Frequently Asked Questions
This section captures common questions and operational guidance for Oracle Trusted Answer Search.
Why not just use a generic LLM Agent?
While LLMs are flexible for open-ended Q&A, they can hallucinate, return inconsistent answers, and exhibit longer response times. Trusted Answer Search focuses on vetted matches: it maps questions to curated descriptions and returns the top search targets. Your application then renders the appropriate report or initiates the intended action with confidence. Optional LLM support can be configured for search-space-level result re-ranking and Target Value Set extraction. A Search Administrator controls how many candidates returned by hybrid retrieval are passed to the LLM re-ranking step. Trusted Answer Search still returns structured target metadata rather than free-form generated answers.
What benefits can I expect?
- Faster access for your end-users to the right page, report, or action via natural language.
- Consistent outcomes because Trusted Answer Search returns curated target metadata instead of free-form LLM-generated answers.
- Stronger security posture: search targets are vetted, and your application retains full control over authorization.
- Lower operational risk: approvals, versioning, and regression reports make language changes auditable and predictable.
What does Trusted Answer Search return—an answer or something else?
Trusted Answer Search returns a structured response in JSON format to your application. The JSON document includes the search target’s URL or SQL along with the target inputs. Your application remains in control of how the JSON response is used and what is rendered to the user.
How can I use Trusted Answer Search?
Trusted Answer Search can be managed and integrated into your application in different ways, depending on how much UI you want to build.
Administration
- Trusted Answer Search Administrator (APEX app): used by administrators and Search Space experts to curate targets, manage versions, and control access.
Integration with your Application
- Search widgets: embeddable search controls for an existing web application.
- Using the API directly: Developers who need a custom UI can call the Trusted Answer Search PL/SQL API. The core
DBMS_TRUSTED_SEARCH.SEARCH()PL/SQL procedure accepts a natural language question and returns a structured response in JSON format.
How does Trusted Answer Search handle value-specific questions (categories, names, etc.) present in the question?
When configured by a Search Space Expert, Trusted Answer Search can resolve target inputs from a natural-language query and include them in the returned target action. Manual, column-based, regex-based, and LLM-based Target Value Sets are available. For example, a Wikimedia target URL can use the :language, :period, and :frequency inputs:
https://stats.wikimedia.org/#/:language.wikipedia.org/reading/page-views-by-country/normal|map|:period|~total|:frequencyFor a query about Italian page views, a configured value set can resolve italian to it. The other inputs can come from the query or their configured defaults. The application decides whether to open the resolved URL.
The application remains responsible for access to the linked resource. Returning a target does not grant permission to view its destination.
How does Trusted Answer Search improve over time?
Trusted Answer Search records search activity and lets users report an unsuccessful search from the widget. Search Space Experts can review query results, apply administrator feedback to relevant or irrelevant targets, and update descriptions, sample queries, or targets. Evaluation sets and test runs help check changes before publication; telemetry helps identify searches that need attention.