Thanks for the comments.

1. Yes, you are right in the sense that WIMP will not die that easily and it should not because it does offer significant productivity improvements.

2. I am only arguing that Search could be a unifying metaphor for the various app silos in the Enterprise. Its not necessary that it has to be one button. Therefore, when you use Onebox search, you can do simple searches and using Advanced Search you can do slightly more advanced searches. The search string I used in my PSFK example was generated using Google’s advanced search page, i didnt have to remember it.

3. I was talking about IBM’s Information Integrator in the context of Adventnet SQLOne type of approoach. It allows you to create a federated query that runs across several information stores and bring back the information.

Interesting debate again.

Perhaps, it is my fault – I take the word “one box search” literally and all my past comments (and this one too) is based on that. And anytime I hear any kind of thing becoming dead in the S/W industry, it always seems to come back in a different shape or form.

1. I almost agree that “all OLTP apps have become silos or islands of information or fiefdoms“. I would just change “all” to “almost all”. I believe that with the evolution of SOA and mashups, end-users will have the ability to develop sit-apps by putting together services created by IT organizations. This would be one way to destruct the silos – exposing capabilities as services. UIs can be put together by end-users based on the services.

2. In the example, the minute I have to press the “Advanced Search” button, it is not “one button search” anymore!! In the blogsearch example you gave, I certainly would not want to remember the syntax for the search string – “inblogtitle:PSFK inpostauthor:Sukumar blogurl:http://www.psfk.com/”. So, I would end up using the “Advanced Search” button. And I would certainly like a pointer device (mouse in this case) to navigate the text boxes in the “Advanced Search” window. I as software professional would not want to remember the syntax. So, in your example, I would certainly not expect the Order Entry Clerk or Financial Analyst remember the syntax for his/her search. I do agree that for _very basic_ searches, one-box could be the way to go.

3. I do not understand the relevance of “one-box” search with solutions such as IBM’s “Information Integrator”. This like lots of their software is a middleware that lets one aggregate/integrate data (both structured and unstructured) across multiple-disparate repositories. It provides a way to unify data and let a single search gather data from the various repositories. The UI/veneer for these searches could be anything – one-box or not.

Ganesh