Nautical charts are an essential information resource for safe navigation. However, they are not only a useful resource for navigators; According to the International Hydrological Organization (IHO), they essentially fulfill two functions: 1) Maritime navigation, since most hydrographic services have the obligation to provide coverage of the…

Considering the importance of subject retrieval for scientific visibility, and the need to guide authors in self-archiving their papers in institutional repositories of university libraries, this study observed the patterns and strategies used by authors while indexing for keyword assignment. The study examined four categories of analysis:…

The diversity of engineering education research provides an opportunity for cross-fertilisation of ideas and creativity, but it also can result in fragmentation of the field and duplication of effort. One solution is to establish a standardised taxonomy of engineering education terms to map the field and communicate and connect research…

Vocabularies are linguistic resources that make it possible to access knowledge through words. They can constitute a mechanism to identify, describe, explore, and access all the digital resources with informational content pertaining to a specific knowledge domain. In this regard, they play a key role as systems for the representation and…

This experiment used five index languages to form nine different index files to the same collection of documents. Each index term, in each language, was treated in two ways: as an independent English term, and as a coded entry in a faceted-type thesaurus which specified relationships between terms. The performance effect of the thesaurus was then…

Explores the use of linear models and a combination of neural networks and linear classifiers to create a hybrid hierarchical mixture of experts (HME) model. Results confirm that using the hierarchical structure of the classification vocabulary improves categorization performance. (AEF)

Reports on two experiments investigating the relationship between topical subject expertise and the assessment of relevance. Results indicate that topical subject expertise enhances effects of the semantic distance model (SDM), and that relevance assessment is a contingent, psychological phenomenon that is part of the human-perception task of…

The indexing and online searching of data bases have both conflicting and complementary structures, determined in part by the choice of indexing language. In the planning of a machine readable system, the Foundation Center, administrator of two data bases, initially chose a natural language for the lower cost, more rapid implementation, and…

Studied the relationship between the vocabulary of user queries and the vocabulary of documents relevant to the queries, as well as the value of adding to the document description record in a retrieval system keywords from previous queries for which the document had proved useful. Eight references are listed. (FM)

Four papers are included in Part One of the eighteenth report on Salton's Magical Automatic Retriever of Texts (SMART) project. The first paper: "Content Analysis in Information Retrieval" by S. F. Weiss presents the results of experiments aimed at determining the conditions under which content analysis improves retrieval results as well…

This book deals with properties of vocabularies for indexing and searching document collections; the construction, organization, display, and maintenance of these vocabularies; and the vocabulary as a factor affecting the performance of retrieval systems. Most of the text is concerned with vocabularies for post-coordinate retrieval systems, with…

Discussion of the information-seeking behavior of humanists focuses on a study that investigated the efficacy of following bibliographic references from documents already known. Topics include the nature of humanities research; vocabulary control and indexing; subject-based literature searches; seed documents; relevance; retrieval based on…

The operational retrospective retrieval service offered by BIOSIS exploits a file created essentially without vocabulary control. A pragmatic program of file building criteria has been persued which has provided improved retrieval and an annual summary of the vocabulary of the literature. (11 references) (Author/KE)

Two programs addressed the development of information retrieval systems useful to a variety of users. One program was designed to examine aspects of indexing and information display. Experiments with different indexing and display systems revealed that for good relevance judgements, a display with full citation, keyboards, and abstract is…

GUIDELINES AND CONVENTIONS ARE PRESENTED FOR THE SELECTION OF APPROPRIATE TECHNICAL SUBJECT INDEXING AND RETRIEVAL TERMINOLOGY AND THE DISPLAY OF THIS TERMINOLOGY IN A THESAURUS FORMAT. THESE CONVENTIONS WERE DEVELOPED BY PROJECT LEX, THE DOD TECHNICAL THESAURUS TASK FORCE, IN COOPERATION WITH THE ENGINEERS JOINT COUNCIL. A DISCUSSION IS GIVEN OF…