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IRList Digest Volume 2 Number 59
IRList Digest Friday, 14 November 1986 Volume 2 : Issue 59
Today's Topics:
Query - Availability of Pisa Proceedings (1986 Int'l Conf. on R&D in IR)?
- Use of neural networks for IR?
Seminars - Schedule for Information Systems Research Group in Nova Scotia
COGSCI - Learning by failing to explain
CSLI - Head-Phrase Structure Grammar Theory and Research
- Relation-changing Affixes and Homonymy
News addresses are ARPANET: fox%vt@csnet-relay.arpa BITNET: foxea@vtvax3.bitnet
CSNET: fox@vt UUCPNET: seismo!vtisr1!irlistrq
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Date: Wed, 29 Oct 86 13:16:38 pst
From: Michael Shepherd <shepherd%cs.dal.cdn%ubc.csnet@csnet-relay.arpa>
Subject: a bunch of things
Ed:
...I missed this year's sigir conference is Pisa, is it possible to
purchase the Proceedings?
...
[Note: I just called ACM. The order number is 606860 and the title
is "Proc. 9th Annual International SIGIR Conf. on R&D in Information
Retrieval." Cost is $18 ($24 nonmembers) and there is $3 shipping, from
ACM Orders Department
P.O. Box 64145
Baltimore MD 21264
They just received the copies in the warehouse yesterday!
Regards, Ed]
------------------------------
Date: Fri, 7 Nov 86 11:57:29 -0100
From: Wyle <seismo!mcvax!ifi.ethz.chunet!wyle>
Subject: RE: citations, conspectus
...
I am building a neral network model and exploring the possibilities of
using it to index text. Do any readers of IR list digest know of work
in this area?
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Mitch Wyle ...!decvax!seismo!mcvax!cernvax!ethz!Wyle
Institut fuer Informatik Wyle%ifi.ethz.cernvax.<network of your choice>
ETH / SOT
8092 Zuerich, Switzerland "Sic itur ad astra."
[Note: in issue 28 was abstract of an article about using the
Connection Machine for information retrieval. - Ed]
------------------------------
Date: Fri, 31 Oct 86 05:10:44 pst
From: Michael Shepherd <shepherd%cs.dal.cdn%ubc.csnet@csnet-relay.arpa>
Subject: ir in Nova Scotia
Ed:
The following is a list of the seminars given in our Information
Systems Research Group. If you want, I can periodically send you this
information.
==================
An informal "Information Systems Research Group" (ISRG) has been formed
in Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada. The purpose of this inter-disciplinary group
is to provide a forum for people to present their research, discuss common
interests, and to stimulate joint research efforts.
As of November 28, 1986, four seminars will have been held. The
following is a brief description of these seminars.
Date: October 3, 1986
Title: Managing Views of Large Databases that are Tailored to Individual
Users
Speaker: Dr. Carl Hartzman
Computing Science Division
Dept. of Math., Stats., & Comp. Sci.
Dalhousie University
Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada B3H 3J5
Abstract: Either for reasons of security or in order to avoid the necessity
of dealing with large amounts of irrelevant data, users of large
databases have restricted views of the database computed for them.
These views are not permanently resident in the computer system.
Thus, any update that the user may wish to make to the information
appearing in his view must be translated to an update on the
underlying database from which the view is computed, in such a way
that the computation of the view yields exactly the updated
information. Generally, if there are any translations that will
accomplish this, there are more than one, each reflecting a
different update policy. This profusion of translations yields
the risk of putting wrong or inconsistent data into the database.
Thus, database management systems have not typically permitted
view updates. The question we examine here is the possibility
of designing databases so that desired view updates have
unique correct translations.
Date: October 17, 1986
Title: Integrating User Profiles into Expert Systems for
Bibliographic Retrieval
Speaker: Dr. Michael Shepherd
Computing Science Division
Dept. of Math., Stats., & Comp. Sci.
Dalhousie University
Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada B3H 3J5
Abstract: The purpose of the proposed research is to investigate knowledge
representations for expert online bibliographic retrieval systems
incorporating the profile-query relationship. The knowledge
representations must be hospitable to user profiles and queries
and permit the definition and implementation of a profile-query
relationship. These knowledge representations must be able to
represent the knowledge within a bibliographic retrieval system
that permits online access to thousands and millions of documents.
The representations must permit the user to query the knowledge-
base as well as the database and the system must be able to make
inferences from the knowledge-base, the profile, and the profile-
query relationship.
Date: November 14, 1986
Title: A Parallel Architecture for a Database Machine
Speakers: Dr. W. Robertson and Dr. P. Bodorik
School of Computer Science
Technical University of Nova Scotia
Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada B3J 2X4
Abstract: This talk outlines the authors' approach to an architecture which
is, in their opinion, eminently suitable for a database machine. An
investigation of the characteristics of various interconnection
topologies lead the authors to the conclusion that a dual-bus
hypercube is probably the most suitable for a modular architecture
for data base operations. The bottleneck at the mass storage
interface is eliminated by the introduction of an interleaved
memory structure at the interface. Under the assumption that a
relation of interest is uniformly distributed over some number, m,
of disc cylinders, and that all cylinders can be accessed
concurrently, the disc to memory bandwidth is balanced. The
maximum number of discs in the system is W**2, for a three cube,
where W is the number of nodes connected to each bus of the
hypercube. This structure has an advantage in that it requires
a smaller number of connections per node and it is also easily
extended to increase mass storage and/or computational capacity
by increasing W and/or the hypercube dimension. The functional
requirements of the nodes and the bus protocol are currently
under investigation.
