This book constitutes the refereed proceedings of the 28th European Conference on Information Retrieval Research, ECIR 2006, held in London, April 2006. The 37 revised full papers and 28 revised poster papers presented are organized in topical sections on formal models, document and query representation and text understanding, topic identification and news retrieval, clustering and classification, refinement and feedback, performance and peer-to-peer networks, Web search, cross-language retrieval, genomic IR, and much more.

Database-backed Web pages provide many advantages for libraries; users get accurate and up-to-date information in real time, and site maintenance and data publishing are much easier. As appealing an idea as database-backed pages are, the ""how-tos"" of creating them remain a mystery to many librarians. This hands-on resource provides the tools to improve users' results by providing current data, make site maintenance and data publishing much easier, and even add new usefulness to existing data. Following these clear, step-by-step explanations, readers will find proven solutions for answers to questions like: What are database-backed Web pages? How much technical know-how is needed to do this? When, and for what kinds of information, are database-backed Web pages appropriate? What are Open Source tools? Who can use Open Source software? and Why is it appropriate for libraries? This authoritative, money-saving guide takes readers through a complete project from concept to implementation. It serves both beginner and expert librarians involved with designing and maintaining websites, as well as IT managers and administrators seeking expert guidance on hardware, software, and programming and documentation procedures. Packed with expert advice and links to real tools, this powerful, hands-on reference will streamline webmasters' results and customers' searches.

Implementing and maintaining effective technology services are a perennial challenge for libraries; for small to medium sized libraries, it can be overwhelming. Not a techie? Not a problem. A librarian and technical expert have joined forces in this thorough and easy-to-understand primer. Access practical hands-on tools to: offer premium services and save money with reproducible forms; keep the plan dynamic and organized with worksheets for planning, budgeting, and more; use smart staffing tips to cover tech needs; and, find the latest resources on the companion website. For any librarian wanting a comprehensive overview, ""Technology Made Simple"" offers clear answers to overcoming libraries' tech challenges.

Are you spending money wisely? If you're a technical services manager at an academic library, an administrator, or a dean, you're tasked with proving it. Incorporate assessment and analysis work into your library's existing workflow with the guidance of this new collection from the Association of Library Collections and Technical Services (ALCTS). Contributors from several academic libraries draw from real-world practices to suggest new approaches for acquisition and collections, cataloging and metadata, digital preservation, and e-resources and serials. You'll find advice on such topics as assessing e-resource budgets, workflows, vendors, and collaborative initiatives; how to use multiple data sets to assess collections across subjects, formats, or other factors; working with data using common applications like Excel, Access, or MySQL; four types of preservation assessment and how to structure them for actionable results; ways to save on serial expenses while avoiding cancellations; seven key considerations for building a data warehouse; and benchmarking techniques for improving metadata processes Exploring your options for assessment will lead you to the right balance of traditional and new metrics, and this book provides a valuable overview.

Due to the lack of a uniform schema for Web documents and the sheer amount and dynamics of Web data, both the effectiveness and the efficiency of information management and retrieval of Web data is often unsatisfactory when using conventional data management techniques.

Web community, defined as a set of Web-based documents with its own logical structure, is a flexible and efficient approach to support information retrieval and to implement various applications. Zhang and his co-authors explain how to construct and analyse Web communities based on information like Web document contents, hyperlinks, or user access logs. Their approaches combine results from Web search algorithms, Web clustering methods, and Web usage mining. They also detail the necessary preliminaries needed to understand the algorithms presented, and they discuss several successful existing applications.

Researchers and students in information retrieval and Web search find in this all the necessary basics and methods to create and understand Web communities. Professionals developing Web applications will additionally benefit from the samples presented for their own designs and implementations.

Collections of digital documents can nowadays be found everywhere in institutions, universities or companies. Examples are Web sites or intranets. But searching them for information can still be painful. Searches often return either large numbers of matches or no suitable matches at all.

Such document collections can vary a lot in size and how much structure they carry. What they have in common is that they typically do have some structure and that they cover a limited range of topics. The second point is significantly different from the Web in general.

The type of search system that we propose in this book can suggest ways of refining or relaxing the query to assist a user in the search process. In order to suggest sensible query modifications we would need to know what the documents are about. Explicit knowledge about the document collection encoded in some electronic form is what we need. However, typically such knowledge is not available. So we construct it automatically.

