Case Study: Implementing Search for the Government of Ontario Scott Gow Federation Standards & Guidance Coordinator E-Government Branch Office of the Corporate Chief Strategist Government of Ontario Presentation to Information Resource Management Association of Canada November 19, 2003

2© Queen’s Printer for Ontario, 2003 Overview  Brief History of the Web in Ontario  The Ontario Web Landscape  Our Users  User Expectations  New Direction  Enterprise Strategy for Portals  Implementing Search  Analysis and Design  Implementation: Before and After Comparison  Next Steps  Other Initiatives  The Need for Standards and Guidance  Questions?

3© Queen’s Printer for Ontario, 2003 A Brief History of the Web in Ontario Government of Ontario Central Internet ( Established in 1996 Serves as “front door” to Ontario government news, services and information 750,674 visitors in March 2003, generating 44,261,763 hits Initiatives underway to integrate site into portal technologies, improve search, etc. Move towards customized information presentation

4© Queen’s Printer for Ontario, 2003 A Brief History of the Web in Ontario Ontario Government Internet Growth 1996-present Central site usage consistently growing  200 Public-facing sites today Content spread across several ministries, agencies and other organizations Diverse levels of skills across OPS Basic content and metadata standards

5© Queen’s Printer for Ontario, 2003 The Ontario Web Landscape Canadians Visiting the Government ComScore Media Metrix, May 2003 Avg. Minutes per Visitor CAN: 34.6 US: 28.7 AUS: 15.5 JAP: 10.6 Avg. Pages per Visitor CAN: 63 US: 40 AUS: 24 JAP: 20

6© Queen’s Printer for Ontario, 2003 The Ontario Web Landscape Accessing Ontario Via the Web 67% of Canadians (81% of Ontarians) have Internet access Canada Information Office, Spring 2001 Canadians spend the most time on-line in the world (9.1 hours per week) Canada Information Office, Spring % of Ontario Internet users have visited a provincial website at least once in the past year More than four in five Ontarians believe that increased emphasis on technology by governments is a move in the right direction

7© Queen’s Printer for Ontario, 2003 The Ontario Web Landscape User Expectations 42.9% of respondents think government web sites are somewhat, or much worse than big company sites Public Portal focus group testing conducted April 10, % of respondents think government web sites should be as good as, or better than big company sites Public Portal focus group testing conducted April 10, 2003 On the whole, clients are looking for: a convenient fast experience effective and easy-to-use information finding capabilities accurate, authoritative Information ability to extract information based on individualized needs, and to customize how it gets presented to them

8© Queen’s Printer for Ontario, 2003 New Direction The Enterprise Strategy for Portals The Strategy establishes a Vision that clients will have seamless, speedy and simple access to government information and services through portals. A Federation of Portals To ensure government services are offered in ways that meet the diverse needs of our clients and that the complexity of government programs is streamlined and simplified, there will be many government portals, each targeting a specific community of interest, client segment, or government programmatic theme. Content will be pushed to many different portals, but will only be created once. In order for this model to work, a federation organization will be established to govern and coordinate the inter-operability of the portals within the federation.

9© Queen’s Printer for Ontario, 2003 New Direction Bundling of Information in Portals Life Event Bundles (Lost Wallet, Having a Baby, etc.) Collaborative Seniors Portal (Cross-jurisdictional content) Integrated Service Delivery Portal Employee Portal Federated Services CRM Training Standards Search Content Categorization Etc.

10© Queen’s Printer for Ontario, 2003 Where Does Search Fit in? The Importance of Search Extensive environmental scan undertaken in an effort to replace search engine RFP released for new search engine Successful vendor awarded contract Search engine implemented for externally-facing websites September 2003 From idea to implementation, the new search engine has been a while in the making. Growing amount of content available Increased integration with content management systems, portals, cross- jurisdictional content, etc. Increasing expectations from end user for faster, more relevant information

11© Queen’s Printer for Ontario, 2003 Implementation Milestones April 2003 September 2003 October 2003 March 2004 Implementation initiated for external search External search launched in time for Showcase Ontario (09/08) GO Central Internet site first consumer of the external search Collaborative Seniors Portal launched (10/31) CSP becomes second major consumer of the external search October 2003 – March 2004 Internal Search Implementation Conversion from old search engine Implementation of Decentralized Administration Standards and guidance

12© Queen’s Printer for Ontario, 2003 Analysis and Design Evaluation of Existing Search Engine (Pros/cons) Provided a wealth of “what not to do” items Extended requirements developed for RFP Content Analysis Sites crawled Sites not crawled Keyword Analysis Popular keywords used: Employment, Passports, Taxes, Certificates

13© Queen’s Printer for Ontario, 2003 Analysis and Design Proper Names, Dictionary Development Ontario cities, towns Provincial parks and attractions Members of Provincial Parliament, historical figures, etc. Best Practices, Industry Examples FirstGov ( Google (

