Guided Exploration™ makes interaction with large amounts of information easier. It helps you to find what you need faster and with greater accuracy. Guided Exploration also provides insight into large collections of information. This text presents some of the challenges faced by professionals who depend on information to accomplish their goals and the ways in which Guided Exploration steps up to face those challenges. A more light-hearted introduction to Guided Exploration is available as well.

The challenge

Traditional search is insufficient

Currently, finding information depends on one of two things:

• you have to know where the information is physically located, or
• you have to know one or more keywords that appear in the information

Even worse, traditional search engines generally assume that you already know exactly what you are looking for, while you may only have a broad concept in mind and prefer to refine it as you progress. You have to deal with so much information - much of it from sources not under your control - that it has become virtually impossible to find the relevant information in a timely manner using traditional browsers and search engines.

Information overload

If there is one certainty about the future, it is that the amount of information you use will only increase. The information will come from more and more sources and while most of it may be relevant to you in a general sense, only some of it is relevant at any given time or for any given task. Even now you are expected to use information to accomplish your goals, yet you spend most of your time digging for the details you need, while simultaneously trying to keep enough distance to see the big picture.

The solution

Searching and finding

Guided Exploration is a new way of finding information that helps you find what you need by letting you explore key characteristics of the information, one step at a time. At each step of the process you are presented with context-sensitive options that guide you to the relevant results faster, without ever leading you down a path to zero results.

Insight and overview

Guided Exploration not only helps you find what you need more quickly, it also provides insight into the structure of the information sources, which often leads to interesting discoveries and new opportunities. In addition, Guided Exploration provides high-level visual overviews that help you understand the big picture and derive knowledge from the relations between various information sources.

More information...

Learn more about how Guided Exploration works and what the benefits of using it are for you and your organization.