DARPA Unfamiliar Metadata Project

Overview

Searching is likely to be effective and efficient only when the searcher is familiar with the classification, categorizing, and indexing schemes ("metadata vocabularies") being searched.

The rapid increase in the number of databases that can be accessed over the Internet means that searches will be increasingly require use of indexes and classification schemes that are unfamiliar to person searching.

To provide a cost-effective remedy, the researchers plan to develop Entry Vocabulary Indexes that accept topical statements in the searcher's terms ("Query vocabularies") and respond with a ranked list of terms in the system's vocabulary ("Entry vocabularis").

The Principal Investigator for this project is Professor Michael Buckland, with Professor Ray Larson, and Dr. Fred Gey, Assistant Director of campus UC Data Archive & Technical Assistance. They are helped by Dr. Aitao Chen and Graduate Student Researchers.

This project builds directly on several years research in the School on improved searching techniques. The Classification Clustering technique developed by Professor Ray Larson for the CHESHIRE I system will be used with probabilistic document retrieval algorithms developed by Dr Gey with support from the National Science Foundation.