Extensible information-seeking environments.

A large class of user interfaces for information retrieval can be characterised as over-determined. That is, the user interface stringently prescribes the ordering of dialogs and what information must be entered and how results should be inspected. One consequence is a constraining, step-by-step style of interaction. On the other hand, when many on-line sources, as well as methods for interacting with them, are available, searchers must coordinate their tasks in ways that seem efficient to them. Interleaved, coordinated access is especially important under conditions when response time is variable and when searches, including monitoring and filtering tasks, can be carried out in the background. With competing demands for attention, searchers are likely to behave opportunistically. That is, they will shift the direction of their search as it unfolds and as interesting material arises. The problem is that when a searcher, who wishes to work opportunistically, confronts an over-determined interface, inefficiencies and less than ideal search strategies often ensue. This problem is investigated in this thesis by, on the one hand, designing an application that supports coordinated access to multiple on-line sources. The major characteristic of this application, called SketchTrieve, is that it allows searchers to customise their information-seeking environment and thereby lower the determinacy of the interface. On the other hand, to support general application development of user interfaces for information retrieval, including SketchTrieve, a user-interface architecture is implemented. Importantly, this software architecture, called FireWorks, provides principled sites for extension. At a broad structural level, it does this by introducing a strong separation between a toolkit of relatively fine-grained components and frameworks for deploying the components in task-specific fashions. The toolkit makes weak assumptions about how its components will be used, whereas a given framework makes strong assumptions about what is effective for searchers. At a more detailed level, specific classes within the toolkit are designed to be extended in certain definite ways. Thus, this thesis spans the gap between application design and user-interface architecture design for information retrieval. Extendibility is the thread that binds these two topics: both the searcher and the application programmer need to extend their respective workspaces. To argue about the strengths and weaknesses of SketchTrieve, results from formative evaluations, simple scenarios of use, and structural comparison with other similar systems are discussed. It is argued that, indeed, its extendibility is effective in supporting coordinated information-seeking. The reusability of FireWorks is shown by summarizing its sites for extension, by recounting breakdowns that occurred during its development, and by illustrating the applications that have or could be built with it. On both sides of the gap, the argumentation is largely descriptive, but rigorous.

Grantor dc:publisher.institution

Robert Gordon University

Year dc:date.issued

1996

Author dc:creator

• Hendry, David G.

Advisor dc:contributor.advisor

• D. Harper

• Information retrieval
• Coordinated access
• SketchTrieve
• User-interface
• FireWorks

Language dc:language

en

Identifier

oai:rgu-repository.worktribe.com:2807409
https://doi.org/10.48526/rgu-wt-2807409

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:rgu-repository.worktribe.com:2807409