Date: November 28, 1986
Title: A Framework and Prototype for Intelligent Information Retrieval
Researchers: Dr. Vijay V. Raghavan
Center for Advanced Computer Studies
University of Southwestern Louisiana
Lafayette, Lousiana 70504-4330
Dr. Ravi S. Sharma
Dept. of Mathematics and Computing Sciences
St. Francis Xavier University
Antigonish, Nova Scotia, Canada B2G 1C0
Speaker: Dr. Ravi S. Sharma
Abstract: Information Retrieval (IR) is the process of selectively
disseminating relevant information stored among a variety of
information items. A scheme for efficient (in terms of computer
resources used) and effective (in terms of recall and precision)
information retrieval is proposed. This draws from rough set
theory and an adaptive clustering strategy in order to achieve some
amount of self-organization in the database. The relevance
judgements of weighted queries are used as the basis for influencing
the classification of documents, thus enabling user input to direct
clustering and allow the clustering sub-system to learn. An
evaluation metric based on the theory of rough sets is used as
the clustering criterion, which is enhanced in an iterative fashion.
The clustering algorithm begins with an arbitrary placement of the
documents in the collection on a one-dimensional linear space and,
as each query arrives, uses the relevance judgements to generate
movement along the line so that "similar" documents are moved
closer together and "dissimilar" ones moved further apart from
each other. The precise definitions of what is meant by similar
and dissimilar are also based on ideas from rough set theory. After
a number of queries are processed, the initial positions change as
the system "learns" the users' profiles. The classification,
however, is re-clustered only when this movement is deemed
significant as defined by a variation of a common measure for
determining the similarity between classifications. The general
method of clustering places boundaries on gaps so as to optimize
the clustering criterion. Efficient and effective retrieval
is sought by using a learning scheme known as retrieval-by-example.
The prototype experimental implementation of the scheme indicates
remarkable potential, producing recall and precision results of
between 40 to 80 per cent.
------------------------------
Date: Mon, 20 Oct 86 03:10:09 edt
From: DEJONG%OZ.AI.MIT.EDU@XX.LCS.MIT.EDU
Subject: Cognitive Science Calendar [Extract - Ed]
Date: Friday, 17 October 1986 15:04-EDT
From: JHC at OZ.AI.MIT.EDU
subject: revolving seminar (for real this time)
Thursday, 23 October 4:00pm Room: NE43-8th floor playroom
LEARNING BY FAILING TO EXPLAIN
Robert Joseph Hall
MIT Artificial Intelligence Laboratory
Explanation-based Generalization depends on having an explanation on
which to base generalization. Thus, a system with an incomplete or
intractable explanatory mechanism will not be able to generalize some
examples. It is not necessary, in those cases, to give up and resort
to purely empirical generalization methods, because the system may
already know almost everything it needs to explain the precedent.
Learning by Failing to Explain is a method which exploits current
knowledge to prune complex precedents and rules, isolating their
mysterious parts. This paper describes two techniques for Learning by
Failing to Explain: Precedent Analysis, partial analysis of a
precedent or rule to isolate the mysterious new technique(s) it
embodies; and Rule Re-analysis, re-analyzing old rules in terms of new
rules to obtain a more general set.
------------------------------
Date: Mon, 20 Oct 86 03:11:12 edt
From: EMMA@CSLI.STANFORD.EDU
Subject: CSLI Calendar, October 16, No. 3 [Extract - Ed]
HPSG Theory and HPSG Research
Ivan Sag
October 23, 1986
This seminar presents an overview of the central ideas under
development by members of the CSLI HPSG project. Head-Driven Phrase
Structure Grammar is an information-based theory of the relation
between syntactic and semantic structure. The syntactic concepts of
HPSG evolved from Generalized Phrase Structure Grammar (GPSG) in the
course of the last few years through extensive interaction with
members of the CSLI FOG project. HPSG integrates key ideas of GPSG
with concepts drawn from Kay's Functional Unification Grammar and
Categorial Grammar and incorporates certain analytic techniques of
Lexical-Functional Grammar. The semantic concepts of HPSG are a hybrid
of Situation Semantics and the theory of thematic roles. Current HPSG
theory embodies a number of important design properties: monotonicity,
declarativeness and reversibility, yet current HPSG analyses require
extensions of such standard frameworks as PATR-II. Current research
ideas will be surveyed, as well as ongoing work on the hierarchical
structure of the HPSG lexicon.
------------------------------
Date: Fri, 24 Oct 86 02:18:08 edt
From: EMMA@CSLI.STANFORD.EDU
Subject: CSLI Calendar, October 23, No. 4 [Extract - Ed]
Relation-changing Affixes and Homonymy
Abdelkader Fassi-Fehri
October 28, 12:30, Trailer Classroom, CSLI
Of special relevance to a natural theory of affixation are the
following questions:
a) What is the exact nature of the changes that a lexical unit
undergoes as the result of an affixation process (role or argument
reduction or increase, valency reorganization, etc.), and which
level of representation is the most appropriate to state these
changes?
b) Given that languages use different systems of homonymic forms of
affixes to express different valencies (or the same valency
organized in different ways), is there a possible account which
will predict which homonymy affixation would be natural, and which
one would be accidental?
We propose a theory of lexical organisation that answers these
questions.
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END OF IRList Digest
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