technical development provided by the University Website
Programme resulted in significant improvements to the search interface and user experience.
Neil Allison / Craig Middlemass
University Website Programme, Information Services
Website search requirements and considerations (UWS005)
Page 15 of 25
Appendix 2 – Potential future website user experience
To illustrate the potential of an actively managed search engine (both at the centre
and in schools and units) and well integrated key data sources, the following
potential user experience has been mocked up.
In the absence of a ratified strategy for search promotion, this experience assumes
the University wishes to prioritise content relating to postgraduate student
recruitment, research staff activity and news. It also assumes that the School of
Economics is prioritising PhD recruitment and promotion of its research.
With each screenshot, the user journey is described, along with the likely
requirements to deliver it.
A prospective PhD student interested in game theory…
1. Arrives at the School of Economics home page, and decides to search for
“game theory”
Neil Allison / Craig Middlemass
University Website Programme, Information Services
Website search requirements and considerations (UWS005)
Page 16 of 25
2. The student is presented with search results from across the University
website by default.
A feature box promotes postgraduate study opportunities whenever relevant
search results are available, using data from the Degree Finder.
The Institute of Applied Economics is prioritised ahead of natural search results
as the most appropriate organisational unit.
Academic staff most relevant to the search term are drawn from PURE, with the
opportunity to view more results.
Most recent news articles relevant to the search term are drawn from (potentially)
multiple sources.
Neil Allison / Craig Middlemass
University Website Programme, Information Services
Website search requirements and considerations (UWS005)
Page 17 of 25
3. The student switches to the ‘Just Economics’
Content is now drawn only from the website
www.ed.ac.uk/schools-departments/economics
The School promotes PhD study opportunities whenever a relevant search term
is used and also maps specific search terms to its research units meaning that
the first natural result is placed third.
School staff are prioritised in the right hand column, as for the whole University
search but the School chooses to link to a full list of staff hosted on their website
rather than link to a staff search of PURE data. (This might be because a PURE
staff search on “game theory” also returns staff from the Business School, Maths
and Informatics.)
The School also chooses to promote its programme of lectures, workshops and
public engagement events drawing data from a local source system.
Neil Allison / Craig Middlemass
University Website Programme, Information Services
Website search requirements and considerations (UWS005)
Page 18 of 25
4. Before choosing a result from the School of Economics, the student
explores the additional results available to him.
The use of a dropdown list here is for illustrative purposes only, and probably not the
best way to present additional search options.
Research Explorer and Jobs are distinct data sources with their own search engines
indexing them. Using a corporate web search tool as illustrated:


