Awesome Search - this is all about the (e-commerce, but not only) search and its awesomeness
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I've been building e-commerce search applications for 15+ years. Below is a list of some publications, conferences, and books that have inspired me, grouped by topic. If an item fits into multiple topics, it appears in multiple sections.
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Global Table of Contents
A map of every note in the vault organized by category and theme. This index tracks concepts, topics, people, tools, companies, case studies, conferences, and datasets.
Maps of Content
- All about Information Retrieval & Search — top-level overview
- Concepts · Topics · People · Tools · Case Studies · Videos · Conferences · History · Index
Concepts
Lexical & Sparse Retrieval
BM25 · Bayesian BM25 · Bayesian Optimization · Bag-of-Documents Model · Full-Text Search · WAND · Block-Max WAND · Sparse Vector Retrieval · Learned Sparse Retrieval · SPLADE · ELSER · miniCOIL · Sparse Embeddings · Collocations · Out-of-Vocabulary
Dense Retrieval & Embeddings
Embeddings · Dense Embeddings · Dense Vector Retrieval · Semantic Search · Asymmetric Semantic Search · Bi-Encoder · Dense Passage Retriever · BERT · Word2Vec · Word2Box · Concept Vectors · Matryoshka Embeddings · Multimodal Embeddings · Compositional Embeddings · Task-Aware Embeddings · Embedding Fine-tuning · Pooling · Zero-Shot Retrieval · Vector Similarity Metrics · Contrastive Gap · Modality Gap
Geometric & Set-Theoretic Embeddings
Set-Theoretic Embeddings · Box Embedding · Gaussian Embedding · Poincaré Embedding · Region-Based Representation
ANN Indexing & Quantization
ANN · Brute-Force Vector Search · HNSW · IVF · LSH · ACORN-1 · Vector Filtering · Vector Index Updates · Wormhole Vectors · Vector Quantization · Scalar Quantization · Binary Quantization · BBQ · RaBitQ · TurboQuant · ASH · ITQ · Token Pooling
Dimensionality Reduction
Dimensionality Reduction · PCA · UMAP · t-SNE
Late Interaction & Multi-Vector
Late Interaction · ColBERT · ColPali · MUVERA
Reranking & Cross-Encoders
Reranking · Asymmetric Re-ranking · Cross-Encoder · MonoT5 · RankGPT · RankLLaMA · Knowledge Distillation · Relational Transformer
Learning to Rank
Learning to Rank · LambdaMART · LambdaLoss · RankNet · LTR Feature Engineering · Hashing Trick · Ranking Objectives · Ranking Signal Selection · Pointwise Relevance Evaluation · Pairwise Relevance Evaluation · Listwise Relevance Evaluation · Feature Store · Results Boosting
Hybrid Search & Score Fusion
Hybrid Search · Reciprocal Rank Fusion · Distribution-Based Score Fusion · Linear Score Combination · Relative Score Fusion · Score Normalization · Semantic Boosting
Query Understanding
Query Understanding · Query Segmentation · Query Specificity · Query Types · Query Sampling · Search Intent · Intent Drift · Keywords Extraction · Compositional Queries
Lexical Query Operations
Tokenization · Spelling Correction · Synonyms · Stopwords · Autocomplete · Query Expansion · Query Relaxation · Query Rewriting
Evaluation & Metrics
Search Evaluation · NDCG · MAP · MRR · Precision and Recall · Hit Rate at K · UDCG · Diversity Metrics · Judgment Lists · Implicit Judgments · Kendall Rank Correlation · Inter-Annotator Agreement · LLM as Judge · Levels of Judge Agreement · Prompt Sensitivity · Adversarial Relevance Judgment · Staged Judging · Semantic Relevance · Statistical Significance in Search Evaluation · Interleaving · Isolated Feedback Loops · Out-of-Time Validation · Session-Based Evaluation · Vector Search Evaluation · Hallucination Detection · Needle in a Haystack Test · Relevance feedback · APD
Behavioral Signals & Bias
