Information Organisation and Retrieval Theme

Information Organisation and Retrieval Theme

The group of researchers active in this theme aims to take a broad theoretical and practical view of information organisation and retrieval based specifically on the interests and experience of the members. This incorporates a concern with the role that traditional information organisation tools such as indexes, taxonomies, ontology can have in the emerging semantic web as well as the more informal approach manifested in tags and bookmarking systems. Recent developments in discovery interfaces and the implications of assigned and derived metadata in the context of library services is also a key concern of the group.

Specific research areas:

• User tagging as the foundation of controlled subject systems

Data from novice taggers of images has been analysed to determine the potential of identifying underlying faceted structures and harnessing these to create a taxonomy.

• Critical innovations in summarisation techniques

This project explores the necessity for conventional narratives in automatic summarisation

• The gains and losses with discovery interfaces in libraries

As many libraries move towards a ‘one-stop shop’ single interface search system to enable users to search all their collections, there is a need to understand the advantages of this type of federated search and retrieval software both commercial and open access and evaluate the limitations associated with the inevitable filtering of complex legacy metadata.