Information personalization refers to the automatic adjustment of information
content, structure, and presentation tailored to an individual user. By
reducing information overload and customizing information access,
personalization systems have emerged as an important segment of the Internet
economy. This paper presents a systematic modeling methodology - PIPE
(`Personalization is Partial Evaluation') - for personalization.
Personalization systems are designed and implemented in PIPE by modeling an
information-seeking interaction in a programmatic representation. The
representation supports the description of information-seeking activities as
partial information and their subsequent realization by partial evaluation, a
technique for specializing programs. We describe the modeling methodology at a
conceptual level and outline representational choices. We present two
application case studies that use PIPE for personalizing web sites and describe
how PIPE suggests a novel evaluation criterion for information system designs.
Finally, we mention several fundamental implications of adopting the PIPE model
for personalization and when it is (and is not) applicable.Comment: Comprehensive overview of the PIPE model for personalizatio