Hi Nathan, On 23 Feb 2011, at 6:01 PM, Nathan Kurz wrote:
> On Wed, Feb 23, 2011 at 9:14 AM, Andrew S. Townley <[email protected]> wrote: >> Well, actually, I want it for more than that. For my particular needs, I >> need to get the field name where the match occurred in the document, and >> then I'd ideally like to have the start offset into that field and the >> length of the match. > > Apart from the lack of Ruby bindings, this won't be a problem with > Lucy. It's a data-forward approach, so that if the information is in > the indexes, you'll have access to it. You might need to write a > custom Hit class (or the like), but it will certainly be possible. Sounds good. > >> One of the things that struck me was the "implementing as much functionality >> in high-level languages as possible" comment. What does this mean, exactly? >> Why was this approach chosen rather than put all the muscle in the C code >> and provide thin wrappers--even via SWIG or something more hand-tailored >> where necessary/appropriate? > > I think you're missing an implied "And not only that, if you order by > midnight tonight now you'll also receive..." Lucy is/will-have a > complete C core that can be used directly, but it will also be > possible to override the functionality class-by-class in Perl, Ruby, > Python, etc. It's the added potential for accessing this > functionality from a scripting language that is being highlighted, not > the requirement. Does it come with flying cars too?? ;) http://xkcd.com/864/ >> Part of the reason I ask has to do with the future of my own project. Much >> of what I have now will eventually be rewritten piecemeal in C++ and then >> wrapped via SWIG so I can have Ruby and Java bindings as well as use it in >> other environments natively supporting C/C++. Whatever route I end up going >> for fulltext, this is something that would need to support the same kind of >> thing as I'd actually be leveraging it more from the C++ code than the Ruby >> code. > > Sounds like an excellent fit for Lucy. In the same way that we hope > to allow the C-core to be overridden with scripting languages for fast > prototyping, it's also should be easy to then selectively optimize > that with C++. It's an ambitious multilingual goal, so it's possible > it will not be fully achieved, but your sort of application is exactly > the reason this approach was chosen. Well, all that makes me very optimistic about the future of Lucy. I'll certainly keep my eye on things, and if I have time, I'll certainly help if I can. This is a pretty core feature of the system I'm building - and it's not your average Web search application - so I'm sure I'll be able to provide some alternative needs from the middle-of-the-road ones. Thanks for your replies, guys. Cheers, ast -- Andrew S. Townley <[email protected]> http://atownley.org
