Oracle8 ConText Cartridge QuickStart Release 2.4 A63819-01 |
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# 1
Introduction

This chapter introduces Oracle8 ConText Cartridge and the QuickStart process, and describes the requirements for enabling ConText to store and retrieve text.

The following topics are covered in this chapter:

- What is Oracle8 ConText Cartridge?

- What is QuickStart?

- QuickStart Requirements

## What is Oracle8 ConText Cartridge?

Oracle8 ConText Cartridge provides powerful search, retrieval, and viewing capabilities for text stored in an Oracle8 database. In addition, ConText provides advanced linguistic processing of English-language text.

These capabilities are implemented in Oracle8 using ConText server processes and ConText indexes for each database column in which text is stored.

With ConText, you can use SQL and PL/SQL to incorporate advanced text and linguistic functionality into new or existing applications.

### Text Processing

ConText provides advanced text searching and viewing functionality, such as full text retrieval (queries), relevance ranking, and query term highlighting.

Text queries support a wide range of search options, including: logical operators (AND, OR, NOT, etc.), proximity searches, thesaural expansion, section searches, and stored queries.

Text viewing capabilities include WYSIWIG and plain text viewing of documents, as well as highlighting of query terms.

Note: Text viewing is not covered in this manual. For complete details about text viewing, see Oracle8 ConText Cartridge Application Developer's Guide.

For an explanation of the steps required to set up text queries, see "Startup and Hot Upgrade" in Chapter 2, "Using Text Queries".

For examples of some basic text queries, see "Text Queries" in Chapter 2, "Using Text Queries".

### Linguistic Processing

For English-language text, ConText provides in-depth linguistic analysis and output. The linguistic output can be used to create theme indexes for performing theme queries and theme highlighting.

A theme query retrieves documents based on the main topics found in the documents in a column. Theme highlighting highlights the paragraphs that contribute to a theme for a selected document.

Note: Theme queries are performed in the same way as text queries and support many of the same search options. Theme highlighting is similar to text highlighting and is not covered in this manual. For complete details about theme highlighting, see Oracle8 ConText Cartridge Application Developer's Guide.

In addition, ConText can be used to generate linguistic output for individual documents. The output can be used to provide advanced document viewing capabilities such as lists of themes, theme summaries, and document Gists.

For an explanation of the steps required to set up theme queries and generate linguistic output, see "Startup and Hot Upgrade" in Chapter 3, "Using Theme Queries and CTX_LING"

For examples of some basic theme queries and linguistic output usage, see "Theme Queries" and "Linguistics" in Chapter 3, "Using Theme Queries and CTX_LING".

## What is QuickStart?

Before text and theme query functionality can be integrated into an application, the database columns used to store text must be defined as text columns and text/theme indexes must be created for the columns.

In addition, if you want to incorporate theme lists and Gists into your English-language text applications, the Linguistics must be called to generate linguistic output for your documents and the output must be stored in database tables.

QuickStart provides step-by-step instructions for quickly and easily performing these tasks. Once the QuickStart tasks have been performed, your system is text-enabled for text/theme queries and viewing linguistic output.

QuickStart also provides examples of text and theme queries, as well as examples of queries that use the output generated by the ConText Linguistics.

## QuickStart Requirements

Before you can perform the QuickStart tasks, Oracle8 and ConText must be installed and the ConText implementation tasks must be completed. In addition, QuickStart is easiest to perform when text is already stored in the database.

If the required installation and implementation tasks have not been completed, see Chapter 4, "Implementing ConText".

### Oracle Users and Tables

This QuickStart manual presents an example Oracle user named ctxdev and an example text table named docs. Ctxdev and docs are used in all QuickStart examples; however, they are used for illustration purposes only and are not provided by ConText.

To perform QuickStart, you can use an existing Oracle user and table or you can create a user and table (i.e. ctxdev and docs).

### ConText Defaults

QuickStart assumes the following conditions for your text and uses the appropriate defaults in ConText:

- non-pictorial language (i.e. English or the other supported Western European languages)

- unformatted, plain (ASCII) text

- text stored directly in database columns

- each document stored as a single row

If these conditions are not valid for your setup, QuickStart can still be performed; however, you cannot use the defaults in ConText and must specify settings that match your setup.

See Also: Oracle8 ConText Cartridge Administrator's Guide

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