1. FirstGov Search July 28th, 2004 NOAA Webshop
Office of Citizen Services and Communications
E-Gov Solutions Support
1800 F Street, NW
Washington, DC 20405

2. FirstGov Search Service Offerings Enhancements How FirstGov Works
Contents
FirstGov Search Service Offerings
Enhancements
How FirstGov Works
Updating the FirstGov Index
Expectations
Contact Information

3. FirstGov Search Service Offerings
FirstGov collaborates with Federal agencies and uses its search engine to crawl Federal websites. The result is a citizen-centric and government-wide index of 15 million documents.
This index is made available to Federal agency websites, enabling them to provide site search at no cost.
Agencies can access:
The index for only their specific website
The index for a selected list of websites
The entire government-wide index of documents
FirstGov Search affiliates adhere to ICGI standards

4. Enhancements from Recent Upgrade
New Software
FAST 3.2
Allows “real-time” indexing
Search can be updated quickly for important information
New Business Processes
The FirstGov search team works closely with agencies to ensure quality results

5. How FirstGov Search works
Crawlers
(Weekly)
Search
Index
Govt
Web
Search
Update
Program
Search Results

6. How Affiliate Search Works – Easy as 1-2-3
Search queries from affiliate sites are passed to FirstGov Search and results are presented in the affiliate template.
FirstGov
Search
Filter 1)
Citizen Runs a Search on nws.noaa.gov 2)
Results From NWS Filter Presented on FirstGov.gov 3)
Citizen Returns to nws.noaa.gov

7. All results displayed in an agency’s presentation style
Filtering Options
Individual Web Site Search
Will allow any federal web site to offer search from their own specific web site
Portal Search
Allows agencies to search a network of sites within the index
Government-Wide Search
Displays results from the total index
All results displayed in an agency’s presentation style

8. Updating the FirstGov Index
Using the Crawler
The crawler retrieves information directly from your web site(s)
Do not guarantee 100% coverage
No ‘custom’ scheduling available
Search Update Program
You provide FirstGov a link with your updated content
FirstGov regularly retrieves your list of content and updates the index
Useful for web sites with content management systems

9. Coming Soon to a Website Near NOAA
Categorization
Sort results based on topic
Easy updates to your header and footer
Spotlight for popular terms
Think ‘breadth’ not ‘depth’ – Easier for Users

10. Think ‘breadth’ not ‘depth’ – Easier for Users
Setting Expectations
To effectively manage resources while providing the citizen with useful information FirstGov maintains editorial control over the search index
FirstGov does not guarantee that every document on every web site will be in the index
FirstGov can work with agencies to maximize the results from the FirstGov index
Think ‘breadth’ not ‘depth’ – Easier for Users

11. Questions / Contact Information
John Murphy
Erik Arnold
Mary Sue Deffily to