Information Retrieval (IR) is one of the most evolving research fields and has drawn extensive attention in recent years. Because of its empirical nature, the advance of the IR field is closely related to the development of various toolkits. While the traditional IR toolkit mainly provides a platform to evaluate the effectiveness of retrieval…

In recent years, tags have become a standard feature on a diverse range of sites on the Web, accompanying blog posts, photos, videos, and online news stories. Tags are descriptive terms attached to Internet resources. Despite the rapid adoption of tagging, how people use tags during the search process is not well understood. There is little…

This article summarizes the author's dissertation regarding search strategies of millennial undergraduate students in Web and library online information retrieval systems. Millennials bring a unique set of search characteristics and strategies to their research since they have never known a world without the Web. Through the use of search engines,…

This dissertation explores the use of geometric and graphical models for a variety of information search and filtering applications. These models serve to provide an intuitive understanding of the problem domains and as well as computational efficiencies to our solution approaches. We begin by considering a search and rescue scenario where both…

Introduction: The goal of this study is to expand our understanding of the relationships between selected tasks, cognitive abilities and search result interfaces. The underlying objective is to understand how to select search results presentation for tasks and user contexts Method: Twenty three participants conducted four search tasks of two types…

This paper introduces Ontoolsearch, a new search system that can be employed by educators in order to find suitable tools for supporting collaborative learning settings. Current tool search facilities commonly allow simple keyword searches, limiting the accuracy of obtained results. In contrast, Ontoolsearch supports semantic querying of tool…

This study investigates the relationships between the use of a zoom tool, the terms they supply to describe the image, and the type of image being viewed. Participants were assigned to two groups, one with access to the tool and one without, and were asked to supply terms to describe forty images, divided into four categories: landscape, portrait,…

Academic libraries customize, support, and provide access to myriad information systems, each with complex graphical user interfaces. The number of possible information entry points on an academic library Web site is both daunting to the end-user and consistently challenging to library Web site designers. Faced with the challenges inherent in…

Discussion of search strategy in information retrieval by end users focuses on the role played by strategic reasoning and design principles for user interfaces. Highlights include strategic help based on collaborative coaching; a conceptual model for strategic help; and a prototype knowledge-based system named FIRE. (Author/LRW)

Discusses database interfaces and explains that collaboration is an important aspect of searching online information retrieval systems that requires explicit computerized support. Collaboration in physical and in digital libraries is discussed and an example of a system that supports collaboration between browsers, ARIADNE, is described. (105…

Describes the MultiText information retrieval system that finds arbitrary passages of text, as opposed to complete documents, that are likely to be relevant. Discusses relevance ranking, term expansion, interactive user interface, and distributed searching used in experiments for TREC-6 (Text Retrieval Conference) in the ad hoc, high precision,…

Discusses qualitatively enhanced access to data collections, requiring a more meaningful interface which endows the users with personal agents that are adaptable to the users' individual retrieval preferences. Users are given recommendations derived from best practice in information search processes to perform successful retrieval activities via…

Discusses full-text databases and whether existing aggregator databases are meeting user needs. Topics include the need for better search interfaces; concepts of quality research and information retrieval; information overload; full text in electronic journal collections versus aggregator databases; underrepresentation of certain disciplines; and…

Describes Hermes, a research tool that uses specially designed acquisition, parsing and presentation methods to integrate information resources on the Internet, from searching in disparate bibliographic databases, to accessing full text articles online, and developing a web of information associated with each reference via one common interface.…

Findings from a study of users' multitasking searches on Web search engines include: multitasking searches are a noticeable user behavior; multitasking search sessions are longer than regular search sessions in terms of queries per session and duration; both Excite and AlltheWeb.com users search for about three topics per multitasking session and…