FAST ESP: Feature Snapshot - Vedant Kulshreshtha - Site Home

FAST ESP is a feature rich search platform; no doubt about that. To give my readers, especially SharePoint 2007 developers/architects, an idea of what it provides, given below are some of FAST ESP features in an alphabetical order:

Capability	Description
Advanced Linguistics	Match against dictionaries, synonyms and thesauri (all configurable). Anti-phrase
Advanced Query Processing	Support wide variety of query string functions including wildcards, include/exclude, query term weighting, parenthesis and ranges of values Ensure all relevant results get returned through features like stemming, lemmatization, spell check, phrase detection, case/accent sensitivity, and dictionary/synonym match Aid keyword identification with autocomplete and suggestions Pinpoint search to text or metadata and document sections (e.g., title, summary)
Advanced Results Processing	De-dup results list. Options for results ordering (by rank, by date, by distance etc..) Teasers (static or dynamic) and highlight hits within results list Numeric and visual interpretation of results set such as count, histogram, tag clouds Segment results by source, content type or other classification
Boost/Block Results	Boost individual pieces of content or content categories within results set. Boosting may be absolute or relative Block types of content from appearing in results set
Content Enrichment	Pass metadata or enhance metadata (automated) at time of index
Content/Source Support	Make unstructured content (e.g., PDFs, HTML, ASCII, video) and structured content (e.g., RDBMS, XML) searchable
Contextual Navigation	Navigation elements based on defined taxonomies or facets, identified entities (e.g., person's name, company name) and/or topics (e.g., health) interpreted within the search results set Limit navigation choices to those relevant to returned result set (dynamic navigation)
Entity Extraction	Identify/tag entities (e.g., company names), topics and summaries within content Customize for industry or user base
Incremental Indexing	Allows updates to the index to be available for search in almost no time
Query Analytics	Monitor and report on query behavior
Related Links/View Similar	Provide links to content that is similar to a document, based on document vector analysis
Relevancy Tuning	Tune the algorithm that ranks results Define factors and weights used for calculating relevancy Create multiple profiles for ranking
Scale	FAST scales in 3 dimensions: content, query traffic (QPS), and index latency
Search-Driven Portals	Develop portals driven by search that combine mini search results lists (“searchlets”), each with its own source, results list and relevancy model Tailor searched content and "push search results" to audience, role or topic. Provide synthesis of information such as charts, histograms, etc on search results
Security	Enforce content-level security
User Experience Control	Configure and manage the user experience with a variety of tools such as relevancy tuning, dictionary/synonym/thesaurus management, search profile management and customizable UI

Using the FAST ESP Add-Ons you can enable following features:

Capability	Description	Add-On
Advertising Network	Administer your own advertising network for contextual ads	FAST AdMomentum
Data Cleansing	Cleanse, normalize and standardize data (e.g., product information) coming from multiple sources or external parties Unify view of data for a single entity (e.g., 360 customer view across all data sources)	FAST Data Cleansing
Feature Content/ Promote Products	Spotlight individual content pieces (e.g., new report), products or services based on keywords and context of user’s search	FAST Featured Content / Impulse
Federated Search	Unify results from multiple sources, both internal (e.g., other business units) and external (e.g., partner content, general web results) Merge results set (Deep Federation) or keep results separated by source	FAST Unity
Geo Targeting	Narrow search results and tailor experience based on explicitly defined or interpreted geographic location Show distance of result from geographic point	FAST GeoSearch
Mobile	Provide search experience tailored to mobile device Limit search to mobile-friendly formatted sites. Pinpoint geography and tailor experience. Match experience to particular mobile device	FAST Active Mobile
Topic Monitoring	Allow users to monitor information over time – changes, trends – through saved searches	FAST Monitored Content

The text above is abridged for a blog post. I will cover some of these in more details in future posts.

Let me know your thoughts on the feature set. As a SharePoint developer/user, which feature excites you most? What feature is missing? Which feature would you like me to cover in more detail?