My seven-year-old daughter thinks that there is a knowledge genie that her teacher "Googles" for answers. While cute, the anecdote also exemplifies how much Google's obsession with simplicity has helped build brand awareness, making their name literally synonymous with search. I can foresee generations X and Y being followed by generation S - one that will rely on search to accomplish almost any task.

Search's simplicity has excited many people about the prospect of bringing Google-like search into enterprise business intelligence (BI) systems. There is something magical about the thought of asking a question using key words and receiving an answer in less than a second. Yet, as of now, BI search deployments are limited to a few functional areas, mainly Websites and departmental document directories.