The fourth campaign of the Cross-language Evaluation Forum (CLEF) for European languages was held from January to August 2003. Participation in this campaign showed a slight rise in the number of participants from the previous year, with 42 groups submitting results for one or more of the different tracks (compared with 37 in 2002), but a steep rise in the number of experiments attempted. A distinctive feature of CLEF 2003 was the number of new tracks and tasks that were offered as pilot experiments. The aim was to try out new ideas and to encourage the development of new evaluation methodologies, suited to the emerging requirements of both system developers and users with respect to today s digital collections and to encourage work on many European languages rather than just those most widely used. CLEF is thus gradually pushing its participants towards the ultimate goal: the development of truly multilingual systems capable of processing collections in diverse media. The campaign culminated in a two-day workshop held in Trondheim, Norway, 21 22 August, immediately following the 7th European Conference on Digital Libraries (ECDL 2003), and attended by more than 70 researchers and system developers. The objective of the workshop was to bring together the groups that had participated in the CLEF 2003 campaign so that they could report on the results of their experiments."

* Covers the brand new Portlet Specification (JSR-168) to provide a standard API to portal applications. * Focuses on the key issues of portal development including integration, security and single sign-on. * Readers can learn how to port existing applications into the new portal environment firsthand from Jeff Linwood who helped to create the actual specification. * Readers can learn how to port existing applications into the new portal environment firsthand from Jeff Linwood who helped to create the actual specifications.

The Semantic Web o?ers new options for information processes. Dr. Visser is dealing with twocore issuesin this area: the integrationofdata onthe sem- tic level and the problem of spatio-temporalrepresentation and reasoning. He tackles existing research problems within the ?eld of geographic information systems(GIS), thesolutionsofwhichareessentialfor animprovedfunction- ity of applicationsthat makeuse of the Semantic Web (e.g., for heterogeneous digitalmaps).Inaddition, theyareoffundamentalsigni?canceforinformation sciences as such. In an introductory overview of this ?eld of research, he motivates the - cessity for formal metadata for unstructured information in the World Wide Web. Without metadata, an e?cient search on a semantic level will turn out to be impossible, above all if it is not only applied to a terminological level but also to spatial-temporal knowledge. In this context, the task of infor- tionintegrationisdividedinto syntactic, structural, andsemanticintegration, the last class by far the most di?cult, above all with respect to contextual semantic heterogeneities. A current overview of the state of the art in the ?eld of information in- gration follows. Emphasis is put particularly on the representation of spatial and temporal aspects including the corresponding inference mechanisms, and also the special requirements on the Open GIS Consort

We are delighted to present the ECDL 2004 Conference proceedings from the 8th European Conference on Research and Advanced Technology for Digital - braries at the University of Bath, Bath, UK. This followed an impressive and geographicallydispersedseriesof locationsfor previousevents: Pisa(1997), H- aklion(1998), Paris(1999), Lisbon (2000), Darmstadt(2001), Rome (2002), and Trondheim (2003). The conference re?ected the rapidly evolving landscape of digital libraries, both in technology developments and in the focus of approaches to implem- tation. An emphasis on the requirements of the individual user and of diverse and distributed user communities was apparent. In addition, the conference p- gramme began to address, possibly for the ?rst time, the associated themes of e-research/e-scienceand e-learning and their relationship to digital libraries. We observed increasing commonality in both the distributed information archit- tures and the technical standards that underpin global infrastructure devel- ments. Digital libraries are integral to this information landscape and to the creation of increasingly powerful tools and applications for resource discovery and knowledge extraction. Digital libraries support and facilitate the data and information ?ows within the scholarly knowledge cycle and provide essential - abling functionality for both learnersand researchers. The varied and innovative research activities presented at ECDL 2004 demonstrate the exciting potential of this very fast-moving ?eld. The 148 papers, 43 posters, 5 panels, 14 tutorials and 4 workshops subm- ted this year were once again of the highest qu

Using database-driven web pages or web content management (WCM) systems to manage increasingly diverse web content and to streamline workflows is a commonly practiced solution recognized in libraries to-day. However, limited library web content management models and funding constraints prevent many libraries from purchasing commercially available WCM systems. And, the lack of much needed technical expertise in building in-house WCM systems presents a great challenge for libraries of all types. Content and Workflow Management for Library Websites: Case Studies provides practical and applicable web content management solutions through case studies. It contains successful database-to-web applications as employed in a variety of academic libraries. The applications vary in scope and cover a range of practical how-to-do-it examples from database-driven web development, locally created web content management systems, systems for distributing content management responsibilities, dynamic content delivery, to open source tools, such as MySQL and PHP to manage the content. Issues and challenges associated with the development process are discussed. Authors will also discuss detours, sand traps, and missteps necessary to a real learning process.

