The current relevance of information retrieval and information retrieval techniques (Information Retrieval, IR) is demonstrated in a very expressive way if we take into account studies that indicate that about 92% of Internet users consider this to be the preferred method to obtain information from you need in your day-to-day. Despite the fact that not all the techniques used were originally thought for the Web, it is a reality that this constituted one of the main enhancers of the expansion and innovation of the IR area, namely through the search engines. In this curricular unit, the main techniques and models underlying research and information retrieval are covered, both in their classic aspect of research in data repositories and in their Web application. Text search methods are mainly considered.
It is expected that the student when completing this course unit will be able to:
1. Recognize the importance of research and information retrieval in the current context of the requirements of the information society;
2. Identify the main concepts, models and techniques of research and information retrieval, giving special relevance to research on the Web and in data repositories;
3. Design and implement and apply research and information retrieval solutions.
The syllabus that will be covered within the 5 topics provided for this UC, will address the following themes (some, included within others):
1. Motivation and historical perspective.
2. Boolean models: inverted indexes and dictionaries.
3. Pre-processing and data compression operations.
4. Vector Models.
5. Probabilistic models.
6. Evaluation of IR Systems.
7. Search the Web.
8. Comparative analysis of the main IR systems.
Ricardo Baeza-Yates, Berthier Ribeiro-Neto, Modern Information Retrieval, Pearson - Addison Wesley Longman/ACM Press, 2nd Edition, 2010. ISBN 978-0321416919.
Christopher D. Manning, Prabhakar Raghavan and Hinrich Schütze, Introduction to Information Retrieval, Cambridge University Press, 2008. ISBN 978-0521865715.
E-learning
Evaluation is made on individual basis and it involves the coexistence of two modes: continuous assessment (60%) and
final evaluation (40%). Further information is detailed in the Learning Agreement of the course unit.
The students are supposed to be proficient in Portuguese language and also in English language at reading level.
