Visualization for the document space

An information retrieval frame work that promotes graphical displays, and that will make documents in the computer visualizable to the searcher, is described. As examples of such graphical displays, two simulation results of using a Kohonen feature map to generate map displays for information retrieval are presented and discussed. The map displays are a mapping from a high-dimensional document space to a two-dimensional space. They show document relationships by various visual cues, such as dots, links, clusters, and areas, as well as their measurement and spatial arrangement. Using the map displays as an interface for document retrieval systems, the user is provided with richer visual information to support browsing and searching.<>