Database Taxonomy Categories

Users interact with the search system in two ways. They can type direct queries to search the database, or they can browse through the database contents using a set of categories that you design. A hierarchy of categories is sometimes called a taxonomy. Categorizing resources is like creating a table of contents for the database.

Browsing is an optional feature in a search system. That is, you can have a perfectly useful Search system that does not include browsing by categories. You need to decide whether adding categories that users can browse is useful to the users of your index, and, if so, what kind of categories you want to create.

The resources in a Search database are assigned to categories to reduce complexity. If a large number of items are in the database, grouping related items together is helpful. Doing so allows users to quickly locate specific kinds of items, compare similar items, and choose which ones they want.

Such categorizing is common in product and service indexes. Clothing catalogs divide men’s, women’s, and children’s clothing, with each of those further subdivided for coats, shirts, shoes, and other items. An office products catalog could separate furniture from stationery, computers, and software. And advertising directories are arranged by categories of products and services.

The principles of categorical groupings in a printed index also apply to online indexes. The idea is to make it easy for users to locate resources of a certain type, so that they can choose the ones they want. No matter what the scope of the index you design, the primary concern in setting up your categories should be usability. You need to know how users use the categories. For example, if you design an index for a company with three offices in different locations, you might make your top-level categories correspond to each of the three offices. If users are more interested in, say, functional divisions that cut across the geographical boundaries, it might make more sense to categorize resources by corporate divisions.

Once the categories are defined, you must set up rules to assign resources to categories. These rules are called classification rules. If you do not define your classification rules properly, users cannot locate resources by browsing in categories. You need to avoid categorizing resources incorrectly, but you also should avoid failing to categorize documents.