Language Technologies and Learning Sciences

There is an interesting area emerging at the cross section of learning sciences and language technologies. Applying various language technologies including intelligent information retrieval, information extraction, personalization, summarization, and cross language information access to create or enhance an effective learning environment seem to be of immense benefit and promise.

Some of our (SIEL’s) past and current work can be applied to explore the role of personalized search and personalized summarization technologies in creating collaborative leaning environments.

We plan to collaborate with LTI of CMU in this area. Our project on Creation of Smart space in the classroom (funded by Nokia University Relations Program) also falls in this area.

A Paper Into ACL 2009

Here gets a paper ACCEPTED into acl-ijcnlp-2009.

Title:

“QUERY-FOCUSED SUMMARIES OR QUERY-BIASED SUMMARIES?”
By: Rahul Katragadda

Hearty Congrats From SIEL, LTRC, IIIT-H  to Rahul Katragadda.

Google Tests Related Search Phrases Inline With Search Results

It was noticed that Google is testing a new location for “related” search results. The location appears to be directly under each individual search result’s URL.

You can find the snapshots here.
http://www.seobook.com/google-beta-testing-showing-related-phrases-near-documents

Cuil Launches Biggest Search Engine on the Web

Cuil, a technology company pioneering a new approach to search, launches its innovative search offering, which combines the biggest Web index with content-based relevance methods, results organized by ideas, and complete user privacy.

Summary of Cuil’s features:

• Biggest Internet search engine—Cuil has indexed 120 billion Web pages, 3x more than any other search engine
• Organized results—Cuil’s magazine-style layout separates results by subject and allows further search by concept or category
• Different results—Unlike other search engines, Cuil ranks results by the content on each page, not its popularity
• Complete privacy protection—Cuil does not keep any personally identifiable information on users or their search histories

For more information, refer the following links.

http://www.cuil.com
http://searchengineland.com/080728-000100.php

Google into Indian language CLIR

http://www.thehindubusinessline.com/businessline/blnus/15181205.htm

Google mulls Indian version of cross-language info retrieval

MUMBAI: Internet giant Google may come up with Indian version of its cross-language information retrieval (CLIR) facility, which searches queries in English pages and gives result in native language.

“We introduced this facility in 15 international languages in May and it has been extremely popular. Looking at its success, there is a possibility that Google may introduce the same in any of the Indian languages, depending upon its usage,” Mr P Nayak, Member, Technical Staff, Google, told PTI here on Tuesday. Though he declined to confirm the language, he said it could possibly be Hindi or Tamil since they were two widely used languages in India.

“The English web-based search engines have very large and good content available. But there are also smaller language web pages like Arabic and Chinese, where search doesn’t give enough information compared to English. CLIR, through its in-built translat ion facility, expands the scope of search.”

CLIR is a subfield tool dealing with retrieving information written in a language different from the language of the user’s query. For example, a user may pose query in English but retrieve relevant documents written in French. “To avail this facility, the user has to log on to www.translate.google.com, type the query in English and seek the information in any of the 15 languages including English, French, Spanish, Chinese and Arabic,” he said. – PTI