Customers can use the Bing Search template to find and read articles more relevant to a search term. Bing News Search abilities are enhanced, with filters available based on topics, sentiment, and location, people, and organizations. Brand managers have much more control over searches and can filter snippets to find content that matches their request. To set up the Bing News solution in Power BI, users just need search terms they want to track. The template works through an automatic ETL pipeline that sets up the flow. Microsoft points out that customers need an Azure subscription to use the solution. Microsoft Research was a collaborator on the template, using its information retrieval technology during development. With this new technology on board, the Bing News solution uses natural language processing such as unsupervised machine learning algorithms. Microsoft explains how the template works behind the scenes to deliver results: “All these enrichments are carried out inside the solution template pipeline using Azure services like Logic Apps and Azure Functions for orchestration as well as Cortana Analytics cognitive services and Azure ML for the machine learning pieces.”
Visualizing Data from Bing News
The template also makes visual collections for users. Microsoft says it is important how the information is presented. Microsoft Research created several “sophisticated custom visuals” that will help the information experience. For example, the cluster map visualizes themes by displaying clusters of related articles. They are collected by keyword, allowing brand managers to identify topics more quickly. Microsoft says this method offers a “visually impactful” way of exploring topics in full. Representing data visually is also achieved with the facet key, which aggregates entities into categories in a visual way. “For the solution template, we use locations, people and organizations as the entity categories,” Microsoft explains. “The facet key helps us find articles that mention the specific entity we are interested in. Once we decide on an entity or theme we can easily navigate from the snippet to the article by clicking on the link inside the tile.”
