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Winning company: Google
Winning product: Google search appliance
In what used to be a category strictly applied to storage gear, we now include new and interesting products that can help enterprises navigate data sitting on storage gear. The Google Search Appliance - our winner in this newly designated Information Management category - is a case in point.
Our test showed that Google has successfully packaged its popular Internet search technology into an easy-to-use search engine for corporate intranets and public-facing business sites. However, the new enterprise-focused Google Search Appliance could use a bit of polish to make it more appealing to veteran network professionals.
Network World Lab Alliance partner Thomas Powell gave the search tool 4.35 out of 5 points, saying the appliance is easy to configure and maintain. He also liked it because of the underlying, highly accurate, crawler-driven engine. The crawler is capable of indexing 220 types of content. "We saw no limitation in the crawler and found that the device tended to discover files that we were not aware of in some test data sets," Powell notes.
Since we tested the appliance last summer, Google released updated versions of the box focused on performance and scalability. All appliance models received enhancements in crawl speed, processing and query volumes, while the clustered models (specifically the GB-5005 and GB-8008) also were upgraded to support greater document capacities.
Google says it will roll out another software upgrade later this year aimed at improving the user experience. The upgrade should improve search quality and speed, increase the types of searchable content, and boost the types of authentication and authorization systems with which the appliance can interoperate, the company says.
Google's Enterprise division experienced strong market growth last year, amassing about 50 new customer installations. Among corporate users are the city of Toronto, in Canada; DuPont, ING, Ingersoll Rand and the Ministry of Defense in the United Kingdom.
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Copyright 2008 Network World Inc.
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RE: Best Products: Information management By David Swift on August 6, 2008, 4:27 pm Reply | Read entire comment How much do they sell for?
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