WebCutter: A system for dynamic and tailorable site mapping

Abstract

Conventional information discovery tools can be classified as being either search oriented or browse oriented. In the context of the Web, search-oriented tools employ text-analysis techniques to find Web documents based on user-specified queries, whereas browse-oriented ones employ site mapping and visualization techniques to allow users to navigate through the Web. This paper presents a unique approach that tightly integrates searching and browsing in a manner that improves both paradigms. When browsing is the primary task, it enables semantic content-based tailoring of Web maps in both the generation as well as the visualization phases. When search is the primary task, it enables to contextualize the results by augmenting them with the documents' neighborhoods. The approach is embodied in WebCutter, a client-server system fully integrated with Web software. WebCutter consists of a map generator running off a standard Web server and a map visualization client implemented as a Java applet runnable from any standard Web-browser and requiring no installation or external plug-in application. WebCutter is in beta stage and is in the process of being integrated into the Lotus Domino.Applications product line. © 1997 Published by Elsevier Science B.V.