Introduction to Search with Sphinx

Preface

I can’t quite believe it, but just 10 years ago there was no Google.

Other web search engines were around back then, such as AltaVista, HotBot, Inktomi, and AllTheWeb, among others. So the stunningly swift ascendance of Google can settle in my mind, given some effort. But what’s even more unbelievable is that just 20 years ago there were no web search engines at all. That’s only logical, because there was barely any Web! But it’s still hardly believable today.

The world is rapidly changing. The volume of information available and the connection bandwidth that gives us access to that information grows substantially every year, making all the kinds—and volumes!—of data increasingly accessible. A 1-million-row database of geographical locations, which was mind-blowing 20 years ago, is now something a fourth-grader can quickly fetch off the Internet and play with on his netbook. But the processing rate at which human beings can consume information does not change much (and said fourth-grader would still likely have to read complex location names one syllable at a time). This inevitably transforms searching from something that only eggheads would ever care about to something that every single one of us has to deal with on a daily basis.

Where does this leave the application developers for whom this book is written? Searching changes from a high-end, optional feature to an essential functionality that absolutely has to be provided to end users. People trained by Google no longer ...