Eager to feed their curiosity with interactive information, children are becoming more responsive to technology, and many now use a mouse more effectively than a crayon. By embracing the possibilities of the Internet when programming for children, libraries can empower the young with great information while supplementing traditional children's services. These award-winning children's web developers and librarians build their virtual library services starting from the four pillars of children's librarianship: readers' advisory, homework reference help, programming, and outreach. Presenting a wide assortment of possibilities, the authors offer guidance, inspiration, and practical direction - complete with sample screen shots - to: Create appropriate sites for different ages; Develop a project plan, including an ""Approach to Success"" document; Map our details with storyboards and flowcharts; Make user experiences easy and fun using mascots, navigation tools, and downloads; Authoritative and comprehensive, this guide provides sample documents and hands-on help on technical issues - usability testing, dealing with online privacy, monitoring, maintaining, promoting the site, testing for functionality, and using meta tags, Children's and web librarians, generalists responsible for creating online services, as well as school library media specialists, instructors and administrators will find the support they need to design successful websites that serve a whole generation of tech-savvy kids.

Searching for health information may be the most important type of search a librarian performs in a day. Instead of starting a health care search with a blank computer screen or simply accessing ordinary information available most anywhere on the Web, start with help from the prestigious Medical Library Association. Each entry will show you how an experienced health sciences librarian would approach the question. You can begin a truly valuable search knowing: Special searching issues; What to ask; Where to start; Supplementary search strategies; Topic profile; Recommended search terms and Important sites; Hotline phone numbers; FAQs; Publicational on the Internet; Professional Organizations; Patient support organizations and discussion groups; Best ""One-Stop-Shops""; Finally, there's one ready-reference source, written by librarians to help their colleagues, that covers every important aspect of the question you or your user want to answer.

Theseproceedingscontaintherefereedfulltechnicalpaperspresentedatthe26th Annual European Conference on Information Retrieval (ECIR 2004). ECIR is theannualconferenceoftheBritishComputerSociety'sspecialistgroupinInf- mation Retrieval. This year the conference was held at the School of Computing and Technology at the University of Sunderland. ECIR began life as the - nual Colloquium on Information Retrieval Research. The colloquium was held in the UK each year until 1998 when the event was held in Grenoble, France. Since then the conference venue has alternated between the United Kingdom and Continental Europe, and the event was renamed the European Conference on Information Retrieval. In recent years, ECIR has continued to grow and has become the major European forum for the discussion of research in the ?eld of Information Retrieval. To mark this metamorphosis from a small informal c- loquium to a major event in the IR research calendar, the BCS-IRSG decided to rename the event to the European Conference on Information Retrieval. ECIR2004received88fullpapersubmissions, fromacrossEuropeandfurther a?eldincludingNorthAmerica, ChinaandAustralia, atestamenttothegrowing popularity and reputation of the conference. Out of the 88 submitted papers, 28 were accepted for presentation. All papers were reviewed by at least three reviewers. Among the accepted papers 11 have a student as the primary author, illustrating that the traditional student focus of the original colloquium is alive today.

Information-hungry consumers have become accustomed to flashy commercial web sites, the lightning speed of major search engines, and the seemingly endless array of ""content"" at sites like BN.com or Amazon.com. Libraries committed to delivering online content and services in this frenzied environment need the authoritative guidance and practical know-how available in Library Web Sites. This patton-centered step-by-step guide is the foundation for creating either basic or advanced online library services and integrating all aspects of library activities in the virtual world. Beginning with a checklist of elements essential to a library web site, it further explains how to: Manage content using database-backed Web pages; Brand the library's marketing and promote services online; link external content - licensed databases, library catalog and e-books - onto the site; Conduct readers' advisory services online; Keep the site fresh and updated using the editorial calendar tool; Archive online resources; Public and academic librarians, technology specialists, and all those front line staff responsible for creating, designing, and updating the library's web site will find an all-encompassing user-friendly guide designed to help them make the library's vast resources accessible online. Visit the companion web site for this book at . You can access an online version of the editorial calendar, examples of spreadsheets used to collect statistics, updated virtual library information, and more.