Could potentially bring additional search functionality not present currently
Would definitely enhance the user experience by not requiring them to visit a
specific starting point within the website to conduct a particular kind of search.
‘Courses, fees and funding’ could potentially amalgamate multiple data sources to
pull together search results of priority information for prospective students.
The Library already operates several specialist search solutions that the corporate
web search would be highly unlikely to better. However, it may be desirable to
provide an initial view on Library resources via the search box present on every web
page.
Neil Allison / Craig Middlemass
University Website Programme, Information Services
Website search requirements and considerations (UWS005)
Page 19 of 25
Appendix 3 - Search vendors engagement & investigation
Market research was carried out to identify potential vendors of an alternative search
engine.
Twelve vendors were identified and asked for information about their search engine.
Five of these responded with sufficient information to assist in the analysis for this
paper and all are viable suppliers of a new search engine.
One open source option is included; while there are no licencing costs there will be
implications of taking on an open source solution, including development,
maintenance and tuning all having to be completed by University staff, with no
supplier support.
Two of the suppliers (Attivio and Funnelback) displayed noticeable enthusiasm to
work with the University and work on a road map to define what the University needs
right now to get started and looking for the future to fuller search engine use.
Engagement with public sector networks
In addition, questions we posted to UK & US Higher Education and UK Local
Government web management discussion groups. Here we asked about the search
tool they were using, how they were managing it and how satisfied they were.
Responses were limited with two very enthusiastic endorsements of Funnelback
from universities. Most reported moving away from Google services as a result of
review exercises.
Questions posed to search engine vendors
The following suppliers were all contacted about their products and asked to respond
to a number of questions related to their search offering:
1. Details of your search engine and how content management (including
creation of metadata) can be used to drive search results including prioritising
content
2. How to use facetted searches in order to narrow down or separate search
results based on the type of information and source (e.g. news items from the
University versus research data from our library system).
3. What analytical reporting does your search engine provide and how could we
use this in a continuous review of our content and common search results
4. A rough indication of charging structure and cost for using your search engine
(e.g. onsite vs hosted and flat rate vs pay per search)
5. An outline of your licensing (e.g. should we purchase the search engine for
use on the main University website and then expand it to cover searches on
intranets for schools within the University would this incur an increase in
licence fee).
Neil Allison / Craig Middlemass
University Website Programme, Information Services
Website search requirements and considerations (UWS005)
Page 20 of 25
Vendors engaged
The following table details the search engine vendors approached and the nature of
their response.
Search Provider
Letter
Sent
Website
Respons
e
Received
Endeca Information
Discovery (EID)
http://www.oracle.com/partners/index.ht
ml
Yes
Yes
Attivio
http://www.attivio.com/
Yes
Yes
Autonomy
http://www.autonomy.com/
Yes
No
Amazon
Cloudsearch
http://aws.amazon.com/cloudsearch/
Yes
No
Google Search
Appliance
http://www.google.com/intl/en_uk/enterpr
Yes
ise/search/
Bing
Yes
Yes
No
Funnelback
http://www.funnelback.com/home
Yes
Yes
Vivismo
http://vivisimo.com/
Yes
Yes
Ask Partner Network http://apn.ask.com/
Yes
No
Yahoo / Altavista
Altavista closed business now operated
by Yahoo
Yes
No
Lycos
http://info.lycos.com/about/contact-us
Failed
N/A
N/A
Apache Solr
http://lucene.apache.org/solr/
N/A
Thunderstone
(Open
source)
http://www.thunderstone.com/texis/site/p
Yes
ages/
(Open source)
In
Progress
Neil Allison / Craig Middlemass
University Website Programme, Information Services
Website search requirements and considerations (UWS005)
Page 21 of 25
Summary of vendor responses
Of the vendors that responded to our approach, the following table summarises the
key considerations and costs (as currently understood) of their service.
Vendor
Endeca Attivio
Funnelback Google
Hosted7
Core
Function8
Licence
Model
Yes
Yes
Peak
Load
Based
Hosted or In
in house
House
Estimated £123k
Licence
Cost
Estimated £27k
Renewal
per
Fee
annum
Estimated N/A
Hosted
Cost
Our
£20k
hosting
cost
Total 5
£278k
year cost
Yes
Yes
Negotiable No of pages
indexed
In House
In House9
Google
Vivisimo
Search
Appliance
Yes
Yes
No of
No of
Searches pages
indexed
Hosted
In House
Solr
Yes
Capacity of Open
Information Source
index
In House
In
House
TBC
N/A
Negotiable £45k
N/A
N/A
Negotiable £9k per
annum
N/A
£10k after
2 years
TBC
N/A
N/A
N/A
£34k per
annum
N/A
TBC
N/A
£20k
£20k
£4k10
N/A
TBC
£20k
£174k
£124k11
£xxx,xxx
+ server
Dev +
Server
Negotiable £110k
+ server
7
This is the current model the University of Edinburgh is operating.
See section 3.5 for an overview of core functions
9 Funnelback also offer a hosted service. Costs of this have not been clarified at this stage.
10 Currently paying £2k for a single virtual machine but this will expand to 2 machines to provide a test
environment.
11 Based on Google Search Appliance GSA GB-7007-2M-EU (£94,000 for appliance and 2 years’
worth of support).
8
Neil Allison / Craig Middlemass
University Website Programme, Information Services
Website search requirements and considerations (UWS005)
Page 22 of 25
Appendix 4 – University user group personas
As the managers of local search experience will also be the managers of school and
unit websites, the Polopoly user group personas below provide a good illustration of
the participants in a future devolved search management network.
Unit-based web managers have a range of time, influence, skills and experience:
-
-
-
Annabel: Non-specialist, time-poor, with limited awareness of or influence on,
business objectives. The majority of the University web publishing community.
In some units, the role of web manager or lead publisher falls to Annabel.
Colin: Has a significant proportion of their time given over to internal and/or
internal communications. Not necessarily technically adept, but a competent
user of systems with a good understanding of what the business is trying to
achieve with its online presence and other communications channels. Likely
to have an influence over the approach taken.
Terry: Technical specialist who would typically look to minimise their
involvement in low-tech and day-to-day web related activities. Potentially has
some awareness or interest in what the business is trying to achieve, but not
necessarily from a communications or marketing perspective.
CMS User personas – developed and used by the University Website Programme to inform
discussion and decisions around user support and technical development
Neil Allison / Craig Middlemass
University Website Programme, Information Services
Website search requirements and considerations (UWS005)
Page 23 of 25
Appendix 5 – University data sources
During the analysis a number of University data sources were identified as being
providers of information that contribute to the University’s strategic goals.
An IS Business Analyst contacted each of the data source owners to see if they had
thought about how their content could be better represented by the University search
engine.
Of the 16 data sources identified 7 were willing to actively engage with the project
and provided a useful insight into what their systems provided and any limitations
they were currently facing with their own search engine.
Engagement primarily took place via email and phone, with one face-to-face meeting
attended by representatives of Communications & Marketing, PURE and DRPS.
A number of issues arose from the discussion with data source owners that have a
direct impact on any new search engine, most notable:




The existing publishing mechanism for the degree finder loses meta data in
the transfer, this has the impact of making all the meta data the same for all
content limiting the ability to influence search result beyond the name of the
degree (no meta data)
The DRPS has good quality meta data but lacks reference to academic year
of the course or published date as such the search engine treats historic and
current courses in equal regard (incomplete meta data)
PURE contains lots of meta data but the search engine offers very limited
filtering and no faceting of results therefore devaluing the meta data on offer
(no search engine fine tuning)
The Events calendar from CAM is based on Google calendar entries and as
such is not currently searchable (incompatible source data)
Issues such as these show that the introduction of a new search engine in itself will
not necessarily bring significant improvements to the search experience of these
important data sources.
A well configured and actively managed search will mitigate the impact of some of
these challenges, but it will only be through the evolution of data sources, changes in
web publishing methods and actively managed relationships, that the real benefit of
this content will be realised.
While this project is not tasked with bringing data sources up to a minimum spec in
order to exploit a new search engine, the role of Information Architect will need to
engage with the data source owners and potential raise future developments to
leverage the benefits of a new search engine.
The following list details the data sources identified as having important information
that could be presented or discovered via a customised search engine.
Neil Allison / Craig Middlemass
University Website Programme, Information Services
Website search requirements and considerations (UWS005)
Page 24 of 25
System
PURE - Edinburgh
Research Explorer
www.research.ed.ac.uk
Summary of Content & Functionality
Search engine for:





Searchabl
e across
University
website
Mostly
Research staff
Projects
Events*
Press
Activities
*Events are the only facet of their search that does not
appear on the University web search.
Research explorer for PURE is targeted toward discovery
of content rather than searching.
PURE contains lots of tags (metadata) but suffers from
limited filtering and no faceting of search results.
Main Library Catalogue Search for library resources
www.catalogue.lib.ed.a
Search engine TBC
c.uk
No
Edinburgh Research
Archive
www.era.lib.ed.ac.uk
Search through research publications
Yes
Edinburgh Research
and Innovation
Search of:
www.researchinnovation.ed.ac.uk
(externally facing)
Current uses basic Google search






External Site
- Yes
research publications
projects
consultancy and facilities
Company formation
technology licensing
R&D collaborations
Polopoly Site
- No
www.ed.ac.uk/schoolsCurrently uses basic Google search
departments/edinburgh
-research-innovation
There are two facets of ERI, the externally available
(for University staff)
publications and Polopoly-driven EDLAN-only content for
staff (the internal site is not currently searchable)
Experts Directory
Used by Public Relations team for contacts on experts in a No
particular fields of study
New Archive
Complete library of new publications.
Yes
http://www.ed.ac.uk/ne
ws/all-news/archive
Neil Allison / Craig Middlemass
University Website Programme, Information Services
Website search requirements and considerations (UWS005)
Page 25 of 25
System
Events Calendar
www.ed.ac.uk/news/ev
ents/latest
Summary of Content & Functionality
Date ordered view of all events with minimal detail and
links to main material.
Searchabl
e across
University
website
No
Currently pulled data from Google Calendar
Not searchable
Jobs (old www.jobs.ed.ac.uk)
Old Jobs appear in the University search results, although
the new vacancies do not (old links are repointed to the
new site).
No
Degree Regulations
and Programme of
Study
EUCLID driven publishing, uses a Google search at
present, not customised.
Yes
Scholarship and
Student Funding
Services
Search of:
No
(new https://www.vacancies.
ed.ac.uk/)
Scholarships and bursaries based on level of study,
nationality and subject area
A-Z listing of scholarships some for schools, some
external
Degree Finders (online
prospectuses)
Undergraduate:
www.ed.ac.uk/studying/
undergraduate/degrees
Undergraduate, Postgraduate and Visiting student
prospectuses are distinct databases.



Yes
UG: Search by course title or UCAS code
PG: Filter by school
Visiting: Filter by field content
Postgraduate:
Results are searchable from the main University website
www.ed.ac.uk/studying/ but are generally outperformed by other content unless
postgraduate/degrees
search by specific degree title or ucas code as the
publishing route currently strips out meta data.
Visiting:
www.ed.ac.uk/studying/
visitingexchange/course-finder
Full details of the discussions with the data source providers is available on the
UWS005 project website (http://bit.ly/14vyQU1)
Neil Allison / Craig Middlemass
University Website Programme, Information Services
Website search requirements and considerations (UWS005)