Apache Solr is an open source faceted search engine or server platform from the Apache Software Foundation. It is an application built upon Lucene – a full-text search library also from Apache. Both Solr and Lucene are written in Java. The name is not indicative that it runs only on the Apache web server; it operates on any Java machines on Windows, Mac OS, Linux etc.

Solr enables libraries to offer full-text search, hit highlighting, faceted search, dynamic clustering, database integration, and rich document (e.g., Word, PDF) handling.

The training session was attended by 19 delegates from 12 EIFL countries, all of whom successfully installed and explored Solr.

The session was presented by Boon Low, who has recently managed the JISC project 'Usability and Contemporary User Experience in Digital Libraries (UX2.0)' and developed the digital library services for Enabling Grids for E-SciencE (EGEE). The services are based on custom-built web applications and engineered systems from off-the-shelf and open source systems including Apache Solr faceted/enterprise search infrastructure, Blacklight faceted search User Interface (Ruby on Rails), and Fedora Repository (Java).

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Apache Solr (also known as Lucene/Solr after the merger of the two projects) is an enterprise search platform written in Java, often used to enable faceted searching and resource discovery.

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