The International Conference on Asian Digital Libraries (ICADL) is an annual international forum that provides opportunities for researchers and experts to meet and exchange research results, innovative ideas and state-of-the-art de- lopments in the digital libraries of their respective countries. Building on the success of the ?rst ?ve ICADL conferences, the 6th ICADL conference in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia aimed to further strengthen the collaboration and strategic alliance between the di?erent researchers and experts from the Asia-Paci?c - gion in the ?eld of digital libraries. Thethemeoftheconference, DigitalLibraries: TechnologyandManagement of Indigenous Knowledge for Global Access, re?ects the shared belief of the - ganizers that success in the development and implementation of digital libraries in the k-economy is based on four key areas: the technologies that are employed to create a user-friendly environment, organization, interaction, navigation, and access to content; a knowledge management approach that ensures all types of knowledge (explicit, tacit and implicit) are included; indigenous content, which implies the creation of suitable and speci?c content to meet the needs of the indigenous community; and global access, which implies that content should be made available across time and space, and also implies that the content should be ?exible enough to meet global needs. The ICADL 2003 began with an opening ceremony and a keynote address."

The third campaignof the Cross-LanguageEvaluation Forum (CLEF) for Eu- pean languages was held from January to September 2002. Participation in this campaignshowedaslightriseinthenumberofparticipantswith,37groupsfrom both academia and industry and a steep rise in the number of experiments they submitted for oneor moreof the ?ve o?cialtracks. The campaignculminated in atwo-dayworkshopheldinRome, Italy,19-20September, immediatelyfollowing the Sixth European Conference on Digital Libraries (ECDL 2002), attended by nearly 70 researchersand system developers. The objective of the workshop was to bring together the groups that had participated in CLEF 2002 so that they could report on the results of their experiments. Attendance at the workshop was thus limited to participants in the campaignplus severalinvited guests with recognized expertise in the multilingual information access ?eld. This volume contains thoroughly revised and expanded versions of the preliminary papers presented at the workshop accompanied by a complete run-down and detailed analysis of the results, and it thus provides an exhaustive record of the CLEF 2002 campaign. CLEF2002 wasconducted within the frameworkof a projectof the Infor- tion Society Technologies programme of the European Commission (IST-2000- 31002). The campaign was organized in collaboration with the US National - stitute ofStandardsandTechnology(NIST)andwiththe supportoftheDELOS Network of Excellence for Digital Libraries. The support of NIST and DELOS in the running of the evaluation campaign is gratefully acknowledged. We would also like to thank the other members of the Workshop Steering Committee for their assistance in the coordination of this even

Extracting content from text continues to be an important research problem for information processing and management. Approaches to capture the semantics of text-based document collections may be based on Bayesian models, probability theory, vector space models, statistical models, or even graph theory. As the volume of digitized textual media continues to grow, so does the need for designing robust, scalable indexing and search strategies (software) to meet a variety of user needs. Knowledge extraction or creation from text requires systematic yet reliable processing that can be codified and adapted for changing needs and environments. This book will draw upon experts in both academia and industry to recommend practical approaches to the purification, indexing, and mining of textual information. It will address document identification, clustering and categorizing documents, cleaning text, and visualizing semantic models of text.

In just a few years a generation has grown up believing that everything can be found on the Web and indeed there are now more than two billion documents in cyberspace, not including the 550 million documents that can be accessed via the "deep" or "invisible" Web. But how do you separate quality, authoritative information from all of the dross? It seems that the difficulties of finding "valid" information on the Web are growing as fast as the Internet itself. New search tools appear every few weeks and the familiar ones are constantly evolving. Effective searching in this ever-expanding environment requires new strategies. Maureen Henninger addresses these issues and assumes that for most reader the Internet is no longer a mystery, and the finding of quality information has become their major concern. So often it is the worthwhile information that remains hidden to Web users, even very experienced ones. This book provides strategies for uncovering valuable information from a vast number and variety of sites confronting users.

