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- 1. INTRODUCTION The Information Retrieval System was coined by Calvin Mooers in 1952. These information retrieval systems were, truly speaking, document retrieval system, since they were designed to retrieve information. Information retrieval deals with storage, organization and access to text, as well as multimedia information resources. Information Retrieval is a process of searching some collection of documents, using the term document in its widest sense, in order to identify those documents which deal with a particular subject. Any system that is designed to facilitate this literature searching may legitimately be called an information retrieval system. Information retrieval systems originally meant text retrieval systems, since they were dealing with textual documents, modern information retrieval systems deal with multimedia information comprising text, audio, images and video. While many features of conventional text retrieval system are equally applicable to multimedia information retrieval, the specific nature of audio, image and video information have called for the development of many new tools and techniques for information retrieval. Modern information retrieval deals with storage, organization and access to text, as well as multimedia information resources. Definitions According to Science and Technology Dictionary , information retrieval is the technique and process of searching, recovering, and interpreting information from large amounts of stored data. Britannica Concise Encyclopedia says information retrieval is recovery of information, especially in a database stored in a computer. The concept of information retrieval is broad and often employed in an imprecise meaning. It is used to denote systems designed to provide users or a group of users with information.
- 2. The concept of information retrieval presupposes that there are some documents or records containing information that have been organized in an order suitable for easy retrieval. The documents or records we are concerned with contain bibliographic information which is quite different from other kinds of information or data. We may take a simple example. If we have a database of information pertaining to an office, or a supermarket, all we have are the different kinds of records and related facts, like names of employees, their positions, salary, and so on, or in the case of a supermarket, names of different items, prices, quantity, and so on. The main objective of a bibliographic information retrieval system, however, is to retrieve the information-either the actual information or the documents containing the information that fully or partially match the user’s query. The database may contain abstracts or full texts of document, like newspaper articles, handbooks, dictionaries, encyclopedias, legal documents, statistics,etc., as well as audio, images, and video information. An information retrieval system thus has three major components- the document subsystem, the users subsystem , and the searching/retrieval subsystem. These divisions are quite broad and each one is designed to serve one or more functions, such as: Analysis of documents and organization of information(creation of a document database) Analysis of user’s queries, preparation of a strategy to search the database Actual searching or matching of users queries with the database, and finally Retrieval of items that fully or partially match the search statement. PURPOSE OF INFORMATION RETRIEVAL SYSTEM An information retrieval system is designed to retrieve the documents or information required by the user community. It should make the right information available to the right user. Thus, an information retrieval system aims
- 3. at collecting and organizing information in one or more subject areas in order to provide it the user as soon asked for. Belkin presents the following situation which clearly reflects the purpose of information retrieval systems: A writer presents as set of ideas in a document using a set of concepts Somewhere there will be some users who require the ideas but may not be able to identify those. In other words, there will be some persons who lack the ideas put forward by the author in his/her work. Information retrieval system serve to match the writers ideas expressed in the document with the user requirements or demand for those. Thus, an information retrieval system serves as a bridge between the world of creators or generators of information and the users of that information. Components of information retrieval system An information retrieval system there are the documents or sources of information and on the other there are the user’s queries. These two sides are linked through a series of tasks. Lancaster mentions that an information retrieval system comprises six major subsystems: The document subsystem The indexing subsystem The vocabulary subsystem The searching subsystem The ser-system interfece,and The matching subsystem
- 4. The broad outline of an information retrieval system Subject or content analysis includes the tasks related to the analysis, organization and storage of information. The process of search and retrieval includes the tasks of analyzing user’s queries, creation of a search formula, the actual searching, and retrieval of information. The major emphasis of this book is laid on these two areas. Researchers in the information retrieval world are engaged in developing suitable methodologies for both sets of operations. Developments in the technological world, especially in computer and communication technology, have provided an additional impectus to the development of information retrieval systems. Researchers who are working on the storage side of the information retrieval system are engaged in designing Information sources Analysis and Representation Organized Information Retrieved Information Matching Users Query Analysis Analyzed Queries
- 5. sophisticated methods for identification and representation of the various bibliographic elements essential for documents, automatic content analysis, and text processing, and so on. On the other hand, researchers working on the retrieval side are attempting to develop sophisticated searching techniques, user interfaces, and various techniques for producing output for local as well as remote user. Kinds of information retrieval systems Two broad categories of information retrieval system can be identified: in- house and online. In-house and online. In- house information retrieval systems are set up by a particular library or information centre to serve mainly the users within the organization. One particular type of in-house database is the library catalogue. Online public access catalogues (OPACs) provide facilities for library users to carry out online catalogue searches, and then to check the availability of the item required. By online information retrieval system we mean those that have been designed to provide access to remote databases to a variety of users. Such services are available mostly on a commercial basis, and there are a number of vendors that handle this sort of service. With the development of optical storage technology another type of information retrieval system appeared on CD-ROM. Information retrieval systems based on CD-ROM technology are available mostly on a commercial basis, though there have been some free and in-house developments too. Basic techniques for search and retrieval of information from the in-house or CD-ROM and online information retrieval systems are more or less the same, except that the online system is linked to users at a distance through the electronic communication network. Recent developments in computer and communication technologies have widened the scope of online information retrieval system. The Internet and World Wide Web have made information available for use by anyone virtually anywhere with access to the appropriate equipment. This has led to the concept of a digital global library system where information can be generated and made available in electronic form on the Web for use by any user from any corner of the world. This
- 6. of course involves a number of technical and management issues that need to be resolved in order to make the global digit library concept a reality. Functions of information retrieval system An information retrieval system deals with various sources of information on the one hand and user’s requirements on the other. It must: Analyze the contents of the sources of information as well as the user’s queries, and then Match these to retrieve those items that are relevant The major functions of an information retrieval system can be listed as follows: To identify the information(sources) relevant to the areas of interest of the target users community To analyze the contents of the sources(documents) To represent the contents of the analyzed sources in a way that will be suitable for matching user’s queries To analyze user’s queries and to represent them in a form that will be suitable for matching with the database To match the search statement with the stored database To retrieve the information that is relevant, and To make necessary adjustments in the system based on feedback form the users.
- 7. Document Store Content Analysis Descriptor Located Documents Retrieval Matching Standard Vocabulary Users Query Analysis Analyzed Queries Feedback Modification
- 8. Features of an information retrieval system Liston and Schoene suggest that an effective information retrieval system must have provisions for: Prompt dissemination of information Filtering of information The right amount of information at the right time Active switching of information Receiving information in an economical way Browsing Getting information in an economical way Current literature Access to other information systems Interpersonal communications, and Personalized help. Conclusion An information retrieval process begins when a user enters a query into the system. Queries are formal statements of information needs, for example search strings in web search engines. In information retrieval a query does not uniquely identify a single object in the collection. Instead, several objects may match the query, perhaps with different degrees of relevancy. Most IR systems compute a numeric score on how well each object in the database matches the query, and rank the objects according to this value. The top ranking objects are then shown to the user. The process may then be iterated if the user wishes to refine the query. Reference www.information retrieval.com