Course Information

Course Title: Information Retrieval

Semester: 2nd

Weekly Hours: 3

ECTS Credits: 6

Learning Objectives:

To develop an understanding and practical experience in techniques of statistical natural language processing, as well as information retrieval and processing, to support the design and development of advanced internet-based systems and services.

Course Topics:

• Understanding the functioning of search engines
• The “hidden” web and methods of processing & retrieving information from it
• Basic principles of statistical natural language processing
• Basic principles of information retrieval
• Search engines
• Basic principles and problems of distributed information retrieval
• The problem of finding and representing web pages on the internet
• The problem of source selection on the internet
• The problem of aggregating results from multiple sources on the internet
• Search in peer-to-peer networks
• Social Search – Semantic Search

Teaching Method:

Lectures supported by slides and other educational materials (3 hours/week),
Practical exercises (2 hours/week),
Laboratory exercises (1 hour/week)

Student Evaluation:

Written exams and assignments (exercises/practical work). Development of a search engine as a practical lab exercise.

Equipment – Software Requirements:

The equipment required for student training in a laboratory environment is provided by the Department of Computer Science, and the tools used mainly belong to the category of free and open-source software.

Recommended Bibliography:

• Understanding Search Engines: Mathematical Modeling and Text Retrieval (Software, Environments, Tools) by Michael W. Berry, Murray Browne. Society for Industrial & Applied Mathematics.
• Finding Out About: A Cognitive Perspective on Search Engine Technology and the WWW (With CD-ROM) by Richard K. Belew, C. J. Van Rijsbergen. Cambridge University Press.
• Natural Language Processing for Online Applications: Text Retrieval, Extraction, and Categorization (Natural Language Processing, 5) by Peter Jackson, Isabelle Moulinier. John Benjamins Publishing Co.
• Foundations of Statistical Natural Language Processing by Christopher D. Manning, Hinrich Schόtze. MIT Press.
• Korfhage, Robert F. (1997) “Information Storage and Retrieval” Wiley Computer Publishing.