Computerworld and other trade journals report on the new WebFocus intelligent Search offering from Information Builders. WebFocus Intelligent search feeds content from enterprise databases and other structured sources via Information Builders' cross-repository report building tools into a Google Search Appliance to allow enterprise users to get business intelligence from these sources as easily as they do from enterprise Web servers and the open Web. The key to the system is their iWay Enterprise Index that monitors and transforms content from structured sources into a form that can be indexed by the Google Search Appliance. This setup can also handle custom queries for content that's not cached in a pre-built report, so raw data can be transformed on demand into content for search results. That's a pretty neat trick from a company that's been around for decades with one of the most widely used report generation software packages in the world.

It's also a very interesting inroad for Google, which has had some success in indexing enterprise Web content with its search appliances but has not been a major player to date in the push towards integrating structured and unstructured enterprise content for unified search solutions. Advanced integration tools from other suppliers may offer better architectures and more ability to integrate other sources and publish content in more varieties of forms. But this combination of a very widely known report generating tool with the search interface most widely accepted by users is likely to appeal to companies that don't want to give up established tools while they push to develop integrated business intelligence solutions. Content providers take note, there are many platforms to consider as potential points of integration for business intelligence - and not all of them are the tech leaders that typically roll off of our tongues these days.