2 Getting Started with Oracle Ultra Search

Overview

This chapter provides information about getting started with Oracle Ultra Search. A case study is featured that describes installation and use of Oracle Ultra Search. It enables you to create a browser-based search application to query data sources.

The example uses a fictional customer service call center named Ultra Appliance, Inc. Ultra Appliance is a retail company that sells and supports hundreds of different appliances from dozens of manufacturers nationwide. Customers contact the customer service call center every day to receive technical Help for, and assistance with, an appliance.

This chapter describes how the Ultra Appliance search administrator, can set up a browser-based search application that enables call center agents to find information for appliances that they support. It also describes how you, as the Ultra Appliance call center agent, can use Oracle Ultra Search to query the company intranet and database.

Ultra Appliance call center agents must access a variety of online resources to provide the information needed by the customer. In this example, the Ultra Appliance call center agents have access to two types of information:

• An intranet that contains documents on Web pages with detailed information about appliances sold and serviced by Ultra Appliance.

• A database that contains information about previous maintenance issues and solutions for appliances sold and serviced by Ultra Appliance.

For this example, the Ultra Appliance call center agents search the company intranet and the problem database for information and any issues associated with, the Springmaster 2000 refrigerator.

Installation

This section gives a brief overview of installation of Oracle Ultra Search. For further installation information, refer to Chapter 4, "Installing Oracle Ultra Search" in this book. See the Oracle Universal Installer Concepts Guide for detailed installation instructions.

$ORACLE_HOME/bin/searchctl start

http://your_computer.com:http_port/ultrasearch/admin/index.jsp 

$ORACLE_HOME/oc4j/j2ee/OC4J_SEARCH/config/http-web-site.xml

Setting up the Query Application

Oracle Ultra Search provides APIs with which you can build customized, J2EE query applications. Oracle Ultra Search also includes an application of this sort.

To set up the query application, do the following steps, using your own set of values for the host name, the port, and the SID:

1. Add the following entry to the ORACLE_HOME/oc4j/j2ee/OC4J_SEARCH/config/data-sources.xml file:

   <connection-pool 
      name="UltraSearchCPool" 
      max-connections="100" 
      used-connection-wait-timeout="60" 
      inactivity-timeout="600" 
      property-check-interval="60"> 
      <connection-factory factory-class="oracle.jdbc.pool.OracleDataSource" 
         user="{username}" 
         password="{password}" 
         url="jdbc:oracle:thin:@{hostname}:{listener_port}:{database_SID}"/> 
   </connection-pool> 
   <managed-data-source name="UltraSearchDS" 
      connection-pool-name="UltraSearchCPool" 
      jndi-name="jdbc/UltraSearchPooledDS"/>
   
   

2. If you have started the Oracle Ultra Search middle tier to access the Oracle Ultra Search administration application, then you must restart it, with the query application now configured to use the query application:

   $ORACLE_HOME/bin/searchctl stop
   $ORACLE_HOME/bin/searchctl start
   
   

After the middle tier has been started, you can access the query application with an HTML browser pointed to:

http://your_computer.com:http_port/ultrasearch/query/search.jsp.  

At the end of the installation, find http_port on the Oracle Universal Installer screen. You can find out the value of http_port by looking at:

$ORACLE_HOME/oc4j/j2ee/OC4J_SEARCH/config/http-web-site.xml