Convergence of Categorization Approaches

The following is an assignment in which I took a passage from Heting Chu's Information Representation and Retrieval in the Digital Age; it is translated into Layman's terms.

"What differentiates one categorization approach from another lies mainly in the nature of the framework adopted for the purpose of information representation. Classification, having endured tests of various kinds, has established itself as a plausible method for representing information...as more substantive and quality information becomes available on the Internet, classification is beginning to be utilized to categorize network-based information (e.g., McKiernan, 2001)" (pg 29).

Categorization is the representation of information in a library. It is what helps you find what you are looking for. Different categorization methods for a library are tailored towards the information facility itself. As libraries are more developed so are the categorization materials. Think of the categories as a Table of Contents. When you have a research paper your Table of Contents represents all the information on your paper. Now imagine a textbook's Table of Contents. It would show a lot more detailed listings of the information following it. These can represent different levels of categorization.

The internet contains more and more information everyday. Try to imagine how libraries have different databases and cards as filing systems to help you find what you are looking for. Doing this they use abbreviations, words, numbers, etc. Now try to imagine structuring the World Wide Web into a database system.

"...text categorization using automatic means (e.g., Boley et al., 1998; Yang, 1999) has increasingly been explored with an orientation toward taxonomy rather than classification, as a growing amount of information is available digitally. While automatic classification once attracted a lot of attention from researchers, the brainpower needed for rigorous classification seems unattainable in purely machine-based algorithms" (pg. 29).

As more and more information that we seek is located on the Internet, as Information Professionals, we start to categorize these materials by taxonomies rather than classification. Taxonomy categories are used for online information as hyperlinks. When Chu discusses the "rigorous classification" they are saying that classifying the World Wide Web would be virtually impossible. Therefore, using hyperlinks help to locate these information sources. Imagine that you are trying to find a novel in the library and you use the the call number to find the book. This is using classification in a library setting. Now imagine that you are trying to search for the book online. Sometimes entire books can be typed out online. You can find them through taxonomies.