Compact representations in XML retrieval

Abstract

This paper describes the participation of the Information Retrieval and Interaction group of Robert Gordon University in the INEX 2006 ad hoc track. We focused on two questions: "What potential evidence do human assessors use to identify relevant XML elements?" and "How can this evidence be used by computers for the same task?". Our main strategy was to investigate evidence taken not only from the content, but also from the shallow features of how texts were displayed. We employed the vector space model and the language model combining estimates based on element full-text and the compact representation of the element. We analyzed a range of non-content priors to boost retrieval effectiveness. © Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg 2007.