ADVANCES IN COMPUTERISED SEARCHING TECHNIQUES AND ALTERNATIVE APPROACHES TO COMPUTER-BASED INFORMATION RETRIEVAL

In 1847, English mathematician George Boole developed the "mathematics of logic", based on rules governing the logical functions of true and false. "AND", "OR" and "NOT" they became, and still are, the primary "operators" of, what is now called, Boolean logic. The volumes of information now being stored in computer databases is enormous. As the number and size of databases grow, so do the information retrieval problems associated with them. The limitations associated with traditional Boolean searching have been a driving force towards the modification of that format and provided the encouragement for the development of alternative searching techniques. This Paper outlines the attributes of conventional Boolean searching, including its limitations and problems. In addition, it considers solutions to the limitations and alternative approaches to Boolean.

Rosalinda Bishop,
State Library of New South Wales,
Macquarie Street,
Sydney, NSW, 2000
phone +61 2 92731636
fax +61 2 92731246
email rbishop@ilanet.sl.nsw.gov.au