Query Terms Abstraction Layers

A problem with traditional information retrieval systems is that they typically retrieve information without an explicitly defined domain of interest to the user. Consequently, the system presents a lot of information that is of little relevance to the user. Ideally, the queries’ real intentions should be exposed and reflected in the way the underlying retrieval machinery can deal with them. In this paper we propose using abstraction layers to differentiate on the query terms. We explain why we believe this differentiation of query terms is necessary and the potentials of this approach. The whole retrieval system is under development as part of a Semantic Web standardization project for the Norwegian oil and gas industry.