Smart Subjects: Application Independent

Subject Recommendations

Tito SierraNCSU LibrariesCode4Lib 2007

Outline

• Concept

• Motivation

• Smart Subjects Applications

• How it Works

• Strengths and Weakness

• Future Plans

Smart Subjects Concept

Input:•User search query

Output:• A list of related library subjects

Smart Subjects Concept

Input:•User search query

Output:• A list of related library subjects

Basically a subject recommendation engine.

Example 1

Input:

music therapy

Output:• Music• Curriculum & Instruction• Education• Communication &

Media• Psychology• Biochemistry

Example 2

Input:

asymptotic stability

Output:• Bioinformatics &

Biomathematics• Statistics• Mathematics, Science &

Technology Education• Mathematics• Computer Science• Aerospace Engineering

Example 3

Input:

illegal immigration

Output:• Criminology• Political Science• Public Administration• Biology• Zoology• Industrial Engineering

Example 3

Input:

illegal immigration

Output:• Criminology• Political Science• Public Administration• Biology• Zoology?• Industrial Engineering

Motivation

Search log analysis: standard, international economic development, fines, dissertation abstracts, music therapy, ACM, wolfcopy, Oxford English Dictionary, audio, illegal immigration, schedule, interlibrary, datamonitor, chemistry, JAMA, CRC, photography, vision, wiley, ciation builder, job, academic search elite, ria, film studies, career development, sanborn maps, citation index, iee, history, industry analysis, scholarly journals, ethics, spss, petition, animal behavior, psych info, repository, ENR, diabetes, data, lrl, cancer, textbooks, wharton, Christian Science Monitor, ITTC, blah, PubMed, time magazine, nutrition, DVD, questia, conductive heat transfer, sage, newspaper

Motivation

Search log analysis:• Lots of topical

subject queries in the long tail!

standard, international economic development, fines, dissertation abstracts, music therapy, ACM, wolfcopy, Oxford English Dictionary, audio, illegal immigration, schedule, interlibrary, datamonitor, chemistry, JAMA, CRC, photography, vision, wiley, ciation builder, job, academic search elite, ria, film studies, career development, sanborn maps, citation index, iee, history, industry analysis, scholarly journals, ethics, spss, petition, animal behavior, psych info, repository, ENR, diabetes, data, lrl, cancer, textbooks, wharton, Christian Science Monitor, ITTC, blah, PubMed, time magazine, nutrition, DVD, questia, conductive heat transfer, sage, newspaper

Motivation

Existing work:• Subject Browse

portal at NCSU

Subject Browse at NCSU

• Locally developed subject classification launched in Fall 2005

• 100 subject nodes in 12 top-level categories

• Subject nodes influenced by the university curriculum (e.g. Crop Science)

Subject Browse at NCSU

Subject Browse at NCSU

Smart Subjects Applications

• Quick Search integration

• OpenSearch interface

Quick Search Integration

Quick Search Integration

Quick Search Integration

OpenSearch Interface

OpenSearch Interface

How it Works

1. Harvest available institutional data• Course catalog descriptions• Faculty publications citations

2. Create “text extract” representations for each academic department on campus

3. Index the text extracts

4. Retrieval interface queries indices

5. Retrieval algorithm crosswalks academic departments to library subject classification

How it Works

How it Works

How it Works

Technology Used

• SWISH-E for indexing

• PHP for retrieval processing/scoring

Strengths

• Application and collection independent

• Subject recommendations can be integrated in any library search application

• Encourages broader, serendipitous resource discovery

Weaknesses

• False positives (bad recommendations)

• Zero hits (no recommendations)

Future Plans

• Deploy new uses of Smart Subjects tool•Database Advisor

• Increase the size of subject indices• Article table of contents data• Backlog of course descriptions

• Gauge interest for a community subject recommendation platform

More Information

Project Site:http://www.lib.ncsu.edu/dli/projects/smartsubjects

Thanks!

Tito SierraNCSU Libraries

tito_sierra@ncsu.edu