[dc2447]

> Elasticsearch mostly "just works", and we didn't have to worry about complex schema definitions, working with giant complex XML files (hello Solr)

If you were using Solr there are a few operational modes to run in. Config file based or SolrCloud[0]. The latter is more akin the ES in terms of cluster management.

I agree though from an simplicity of deployment perspective at scale ES is has a much lighter learning curve.

[0] https://cwiki.apache.org/confluence/display/solr/SolrCloud

[acdha]

SolrCloud is nothing like ES in terms of management: you end up running a separate zookeeper service with even more files which all have to be configured correctly just to get it running and you have to micromanage shard allocation to ensure that you can add nodes in the future but also not have it intentionally deadlock when a server fails and you no longer have enough nodes for a quorum. All of this happens with the usual contempt for sysadmins where things you need to know (“refusing to process requests”) won't be logged but a bunch of startup boilerplate will be, and simply configuring logging correctly requires (IIRC) editing two XML files and a properties file.

`java -jar elasticsearch.jar` does a better job and that's basically all it takes. I'm planning to switch as soon as https://github.com/elasticsearch/elasticsearch/issues/256 lands.

[darkarmani]

I lost count of the +1s. That issue must have around +180. :)