Today Learning Management Systems (LMS) have become an integral part of learning mechanism of both learning institutes and industry. A Learning Object (LO) can be one of the atomic components of LMS. A large amount of research is conducted into identifying benchmarks for creating Learning Objects. Some of the major concerns associated with LO are…

It is known that any totally skew quantity with (n + 1) indices, each of which ranges over n values, vanishes identically. The aim of this short note is to show that this is equivalent to the simple fact that any (n + 1) vectors in an n-dimensional vector space are linearly dependent.

Investigates the presence of clustering structure in a document collection and the influence of the presence of clustering structure on the success of cluster-based retrieval. Term-weight and similarity thresholds are discussed, empirical and statistical significance are considered, and indexing exhaustivity for document representation is…

Using examples of data from the areas of information retrieval and of multivariate data analysis, six hierarchic clustering algorithms (single link, median, centroid, group average, complete link, Wards's) are examined and evaluated by using three proposed coefficients of hierarchic structure. Nine references are cited. (EJS)

Addresses the application of automatic classification methods to the problems associated with computerized document retrieval. Different kinds of classifications are described, and both document and term clustering methods are discussed. References and notes are provided. (Author/JD)

Discusses the problem of processing fuzzy queries in databases and information retrieval systems and presents a prototype of a fuzzy query processing system for databases that is based on data clustering and uses Pascal programing language. Clustering schemes are explained, and the system architecture that uses natural language is described. (14…

Presents system for automatic handling of ordered sets, states based on these sets, and differing points of view regarding Universe of Discourse. Aspects are represented by new logical "overlap" function with examples taken from Ranganathan's horse and carriage parable and several books involving four main concepts (history, geography,…

Discusses hierarchic document clustering in information retrieval and its potential improved effectiveness over inverted file search (IFS). Describes experiments conducted to determine whether hierarchic clustering can increase the retrieval effectiveness compared to both static clustering and of conventional IFS when it is applied to search…

Describes a cluster-based information retrieval procedure that can significantly reduce the computational requirements of the single linkage method, while still maintaining the retrieval effectiveness of the resulting classifications. Use of nearest neighbors, experimental details, and results and conclusions are highlighted. Fourteen references…

Describes a method of iterative searching that uses local metrical clustering in the formulation of additional searches by producing searchonyms, terms which are synonymous to keywords in the context of a single query. The method was applied to a database containing Hebrew and Aramaic text. Seven references are listed. (FM)

Demonstrates that the process of comparing each document in an automated system with all others during the classification procedure may be avoided by the use of an inverted file. (FM)

This issue contains nine articles that provide an overview of trends and research in parallel information retrieval. Topics discussed include network design for text searching; the Connection Machine System; PThomas, an adaptive information retrieval system on the Connection Machine; algorithms for document clustering; and system architecture for…

Describes ways of using Boolean questions with a clustered information file, and reviews an experiment studying the effect of such a retrieval method. (FM)

Discusses the intellectual structure of the sciences and describes a study that was conducted to test the usefulness of author cocitation analysis for empirically deriving groupings of intellectual leaders in the field of sociology. Results are contrasted with traditional subjective methods of codification of a field. (35 references) (LRW)

Describes the use of relevance feedback to select additional search terms and discusses the extraction of these terms from a maximum spanning tree connecting all terms in the index term vocabulary; retrieval effectiveness for different spanning trees is shown to be similar. Eight references are included. (Author/BK)