What is Retrieval?
TL;DR
The technology for efficiently searching and extracting relevant information from large datasets. The foundation of RAG.
Retrieval: Definition & Explanation
Retrieval is the technology for efficiently searching and extracting relevant information from large-scale databases or document collections based on a query. Beyond traditional keyword-based search (BM25, etc.), vector search (Semantic Search) has become mainstream. Vector search converts text into embeddings and retrieves relevant documents based on semantic similarity. As the foundational technology of RAG (Retrieval-Augmented Generation), retrieval quality directly impacts AI response quality. Advanced techniques including Hybrid Search (combining keyword and vector search) and Re-ranking (re-ordering search results) have also been put into practical use.