Query Formulation with a Search Assistant

Information overload has led to a situation where users are swamped with too much information, resulting in difficulty sifting through the material in search of relevant content. In this paper, we address this issue from the perspective of collaboration in query formulation. We describe a search assistant that helps users with query formulation by finding related previously submitted queries through mining query logs. The search assistant runs as a reusable software component and can be incorporated into various search engines. We report our approach to designing and implementing the software and evaluation results.