Automatic Reference Librarians for the World Wide Web

众所周知，网络是人类最大、增长最快的数字信息库。许多信息集合都可以通过internet访问，并且大多数将提供可搜索的Web界面。虽然有些馆藏的内容很广泛，但有趋势表明，专门馆藏的数量呈爆炸式增长，这些馆藏内容狭窄但非常深入。因此，用户面临的一个主要挑战将是选择能够回答其查询的Web信息源。在实体图书馆中，用户依靠参考图书管理员来帮助他们找到正确的资源，但是当人类图书管理员在使用Web方面变得越来越成熟时，他们只是解决方案的一部分。我们需要更强大的自动参考工具来帮助人们有效地从网络中检索高质量的信息。通常情况下，参考图书馆管理员不是所查询主题（例如，计算流体动力学）的专家，但他们是识别相关资源（例如，国际流体动力学杂志）和获得必要信息的适当策略的专家。该建议的中心目标是创建具有参考智能的软件代理——对复杂技术主题的理解有限，但对如何以及在何处查找万维网上的高质量信息具有非常复杂的理解。

By all accounts, the Web is humanity's largest and fastest growing repository of digital information. Many collections of information are Internet-accessible, and most will provide a searchable Web interface. While some collections have a broad array of materials, trends show an explosion in the number of specializedcollections with narrow but very deep content. Thus a principle challenge facing users will be the selection of Web information sources capable of answering their query. In a physical library, users rely on a reference librarian to help point them at the correct resource, but while human librarians are becoming increasinglysophisticated in their use of the Web, they are only part of the solution. We need more powerful automatic reference tools to help people efficiently retrieve high quality information from the Web. Typically, reference librarians are not specialists in the topic of inquiry (e.g., computational fluid dynamics) but they are expert at identifying relevant resources (e.g., The International Journal of Fluid Dynamics) and at appropriate strategies for obtaining the necessary information. The central objective of this proposal is to create software agents that posses reference intelligence --- a limited understanding of complex technical topics, but a very sophisticated understanding of how and where to find high-quality information on the World Wide Web.