Dublin MongoDB User Group

Search is one of those things that feels simple — until you're the one building it.
Why does `$regex` fall apart at scale? How do you handle typos, relevance, and performance all at once? And what happens when users search by meaning, not just keywords?

Join the Dublin MongoDB User Group for an evening dedicated entirely to Search — from the foundations of Apache Lucene, to building production-grade search experiences with MongoDB Atlas Search, to the frontier of Semantic Search with vector embeddings. We'll also have a real-world use case walkthrough from someone who's been in the trenches solving search problems for customers.
And yes, you can walk away with an 🎖️ Search Fundamentals Skill Badge 🎖️ which you can share on your LinkedIn profile.

No laptop needed, just your phone!

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🛠️ What we're covering:
The "Why" — Search is Hard A practical look at why developers struggle with search: fuzzy matching, relevance scoring, tokenisation, and why regex just doesn't cut it.
The "Story" — A Real Use Case Hear from a practitioner who's helped customers go from "this search is broken" to "this actually works." Less Lucene textbook, more honest problem-solving.
The "How" — Atlas Search Deep Dive We'll go under the hood on how Atlas Search (built on Apache Lucene) works, and show you how to wire it up in your own applications.
The "Future" — Semantic Search Beyond keywords — how vector embeddings and semantic search let your application understand what users mean, not just what they type.

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📅 Agenda (6:00 PM – 09:00 PM)

• 6:00 – 7:00 PM | Networking & Pizza 🍕
• 7:00 – 7:30 PM | Search 101: How Search Actually Works From text indexing to Lucene — the fundamentals every developer should know.
• 7:30 – 8:00 PM | Real-World Search Use Cases What does bad search look like? What does great search look like? Stories from the field.
• 8:00 – 8:30 PM | From Generic Search to Atlas Search & Semantic Search How MongoDB Atlas Search brings it all together — and where vector embeddings take you next.
• 8:30 – 09:00 PM | Search Fundamentals Skill Badge 🎖️ | Open Discussion & Networking

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See you there! 🎯