Robust audio indexing for Dutch spoken-word collections

Abstract—Whereas the growth of storage capacity is in accordance with widely acknowledged predictions, the possibilities to index and access the archives created is lagging behind. This is especially the case in the oral history domain and much of the rich content in these collections runs the risk to remain inaccessible for lack of robust search technologies. This paper addresses the history and development of robust audio indexing technology for searching Dutch spoken-word collections and compares Dutch audio indexing in the well-studied broadcast news domain with an oral-history case-study. It is concluded that despite significant advances in Dutch audio indexing technology and demonstrated applicability in several domains, further research is indispensable for successful automatic disclosure of spoken-word collections

Evaluation of a prototype interface for structured document retrieval

Document collections often display either internal structure, in the form of the logical arrangement of document components, or external structure, in the form of links between documents. Structured document retrieval systems aim to exploit this structural information to provide users with more effective access to structured documents. To do this, the associated interface must both represent this information explicitly and support users in their browsing behaviour. This paper describes the implementation and user-centred evaluation of a prototype interface, the RelevanceLinkBar interface. The results of the evaluation show that the RelevanceLinkBar interface supported users in their browsing behaviour, allowing them to find more relevant documents, and was strongly preferred over a standard results interface

Finding relevant documents using top ranking sentences: an evaluation of two alternative schemes

In this paper we present an evaluation of techniques that are designed to encourage web searchers to interact more with the results of a web search. Two specific techniques are examined: the presentation of sentences that highly match the searcher's query and the use of implicit evidence. Implicit evidence is evidence captured from the searcher's interaction with the retrieval results and is used to automatically update the display. Our evaluation concentrates on the effectiveness and subject perception of these techniques. The results show, with statistical significance, that the techniques are effective and efficient for information seeking

A Survey of Volunteered Open Geo-Knowledge Bases in the Semantic Web

Over the past decade, rapid advances in web technologies, coupled with innovative models of spatial data collection and consumption, have generated a robust growth in geo-referenced information, resulting in spatial information overload. Increasing 'geographic intelligence' in traditional text-based information retrieval has become a prominent approach to respond to this issue and to fulfill users' spatial information needs. Numerous efforts in the Semantic Geospatial Web, Volunteered Geographic Information (VGI), and the Linking Open Data initiative have converged in a constellation of open knowledge bases, freely available online. In this article, we survey these open knowledge bases, focusing on their geospatial dimension. Particular attention is devoted to the crucial issue of the quality of geo-knowledge bases, as well as of crowdsourced data. A new knowledge base, the OpenStreetMap Semantic Network, is outlined as our contribution to this area. Research directions in information integration and Geographic Information Retrieval (GIR) are then reviewed, with a critical discussion of their current limitations and future prospects