Indexing
Indexing is a never ending process of generating information to allow documents meeting searchable criteria to be located or listed for further research.
- Index information grows as actions are taken - by virtue of records of actions being kept
- Additional information may be added as it becomes available, namely
- Keywords which are allocated manually - often based on word search's such as "Include xxx Exclude yyy"
- Entities such as Work Packages, Zones, Areas, Levels, etc which are allocated at document level
Quick Questions
This is usually either to find a known document, or more commonly some information relevant to that document. There are just two basic situations, illustrated by the following common questions.
- Have I got the latest revision ?
- How would I know ? Probably not answerable by me.
- Is it my responsibility to go and find out ? ISO9001 says NO. Most contracts say NO.
- Has my subcontractor got the latest revision ?
- If I dont know I have a serious problem. This is MY responsibility (ISO9001 and Contractually)
There are a number of ways of answering questions:
- Consult the files
- Takes a fair amount of time
- May be impossible if someone else has the file
- Use some software
- If it has a "treeview" or drill down capability - very fast
- If I have to know the answer (???) before I start - often impossible.
Complex Question
This is usually to generate a list of possible documents, which seen together can resolve a larger matter. Thus a complex question is one with the following characteristics:
- It is being run on a large volume of data - probably several thousands of records
- The filtering can be on many different aspects of the profile simultaneously, for example
- words found in the title revisions, comments, (xxx AND / OR yyy, etc)
- relevant date ranges (received, issued) and relevant reasons and or status
- latest or any revision, document types, orginator, use, etc
- It results in a report of a chosen level of detail, which may include
- title or document information (latest rev, latest status etc)
- revisions (all or latest)
- movements (receipt, issue, status, comments)
- keywords and or attached entities
Points to Note
- Indexing and the ability to answer complex questions quickly are linked,
- Answering Quick Questions in an unindexed environment can take a lot of time.