Industry News: Wilson Debuts Completely Revamped Searching System

The H.W. Wilson Company is releasing a revamped version of its core WilsonWeb database product. The company reports that the product has been completely rebuilt in order to meet the current information needs of its audience. "We didn't have the flexibility with the old system to add a lot of the new features that we needed: we couldn't do full-text searching, we were struggling with improving the thesaurus, we couldn't customize the interface like we'll be able to now. It really brings us up to speed," WilsonWeb's Product Manager Bernie Seiler told LJ. These new features include:

• WilsonLink (SFX) service, which will help libraries to integrate their electronic database collections.
• customization of the interface through the Administrative module. The library will be able to create user classes, customize text in buttons, add the library logo to screens, control access to the system, and add three possible links for their own use.
• dynamic holdings link to the library's OPAC;
• easy multifile searching;
• relevancy ranking option for search results;
• full text searching;
• powerful new thesaurus for every Wilson database; and
• search history improvements that let users save their searches on Wilson's computer for later use.

This is the first major recast of the product. "We've done updates all along but we've gotten about as much as we can out of the old interface, so this is our first real major improvement in a while," Seiler said. He added that the revision has been in the works for several years.

One of the pillars of the new WilsonWeb is the Verity search engine, which Seiler said specializes in searching unstructured data like that found on the Internet. "What we've done is layer that with the Wilson search engines that are intended for structured data, so the combination of the two develops terrific results. It's really allowing us to pull up our information in a way we couldn't do before."

The first database to feature the new technology should be available by the end of June. "We expect to bring out the other databases quickly thereafter." The new WilsonWeb will be on view at the upcoming American Library Association Annual Conference in Atlanta.