Apache Lucene Eurocon

UK Software Company TwigKit Partners with TNR Global to Deliver Search Solutions for FAST and Solr

Hadley, MA–November 28, 2011–TNR Global announced today that they have entered into a strategic partnership with London, UK software company TwigKit.

“Our companies have a number of qualities in common that allow us to combine forces and service clients with a very complete solution” says Karen Lynn, TNR Global’s Director of Business Development. “TwigKit has a very appealing user interface for users across several platforms, and TNR’s strength is on creating a powerful back end search application. Combined, it’s a powerful solution for companies needing a strong search function with an easy to use interface.”

Representatives from the two companies have been in friendly talks for over a year now, meeting periodically at industry conferences. Both companies were in attendance at the Apache Lucene EuroCon conference in Barcelona last October, where the partnership was formalized. Both presentations from TwigKit and TNR can be viewed here.

“TNR’s focus on implementing and servicing enterprise search solutions across a number of platforms is an excellent fit for TwigKit,” says Stefan Olafsson, TwigKit’s co-founder and chief architect. “Our software enables polished user interfaces for search-based applications, provides a rapid development framework, and works across a number of enterprise search platforms including Microsoft FAST and Apache Solr. We’re excited about working with TNR to produce search solutions that boast both a superb user experience and an outstanding technical implementation.”

TwigKit powers enterprise search applications in government and blue-chip organizations. Encapsulating search best practices into configurable components, TwigKit establishes a platform-independent standard compatible with most search technologies including Microsoft FAST, Google Search Appliance, and Apache Solr. Started in London in 2009, TwigKit’s founders organize the 350-member Enterprise Search London meetup, regularly speak at conferences, and write about search and user experience for publications including A List Apart, Boxes & Arrows, and UX Magazine.

TNR Global (TNR) is a systems design and integration company focused on enterprise search and cloud computing solutions. TNR develops scalable web-based search solutions built on the open source LAMP stack. TNR has over 10 years of hands-on experience in web systems and enterprise search implementations, both proprietary and open source search technologies, specializing in FAST and Lucene Solr search applications. Specifically TNR works with content intensive websites for companies and organizations in the following industries: News Sites, Publishing, Web Directories, Information Portals, Web Catalogs, Education, Manufacturing and Distribution, Customer Service, and Life Sciences. TNR Global has offices in western Massachusetts.

TNR Global Attends KMWorld’s Enterprise Search Summit Fall 2011

A proof of concept and rapid integration are essential for search customers–they cannot visualize what a search solution will look like without some help from the search professional.

Last week TNR Global attended the Enterprise Search Summit organized by KMWorld in Washington, DC. VP of Search Technologies Michael McIntosh and Director of Business Development Karen E. Lynn attended the three day conference and Enterprise Solutions Showcase at the Marriott Wardman Park. Several companies were in attendance, and some common themes emerged. Among these were designing for users, dealing with unstrcutured content, the need for better search and content analytics to facilitate better search results, as well as tagging content as part of a best practice in workflow. Also discussed was the need for search vendors to demonstrate to search customers was “right looks like” in a search solution. A proof of concept and rapid integration are essential for search customers–they cannot visualize what a search solution will look like without some help from the search professional.

An unexpected surprise came when the speaker on open source search was unable to attend at the last moment, our own Michael McIntosh was asked to step in and present on the subject. Fortunately, he was fresh from his presentation at Apache Lucene EuroCon and already had his presentation loaded on his machine. Michael discussed Solr and made general points on migrating from a commercial search engine like FAST ESP to a open source platform like Lucene Solr.

Overall it was a great conference with lots of informative talks and friendly search professionals. We’re looking forward to the next Enterprise Search Summit in Spring, 2012.

We’re at Apache Lucene EuroCon in Barcelona 2011

“We’re certain that the urgency to migrate off FAST ESP will be ramping up significantly.”

We’re very excited to be in attendance at the Apache Lucene EuroCon in Barcelona October 17, 18, 19, and 20th, 2011. Our own Michael McIntosh, VP of Search Technologies will be presenting a talk on October 19th, Enterprise Search: FAST ESP to Lucene Solr. The good folks at Lucid Imagination are presenting the conference and will be video recording his talk for future broadcast.

After the conference, Michael will author a White Paper on migrating from FAST ESP to Lucene Solr, expected in November 2011. For a free copy of the White Paper, email us expressing your interest at fast2solr@tnrglobal.com. We believe that those businesses operating on a Linux system will be seeking out the power of Lucene Solr as their licenses expire and support for FAST ESP dries up. We’ve worked with FAST ESP for 7 years and understand it’s strengths and weaknesses. We know businesses who are used to the power of FAST ESP will need something just as powerful, and Lucene Solr is a very nice fit. “It’s a robust platform, capable of a lot that FAST ESP covers,” said Michael. “We’re certain that the urgency to migrate off FAST ESP will be ramping up significantly.”

TNR Global to present at Apache Lucene Eurocon 2011 in Barcelona

We are happy to announce that TNR Global’s own Michael McIntosh will be presenting at the Apache Lucene Eurocon 2011 in Barcelona this October. Michael’s talk is titled “Enterprise Search: FAST ESP to Lucene Solr.” His presentation will discuss migration from the FAST ESP platform to a Lucene Solr search platform. There are many reasons an IT department with a large scale search installation would want to move from a proprietary platform to Lucene Solr. In the case of FAST Search, the company’s purchase by Microsoft and discontinuation of the Linux platform has created an urgency for FAST users. Illustrated through actual case studies, the presentation will include challenges and concerns, present solutions and work-arounds to overcome migration issues.

Michael has more than 16 years of experience in large scale systems design and operation, online consumer product development, high volume transaction processing and engineering management. He has extensive experience developing, integrating and maintaining search technology solutions for companies such as FAST Search and Lycos.

We’re excited that Michael will be presenting in Barcelona this fall. Please introduce yourself if you’re able to go!