Ranganathan in the Perspective of Advanced Information Retrieval
Peter Ingwersen, Irene Wormell · Libri · 1992
Examines Ranganathan's approach to knowledge organization and its relevance to «intellectual accessibility» in libraries. Discusses the current and future developments of his methodology and theories in knowledge-based systems. Topics covered include: semi-automatic classification and structure of thesauri; user-intermediary interactions in information retrieval (IR); semantic value-theory and uncertainty principles in IR; and case grammar. Elaborates on the usefulness and applications of analytico-synthetic methodology in designing classification schemes, thesaurus construction, query negotiation, structuring of search expressions, etc. Close parallel is recognizable between Ranganathan's principles and case-frame theory, for example in techniques of IR, contextual IT theory building and software reuse systems. Concludes that though Ranganathan's criterion of helpful sequence and other aspects of his methodology may have limitations when applied to areas other than subject classification, his principles for knowledge organization and faceted methodology are likely to find applications in cognitive modellind, neural natwork tehniques and patterns recognition