If your customers don't sleep, why should your reference service? Online library reference services available 24/7 are offered in a growing number of institutions. With many models to choose from and more details to be worked out, it is a critical time for librarians to assess their patrons' needs and market their services to address these needs. Collecting and documenting what thousands of virtual reference librarians have learned over the past few years, this comprehensive guide provides a needed overview to help new and aspiring virtual reference library departments - and their directors and administrators, reference librarians, and project managers - to understand the entire process and its ramifications. Here are the basics of designing, implementing, operating, and marketing a virtual reference service from the ground up. In a text supplemented with checklists so no key element is forgotten, this reference offers the real-world answers from leading experts to the most common questions: Where has Web-based library reference come from and where is it going? What is the best digital reference software to address specific needs? Who should staff the virtual reference desktop? How do they get hired and trained? When and how does a library market such a radical new service? Why are evaluations and system enhancements critical to the future of digital reference? With a look into the costs, and a look into the future, supplemented with the most comprehensive bibliography available on the topic, Going Live is a one-stop resource for getting started in digital reference services.

This book constitutes the refereed proceedings of the 25th European Conference on Information Retrieval Research, ECIR 2003, held in Pisa, Italy, in April 2003. The 31 revised full papers and 16 short papers presented together with two invited papers were carefully reviewed and selected from 101 submissions. The papers are organized in topical sections on IR and the Web; retrieval of structured documents; collaborative filtering and text mining; text representation and natural language processing; formal models and language models for IR; machine learning and IR; text categorization; usability, interactivity, and visualization; and architectural issues and efficiency.

Preface l. Database Management 2. Network Management 3. Online Databases 4. CD-ROM Networks 5. Management of Automated Libraries 6. Strategic Management of Modern Libraries 7. Information Policies Index

Information Spaces: The Architecture of Cyberspace is aimed at students taking information management as a minor in their course as well as those who manage document collections but who are not professional librarians. The first part of this book looks at how users find documents and the problems they have; the second part discusses how to manage the information space using various tools such as classification and controlled vocabularies. It also explores the general issues of publishing, including legal considerations, as well the main issues of creating and managing archives. Supported by exercises and discussion questions at the end of each chapter, the book includes some sample assignments suitable for use with students of this subject. A glossary is also provided to help readers understand the specialised vocabulary and the key concepts in the design and assessment of information spaces.

More and more educational and recreational content on the Internet is geared directly to kids. Studies have shown that isolation from contemporary information resources can crush a child's opportunities to succeed in the world today. How can librarians enhance their youth services through the Internet and teach kids information literacy? What types of Internet resources are now being developed for children and teens? What responsibilities do librarians have to accommodate access to the Net by minors and to teach them about that access? Champelli highlights dozens of successful library programs from across the country, describing for each the target audience, the required equipment, the program plan and goals, notes from an experienced teacher of the program, and one library's use policy for that program. Programs are arranged into four major groups: instructional, curriculum related, summer reading, and recreational. This programming manual gives you the foundation you've been looking for to begin or augment Internet programs for your young learners. Don't let your youth programming become irrelevant. Where kids are learning, the future is now.

It's no secret that well-executed exhibits in libraries and museums can make attendance numbers skyrocket. Dynamic exhibits not only provide information and entertainment for your existing customers, but they are also opportunities to reach out to new customers and to widen your market. A great exhibit can be the hook that brings people in the door for the first time.

Creating a Winning Online Exhibition will help you to do just that -- conceive, design, and execute a compelling online exhibition. Different than a digital collection, an online exhibition is a selective presentation of objects organized around a thematic and narrative structure. Digital librarian Martin Kalfatovic takes you through the process of developing an exhibit that will attract users, increase your visibility, and showcase your collection and services. With case studies of successful online exhibitions, sample artwork and screen shots, up-to-date information on mark-up languages such as HTML and XML, and discussion of online databases and software programs, you will be equipped with all you need to pull off a winning exhibition. Also included are helpful samples of:

-- Project proposals

-- Exhibition scripts

-- Time lines

-- Database structures and guidelines

-- Tips on working with outside contractors

Online exhibitions are ideal for collections of manuscripts, handwritten documents, and other materials that might be limited if displayed in traditional ways. This comprehensive guide provides the "how-to's" for selecting materials, developing an overarching theme, and creating a narrative presentation that goes beyond the traditional to deliver a winning exhibition.