Click Models · Neural Click Models · Click Signals · Clicks Residual · Impression Bias · Position Bias · Presentation Bias · Ranking Signal Selection · Signal Downboosting · Personalization · Exploration vs Exploitation
Agentic, Generative & RAG
Agentic Search · Agentic Memory · Model Context Protocol · Agentic Query Workload · Conversational Search · RAG · Generative Retrieval · Differentiable Search Index · Direct Corpus Interaction · Purpose-Built Agentic Search Models · SIRA · Search-R1 · Reinforcement Learning for Search · Semantic IDs · TIGER · RQ-VAE · Context Engineering · DICE · Clean Context · Hypothetical Document Embeddings · Steering Vectors · GraphRAG · HippoRAG · Long-Context RAG · Prompt Compression · Query Routing · LLM Guardrails
Model Fine-Tuning & Serving
LoRA · QLoRA · PEFT · GGUF · Hard Negative Mining · Contrastive Learning · Knowledge Distillation · Synthetic Query Generation · Consistency Filtering · PROMPTAGATOR · FLAN-T5
Search Architecture & Operations
Search Architecture · Retrieval Pipeline · Sharding · Compute-Storage Disaggregation · Unified Search Index · Denormalization for Search · Search Governance · Search Team · Search Results Explainability · Text Chunking · Knowledge Graph Search
Search UX & Discovery
Faceted Search · Federated Search · Search Scopes · Zero Results · Results Merchandising · MMR
Topics
Retrieval & Ranking Techniques
Reasoning Reranking · RL-Trained Search Agents · Late Interaction in Elasticsearch · Late Interaction in OpenSearch · Late Interaction in Qdrant · Late Interaction in Vespa · Elasticsearch Learning to Rank · Vespa Learning to Rank · Tuning BM25 for E-commerce Search · Vector Search Tradeoffs · Dimensionality Reduction vs Quantization · PCA vs t-SNE for Retrieval · Search UX · Search UX Research · Search Result Diversity · Multilingual Search · Personalization in Search · Agentic Memory for Search Personalization · Query Classification · Query Understanding in Practice · Spelling Correction in Search · Synonyms and Vocabulary Management · Autocomplete and Autosuggest · Conversational and Agentic Search · Interaction Paradigms
Domains & Platforms
E-commerce Search · Two-Sided Marketplace Ranking · Enterprise Search · Search using PostgreSQL · Search Platforms · Extreme Search Systems · Migration between Search Engines · Elasticsearch vs OpenSearch · Federated vs Unified Search · Multi-Tenancy in Search
Quality & Operations
A-B Testing for Search · Duality in Measuring Search · NDCG Variants · Search Quality Assurance · Relevance Program Setup · Relevance Evaluation Tools Compared · Quepid Beyond Supported Engines · Model Selection and Fine-Tuning Evaluation · Retrieval Benchmarks and Leaderboards · Embedding Models Compared · Search Observability
Team, Career & Community
Hiring for Search · How to Start a Career in Search · Managing a Search Team · Understaffed Search Team · Search Consultancy · Search Communities · Women of Search · Events and Conferences
Learning Resources
Strategy & Meta
Frontier of Search · Frontier of Search 2025 · Frontier of Search 2026 · Economics of Search · Search Problem Archetypes · Fun and Philosophy
Tools
Search & Vector Engines
Elasticsearch · OpenSearch · Solr · Manticore Search · FAISS · Milvus Vector DB · Pinecone Vector DB · Qdrant Vector DB · Weaviate Vector DB · turbopuffer Search DB · PostgreSQL · ParadeDB · VectorChord
PostgreSQL Extensions
pgvector · pgvectorscale · pg_textsearch · pg_trgm · psql_bm25s
Ranking & ML Libraries
LightGBM · XGBoost · CatBoost · RankLib · Metarank · eland
Embedding Training
Sentence Transformers · qdrant-sparse-finetune · qdrant-relevance-feedback
RAG & LLM Frameworks
LlamaIndex · LangChain · Haystack (deepset) · DSPy · AutoRAG · RAGAS
