[Sigia-l] taxonomy tools
Anita Johnson
arjohnso at students.uiuc.edu
Tue May 28 17:43:47 EDT 2002
Hi there -
Those of you working on thesaurus development/content management
terminology/classification schemas may find the Controlled Vocabularies
Resources site out of Queensland University to be helpful:
http://www2.fit.qut.edu.au/InfoSys/middle/cont_voc.html Also, check the
'other compilations' links at the bottom of the page.
The book (previously mentioned) Thesaurus Construction and Use: A Practical
Manual has an excellent collection of weblinks for further reading. If you
want to see the nitty gritty of thesaurus development you may want to take a
look at the industry standard: NISO's Z39.14 (Rev.1998) Guidelines for the
Construction, Format, and Management of Monolingual Thesauri at:
http://www.niso.org/standards/resources/Z39-19.pdf
For the more theoretically minded, and if you really really want to know about
many of the significant issues regarding the organization of information in
print and online, and from a 'systems approach' see: Elaine Svenonius' The
Intellectual Foundation of Information Organization (2000) from MIT Press,
ISBN 0262194333 I remember paying around $45 for it.
Anita Johnson
MS Candidate, Library & Information Science
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
http://www.lis.uiuc.edu
>===== Original Message From work at mantruc.com, work at mantruc.com =====
>Thanks a lot for helping.
>
>These are the answeres I recieved:
>
>Todd Levy wrote:
>
> > Hey there -
> >
> > Since this has been the most interesting question on this mailing list
> > for as long as I can remember, I've come out of a very long lurk.
> >
> > I can't really answer the questions about controlled vocabs, but I do
> > have some insights into the more theoretical stuff below.
> >
> >> a taxonomy consists of a hierarchical tree, where on every terminal
> >> point there is a special type of node where I can attach my keywords
> >> (terms) and associate the content. Each node's label is also a
> >> keyword in itself.
> >
> >
> > 1)- Is this model right?
> >
> > Essentially, yes.
> >
> > Most taxonomy arguments start over the difference between your basic
> > taxonomy, which is just classification according to a pre-determined
> > system, and pure taxonomy, separating elements of a group (taxon) into
> > subgroups (taxa) that are mutually exclusive, unambiguous, and taken
> > together, include all possibilities.
> >
> > Next people argue over hierarchical or not. Some are hierarchical, like
> > a family tree or the animal kingdom (also pure). Others are not
> > hierarchical, like IKEA Stores, the Lands End catalog, and most Web
>sites.
> >
> > FWIW, the example below isn't de facto hierarchical as you could
> > accurately present it as...
> >
> > -Music
> > -Bands
> > -Pop
> > -Rock
> > -Solo Artists
> > -Pop
> > -Rock
> >
> > ... even though I personal prefer your original model.
> >
> >> 2)- Can the higher level nodes also have related
> >> keywords and articles?
> >
> >
> > Yes, although some people do not do a good job of building Web pages to
> > accurately distinguish the drill-down portion of the page from the
> > related content portion.
> >
> >> 3)- Do each of my tree's nodes have to be unique?
> >> Can some structures be repeated in this fashion?:
> >
> >
> > -Music
> > -Rock
> > -Bands
> > -Solo Artists
> > -Pop
> > -Bands
> > -Solo Artists
> >
> > No, and Sure. The nodes don't HAVE to be anything. And you CAN repeat
> > whatever you'd like. See above re: pure and not pure.
> >
> > I'm not sure if you're familiar with faceted classification, but that
> > may be work exploring for you contents.
> >
> > Music Items
> >
> > * Genres
> > - Rock | Pop
> >
> > * Performer Types:
> > - Solo Artists | Bands
> >
> > Definitely check out the Flamenco Image Browser
> > http://bailando.sims.berkeley.edu/flamenco.html
>
>
>
>
>Adam Doerr wrote:
>
>[ snipped some stuff that Adam didn't feel confident enough to share to
>the list because it?s also his first attempt, but this comment is
>important ]
>
> > It's unfortunate how few good resources there are in this area, at
> > least that I've found. There are library science resources, but very
> > little info on actually applying the principles. Let me know if you
> > find any good ones - best I've found so far is Thesaurus Construction
> > and Use: A Practical Manual, which basically a library science
> > textbook (expensive, too!), but it does cover some of these systems.
> > Unfortunately, very little applied info.
>
>
>
>
>Kathryn Lewellen wrote:
>
>
> > Terminology can get very confusing when talking about
> > taxonomies-for example, taxonomies are controlled
> > vocabularies. Thesauri are controlled vocabularies
> > that leverage synonymous, associative and hierarchical
> > relationships. Keywords are all together different,
> > at least in my mind. You bring up a lot of questions
> > that are difficult to clarify in an email. You're
> > welcome to call me if your questions aren't answered
> > by other listers (work number is 919 990-9407).
> >
> > here's a post from the archives that may help:
> > http://www.info-arch.org/lists/sigia-l/0111/0075.html
>
>
>
>
>javier velasco wrote: [original question]
>
> > Hi all:
> >
> > I'm finally having the chance to design a taxonomy, and I've run into
> > some questions along the way. I hope some of you can help me with these
> > questions:
> >
> > If I have understood correctly, a taxonomy consists of a hierarchical
> > tree, where on every terminal point there is a special type of node
> > where I can attach my keywords (terms) and associate the content. Each
> > node's label is also a keyword in itself.
> >
> > 1)- Is this model right?
> >
> > 2)- Can the higher level nodes also have related keywords and articles?
> >
> > 3)- Do each of my tree's nodes have to be unique?
> >
> > Can some structures be repeated in this fashion?:
> >
> > -Music
> > -Rock
> > -Bands
> > -Solo Artists
> > -Pop
> > -Bands
> > -Solo Artists
> >
> > The other issue that most confuses me is the way this works next to a
> > Controlled Vocabulary / Thesaurus.
> >
> > For what I've undesrstood so far, these are basically lists of preferred
> > terms (a dictionary with no definitions). A thesaurus has a more robust
> > set of rules to establish relationships between terms.
> >
> > 4)- How do you make these two elements work toghether?
> >
> > Dizzily yours...
> >
>
>
>--
>javier
>http://mantruc.com
>
>
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>See http://www.asis.org/CM
>
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