Question 1: (4 marks)

a) Identify the 3 key components of an information retrieval system and describe their function.
b) Describe the difference between a user’s information need and a query?

Question 2: (3 Marks)

a) Identify 3 simple, proven methods to term weighting.
b) For each of the approaches, describe the justifications for why they are successful.


Question 3: (7 marks)

a) For each of the words below use the Porter Stemmer to identify their stems.

i. Stagnate
ii. Appendices
iii. Oriental
iv. Agree
v. Startle
vi. Punctuation
vii. Marvellous
viii. Evolution
ix. Caste
x. Angular

b) For each of the words above identify which of the Porter Stemmer’s steps, as defined in the reference in the readings list, help reduce the word to its stem.

c) For each of the word pairs below identify if the pair of stems reported by the Porter

Stemmer identifies: a true positive, a true negative, a false positive or a false negative.

i. Stagnate/Stagnation
ii. Appendices/Appendix
iii. Oriental/Orientation
iv. Agree/Agreement
v. Startle/Start
vi. Punctuation/Punctual
vii. Marvellous/Marvel

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