Relevance & Query Tooling
Querqy · Quepid · Embabel · Embabel DICE · django-dice · Search Relevance Workbench · OpenSearch Relevance Agent · Elasticsearch Relevance Studio · Rated Ranking Evaluator · Releval · User Behavior Insights · ann-benchmarks · SID-1
ML & Model Serving
LightGBM · XGBoost · CatBoost · RankLib · ONNX · eland
Companies
Airbnb · Algolia · Allegro · Amazon Web Services · Baymard Institute · Bonsai · Booking.com · Canva · Carousell · Cohere · Delivery Hero · Dropbox · eBay · Elastic · Elsevier · Empathy · Enterprise Knowledge LLC · Etsy · Grubhub · Hornet · Jina AI · Kleinanzeigen · LightOn AI · LinkedIn · Meta · MongoDB · Netflix · Nielsen Norman Group · OpenSource Connections · Otto · Pinecone · Qdrant · Reddit · RelativeDB · SID.ai · Sease · Shaped · Shopify · Skyscanner · Slack · Spotify · The Search Juggler · Tiger Data · Twitter · Uber · Vespa · Vinted · Voyage AI · Weaviate · Zalando · searchHub · turbopuffer
Case Studies
Airbnb - ML-Powered Experiences Ranking · Bonsai - Designing Search for a Relational Database · Canva - Search Pipeline Modernization · Etsy - Search Quality and Query Understanding · foodpanda - Classifying 300K Noisy Search Terms Across 16 Markets · Hybrid Fusion Failure - BM25 Displacing Reference Documents · Kleinanzeigen - Vespa Migration for Homepage Feed · Netflix - Content Search Architecture · Reddit - Vector Database Selection · Skyscanner - Learning to Rank for Flights · Slack - Enterprise Message Search with LTR · Uber Eats - Scaling Search for Food Delivery · Vespa - Ranking Without Labels on CORD-19 · Vinted - Migrating Search from Elasticsearch to Vespa · Zalando - Self-DoS via Facet Aggregation
Videos
Conference talks and recorded presentations.
Max Irwin - The Search Engine Migration Circus — Max Irwin, OpenSource Connections; Haystack Live talk on search-engine migration (playbook, "Hello Search", feature parity, the "damage" metric, war stories)
Haystack US 2022 - Bayesian Optimization of Relevance at Shopify — Doug Turnbull & Andy Toulis, Shopify; Haystack US 2022 talk on Bayesian Optimization for retuning BM25 k1/b, with a worked case study on product-title length normalization and a presentation-bias loophole caught mid-experiment
Choosing Indexes for Similarity Search (Faiss in Python) — James Briggs, Pinecone; hands-on FAISS tutorial comparing Flat, LSH, HNSW, and IVF on Sift1M
Rene Kriegler - Query Relaxation — Rene Kriegler, OpenSource Connections; Query Relaxation as a query recommendation problem — word-shape heuristics, term frequency, Word2Vec and a neural network compared for predicting which term to drop
Roman Grebennikov - Personalizing Search Results in Real-Time — Roman Grebennikov, Findify; MICES 2019 talk on real-time LTR personalization — Position Bias feedback loops, shuffled Exploration vs Exploitation segments, cross-merchant generic models, purchase-weighted perfect rankings
Evgeniya Sukhodolskaya - Fine-Tuning Sparse Neural Retrievers for E-Commerce — Evgeniya Sukhodolskaya, Qdrant; MICES 2026 talk on making SPLADE fine-tuning approachable — why MS MARCO-trained sparse models misfire on catalogs, the ANCE Hard Negative Mining loop, full vs inference-free SPLADE, specialize vs generalize
Evgeniya Sukhodolskaya - Relevance Feedback Inside the Search Engine — Evgeniya Sukhodolskaya, Qdrant; Berlin Buzzwords 2026 talk on index-native Relevance Feedback — model-generated feedback steering HNSW hop selection instead of reranking a top-k, Knowledge Distillation of a reranker into the index, and the case against black-box search engines