14© Queen’s Printer for Ontario, 2003 Search: Then and Now Key Statistics Pre-September 2003November 18, 2003 Number of Sites Crawled95Number of Sites Crawled270 Number of Documents Indexed 45,000 Number of Documents Indexed 550,000 Number of terms in the Proper Names Dictionary N/A Number of terms in the Proper Names Dictionary 700+

 Optimized results  Multi-jurisdictional content  Spell-check  Proper name dictionary  Natural language search queries  Advanced search  Added functionality  Search Help 15© Queen’s Printer for Ontario, 2003 Search: Then and Now Pre-September 2003  Limited results  Limited content collection  No spell-check  No proper name recognition  No natural language search queries  No advanced search  Limited functionality  No search help November 18, 2003

16© Queen’s Printer for Ontario, 2003 Search: Then and Now QUERY: “Passport”  OLD SE: Several varied results  NEW SE: Several varied results, PassportOffice.gc.ca page top ranked result QUERY: “McGinty”  OLD SE: 0 Results (unless McGuinty misspelled on crawled website)  NEW SE: 0 Results + “You may also want to try McGuinty” (hundreds of results) QUERY: “Where do I get a birth certificate?”  OLD SE: 0 Results  NEW SE: Several results, Ministry of Consumer and Business Services “How do I…” page top ranked result Advanced Search  OLD SE: Not available  NEW SE: Several options:  Search by ministry, language, relevance, date, file format, etc.

17© Queen’s Printer for Ontario, 2003 Implementation Milestones April 2003 September 2003 October 2003 March 2004 Implementation initiated for external search External search launched in time for Showcase Ontario (09/08) GO Central Internet site first consumer of the external search Collaborative Seniors Portal launched (10/31) CSP becomes second major consumer of the external search October 2003 – March 2004 Internal Search Implementation Conversion from old search engine Implementation of Decentralized Administration Standards and guidance

18© Queen’s Printer for Ontario, 2003 Ontario Public Service Intranets Internal Implementation Planned January 2004 Mirrored infrastructure to that as external search  150 Internal sites Greater diversity of technologies employed Database connections (0 so far for external sites) Password-protected information (0 so far for external sites)

19© Queen’s Printer for Ontario, 2003 Alternative Means of Data Retrieval Content Categorization User can browse content by category Dynamic taxonomy creation Provides structure to unstructured data Content Categorization Service planned in 2004 as a component of the Enterprise Strategy for Portals. Content Categorization Service will serve as an alternative to keyword driven search through “Yahoo!-style” browsing capability. Advantages:

20© Queen’s Printer for Ontario, 2003 The Need for Standards & Guidance The Human Side of Search Metadata Controlled Vocabularies Taxonomies Schemas Thesauri Search Engine Optimization and Rank-tuning User education and awareness While advanced search engine technologies have helped forward the quest for effective data retrieval, there are several human factors that must be addressed to ensure that search objectives are truly met. Among them are the effective use of:

21© Queen’s Printer for Ontario, 2003 The Need for Standards & Guidance Metadata There is no standard usage of metadata for Web resources in the Ontario Public Service. In many cases metadata is poorly applied, if at all. As a minimum, basic metadata standards are required. Examples: Title tags Description Keywords Classification

22© Queen’s Printer for Ontario, 2003 The Need for Standards & Guidance Metadata Strategy Metadata is a mission critical element of a portal strategy that is to deliver no-wrong-door, seamless access to government. It is the vehicle by which information and services can be found through automated means. The strategy will also provide a centralized approach to share cross-jurisdictional data and information. Objectives/Deliverables: Corporate Metadata Repository Metadata Standards (including core standard) Communities of Metadata Practice Development of an overall strategy for the provision data integration Assessment and documentation of practices and standards in partner jurisdictions

23© Queen’s Printer for Ontario, 2003 The Need for Standards & Guidance Controlled Vocabularies, Taxonomies, Etc. High-level taxonomy for portals Controlled vocabularies and thesauri Guidance products

24© Queen’s Printer for Ontario, 2003 The Need for Standards & Guidance User Awareness Managing and learning from user feedback How to effectively use a search engine (Syntax, optimization, etc.) User Survey planned early 2004

25© Queen’s Printer for Ontario, 2003 Lessons Learned How to Get the Most Out of Your Search Engine FIRST: Leverage technology. A good search engine goes a long way. Attain an in-depth understanding of your content Attain an in-depth understanding of your client (preferences, habits, etc.) Factor in the time, resources, and coordination required Develop and maintain standards (Content, Metadata, etc.) Employ a phased approach

26© Queen’s Printer for Ontario, 2003 Conclusion Questions? Government of Ontario Central Internet Site: Government of Ontario Search Engine: Scott Gow Federation Standards & Guidance Coordinator E-Government Branch Office of the Corporate Chief Strategist Government of Ontario