Advanced Search Technologies for Unfamiliar Metadata

Searching of databases (textual or numeric) is likely to be effective and efficient only if the user is familiar with the classification, categorizing, and indexing schemes (metadata vocabularies) being searched. Therefore, it is obviously beneficial to provide a bridge between the user’s ordinary language and the metadata vocabularies of the unfamiliar database in order to compensate for abbreviated, cryptic, or specialized terminologies. Advanced search technologies would utilize customized “Entry Vocabulary Modules” (EVM) which respond adaptively to the user’s ordinary language query with a ranked list of search terms in the target metadata vocabularies that may more accurately represent what is sought in the unfamiliar database. These “Entry Vocabulary Modules” can serve both as an indexing device and a search aid. This project has developed EVMs for several metadata vocabularies, including domestic and international patent classifications and U.S. Standard Industrial Classification Codes. An agent-based architecture is under design to lighten the task of cracking alien metadata vocabularies.