Describes the Constituent Object Parser (COP), a domain independent syntactic parser developed for use in information retrieval and similar applications. The syntactic structure of natural language entities is discussed, and the mechanisms by which COP handles the problems of conjunctions, ellipsis, and discontinuous constituents are explained.…

Presents a method for normalizing English document titles so they can be used in the online retrieval of documents: the title expressed by a noun phrase or clause is converted by parsing to a function-expression, which is transformed to a predicate-governor form and then normalized to a standard form. (Author/JD)

Presents a methodology for extending string indexing from index display production to the provision of descriptor phrases for term proximity searching. Objectives of the extension are discussed, and an illustration of the use of an existing string indexing system for this purpose is given. (14 references) (CLB)

Discusses the automatic construction of abstracts from the texts of documents. Automatic sentence extraction is examined, including syntactic criteria and semantic relational criteria; textual cohesion is discussed, including the recognition of anaphors and noun phrases; text structure is addressed; and the concept of abstract-frames is described.…

Discussion of research into information and text retrieval problems highlights the work with automatic natural language processing (NLP) that is reported in this issue. Topics discussed include the occurrences of nominal compounds; anaphoric references; discontinuous language constructs; automatic back-of-the-book indexing; and full-text analysis.…

Summarizes various linguistic approaches proposed for document analysis in information retrieval environments. Topics discussed include syntactic analysis; use of machine-readable dictionary information; knowledge base construction; the PLNLP English Grammar (PEG) system; phrase normalization; and statistical and syntactic phrase evaluation used…

Discusses the use of natural language captions versus content analysis for retrieving multimedia data such as pictures. Topics addressed include using caption syntax; additional inferences from captions; supercaptions; integrating content analysis; and results of experiments on an expert system with pictures. (Contains 11 references.) (LRW)

Describes a process of morpho-syntactic language analysis for information retrieval. Tree Structured Analytics (TSA) used for text representation is summarized; the matching process developed for such structures is outlined with an example appended; and experiments carried out to evaluate the effectiveness of TSA matching are discussed. (26…

Presents a concept of end-user query language with facilities for expressing relationships between objects kept in a database. The idea of nesting these features in typical document query language is shown. Examples of usage of these new facilities are included. (Author/MBR)

Analyzes the formal properties, structural consequences, similarities, and differences of link indicators, brackets, and cohesion separators in the query languages employed in information retrieval. Eleven figures, a 32-item reference list, and appendices on Extended Backus Notation and the formal definition of the Formal Relevance Language are…

Presents a model for the a priori analysis of natural language queries which uses an algorithm to transform the query into a logical pattern that is used to determine the answerability of the query. The results of testing by a prototype system implemented in PROLOG are discussed. (20 references) (CLB)

Discusses the feasibility and advantages of developing an enhancement for document retrieval systems that would automatically impose Boolean syntax on an input set of search terms. An online specification for such an enhancement is presented, based on experimental results using the MEDLINE database. (13 references) (CLB)

Addresses problem of developing machine-based information system capable of indicating one document, out of a set of documents written in natural language, which shows maximal degree of homeosemy (relationship in meaning between two texts language-fragments ) toward natural language query. Linguistic aspects, information traces, trigrams,…

Describes the three subsystems of an information retrieval system (document descriptions, queries, and matching algorithms) and argues that the interdependency of these subsystems requires adaptation for the system to perform when any component changes. An algorithm for redescribing documents, in response to changes in queries and retrieval rules,…

Suggests structure based on two sets of principles for deriving meaning from data: Shannon's measure of entropy, which provides means of measuring amount of information in message; and Ranganathan's faceted classification scheme, which provides means of determining number of meaningful data. Syntax, meaning, and semantics of data are discussed.…