Federated Search

I recently attended the LIANZA conference held in Rotorua and had the good fortune to attend a session by Andy Neale of the National Library of New Zealand.

Andy spoke persuasively about the need to rationally assess what we are attempting to accomplish with our available resources. His main points were to identify the largest target group who’s needs must be addressed. Address those needs using as small a resource as possible and be clever about this – don’t reinvent stuff as it is likely that there is something out there that will work for you…

He cited using Google Coop as a federated seach engine which could well meet most needs in this area... (also see a Proof of concept for Google federating here...)

If you satisfy this group you will properly have met the needs of many others as well. This strategy will hopefully leave you with some capacity to target strategically important areas...