Hajer Bouafif - Personalize Search Results with OpenSearch Agentic Memory — Hajer Bouafif, Amazon Web Services; Berlin Buzzwords 2026 talk on Agentic Memory as the substrate for search Personalization — preferences inferred offline by an LLM from UBI clickstream, applied online via Query Rewriting and Reranking, with reasoning kept off the query path
Podcasts
Vector Podcast — Dima Kan, Aiven; interview series running since October 2021 (38 episodes) covering vector search, search engines and the businesses around them — vector database founders interviewed mid-build, HNSW co-author Yury Malkov, and on-site batches from Berlin Buzzwords
Conferences
See the Conferences MOC. Berlin Buzzwords · Haystack EU · Haystack US · MICES
Datasets
Amazon ESCI Dataset · ANTIQUE · BEIR · BRIGHT · DSGlobal · ESCI-S Dataset · Home Depot Product Search Relevance · LLMJudge · LocalNews · LoTTE · MIRACL · MS MARCO · MTEB · Natural Questions · RelBench · RTEB · SIFT1M · STaRK · TREC Deep Learning Track · TREC-COVID · WANDS Dataset
People
A — Achinoam Soroker · Adrien Grand · Aleksas Kateiva · Alexander Marquardt · Amélie Chatelain · Andre Charton · Andrea Schütt · Andreas Wagner · Andrew Kornilov · Andrew McCallum · Andrew Mende · André Mourão · Andy Toulis · Anthony K.H. Tung · Antoine Chaffin · Aparna Dhinakaran · Asif Makhani · Atita Arora · Audrey Lorberfeld
B — Benjamin Trent · Billy Chan · Bobby Mohammed · Brage Vik
C — Charles L. A. Clarke · Charlie Hull · Chris Fournie · Congzhe Su
D — Dai Sugimori · Dainius Jocas · Daniel Doro · Daniel Henneberger · Daniel Tunkelang · David Albrecht · David Argüello Sánchez · Davit Khachaturyan · Dima Kan · Dmitriy Meyerzon · Dotan Horovits · Doug Turnbull · Dylan Castillo · Dylan Couzon
E — Erik Hatcher · Ernestas Poškus · Eugene Yan · Elzbieta Jakubowska · Evgeniya Sukhodolskaya
F — Florent Krzakala · Florian Narr · Fraidoon Omarzai · Francesco Casalegno · Frank Goortani · Freddy Domínguez
G — Geoffrey Hinton · Giovanni Fernandez-Kincade · Gustavo Llermaly
H — Hailey Cheong · Hajer Bouafif · Han Xiao · Hassam Chundrigar · Heather Hedden · Honza Král · Hugo Galvão
I — Isabella Tromba · Iulia Brezeanu · Ivan Pleshkov
J — Jagadeesh Chandra · Jaideep Ray · James Briggs · James Rubinstein · Janani Narayanan · Janu Verma · Jeffrey Rengifo · Jettro Coenradie · Jithendrasaikilaru · Jo Kristian Bergum · Jodi Sloan · Joanna Marhula · Jonas Schulz · Jonathan Larson · Joon-Pil (JP) Hwang · Jose Parreño
K — Karthik Ramasamy · Kemal Erdem
L — Lakhan Bukkawar · Lakshmi Devi Prakash · Laura Dietz · Laura Ham · Laurynas Jasiukėnas · Laurens van der Maaten · Leo Schuster · Leonie Monigatti · Lester Solbakken · Li Zhang · Luca Arnaboldi · Luke Vilnis
M — Marianne Haugvaldstad · Maryna Kryvko · Matei Zaharia · Mateusz Sidor · Max Irwin · Michael Hannecke · Michael Ryaboy · Mihajlo Grbovic · Mohamed Arbi Nsibi
N — Naghmeh Farzi · Namratesh Shrivastav · Nathan VanBenschoten · Neal Lathia · Negar Arabzadeh · Nick Zadrozny · Nicolò Rinaldi · Nikhil Dandekar
O — Omar Khattab
P — Peter Straßer · Piotr Mazurek · Prateek Chandra Jha
Q — Quynh Nguyen
R — Ravi Theja · Ravindra Harige · Rene Kriegler · Ritik Jain · Roberto Pagano · Roman Grebennikov · Roshmita Dey · Roy Keyes · Rudolf Batt
S — Sami Maameri · Sergey Feldman · Shane Connelly · Shaw Talebi · Shay Banon · Shib Sankar Dasgupta · Shun Tsukagoshi · Siegfried Schüle · Skip Everling · Soraya Hausl · Steffen Rendle · Steven Truitt · Stuart Cam · Stéphane Clinchant · Sujit Pal · Susan Liu
T — Tao Ruangyam · Taylor Roy · Ted Underwood · Themis Mavridis · Thibault Formal · Thierry Damiba · Thomas Veasey · Tomas Mikolov · Trey Grainger · Tullie Murrell
U — Udi Manber
V — Venkat Ram Rao · Vsevolod Goloviznin
W — Wenqi Glantz · Wolf Garbe · Daniel Wrigley
Y — Yiqun Sun · Yixuan Tang · Yu Su · Yuanyuan Shi · Yuqing Zhang