This paper deals with quantitative evaluation of the effects of erroneous performance by stemming and similar clustering algorithms in information retrieval systems. (Author)

Discussion of the process of library cataloging notes the 8th century cataloger, Alcuin; purpose of cataloging; bibliographic control; access to information; cataloging on OCLC; emphasis on the format in which cataloging information is communicated; lost precision; authority files; and recall versus precision. Seven references are included. (EJS)

An information retrieval system which aspires to retrieval of relevant documents should have second stage which will order topical set to provide maximum informativeness to requestor. A two-stage system concerned only with topicality can be iterated to generate a high recall set and discard imprecise documents without user input. (EJS)

Reviews the advantages and disadvantages of different types of term combination using the positional logic capability of online information retrieval systems and describes a study in which searches for material on "microwave integrated circuits" were conducted in order to find the most economical way of generating the most relevant…

Demonstrates that if simple foundations of the cost structure are taken into consideration, high values of both precision and recall are not necessarily the goal when searching in an information system. Five figures and a reference list accompany the text. (Author/JL)

Discusses the problem of how to permit a patron to represent the relative importance of various index terms in a Boolean request while retaining the desirable properties of a Boolean system. (FM)

Describes a method of measuring the retrieval performance of book indexes which requires human searchers to base their searching strategies on actual passages from the book rather than on test queries. (FM)

Reviews major term-weighting theories, presents methods for estimating the relevance properties of terms based on their frequency characteristics in a document collection, and compares weighting systems using term relevance properties with more conventional frequency-based methodologies. Eighteen references are cited. (Author/FM)

Reviews some examples of library searches for both specified documents and specified subjects, and considers the distribution of library resources in relation to varying patterns of searches. (FM)

Analyzes a study of the effect of controlled variations in indexing vocabulary size on retrieval performance, using the Cranfield 200 and 1400 test collections. Sets of variable-length character strings were tested, in an application of the Cluster Hypothesis and in a series of linear associative retrieval experiments. (Author/SW)

Uses an historical analogy with Archimedes' problem concerning the volume of his king's golden crown to illustrate the evaluation problem for document and reference retrieval systems. Various methods that have been developed since 1950 to measure retrieval effectiveness are described, and utility measure formulas are provided. (JD)

Describes a study that computed low performance standards for the group of queries in 13 information retrieval (IR) test collections. Derived from the random graph hypothesis, these standards represent the highest levels of retrieval effectiveness that can be obtained from meaningless clustering structures. (Author/LRW)

Discussion of connectionist views for adaptive clustering in information retrieval focuses on a connectionist clustering technique and activation spreading-based information retrieval model using the interaction information retrieval method. Presents theoretical as well as simulation results as regards computational complexity and includes…

Explains the use of genetic algorithms to combine results from multiple query evaluations to improve relevance in information retrieval. Discusses niching techniques, relevance feedback techniques, and evolution heuristics, and compares retrieval results obtained by both genetic multiple query evaluation and classical single query evaluation…