VITA in Use: Technology Watch

摘要

The potential wealth to be discovered from mining large data sets or electronic text files for nuggets of knowledge is an alluring prospect. Textual displays, however, do not lend themselves easily to the task as the results still require reading and analysis before the analyst/user can acquire new knowledge from the information therein. Visual displays, on the other hand, attempt to perform some of the preliminary cognitive analysis. VITA, 'a Visual Interface for Text Analysis', is a 3-dimensional paradigm to identify the relations found among meanings or concepts represented in the elements in large text corpora. The paradigm has been realized as a working software application used to direct computer-based document searches. It allows a user, via mouse and keyboard action, to interact with search mechanisms e.g. search engines on the Internet, such as Google and AltaVista - to present visually the sets and relationships of documents. VITA has control features that allow visual clustering of like documents, thus enabling quick refinement of the search process. The visual features of VITA also support the observation and investigation of the, sometimes unexpected, relationships among documents. VITA can also be used to help in reducing document search complexity. Originally conceptualized as a response to the problem of comprehending the results of large computer-based document searches, VITA has the potential for broader applications in text mining and knowledge discovery. One such application is Technology Watch. 'Tech Watch' is a methodology used to identify technology trends and make strategic investments in science and technology research and procurement. It looks for strengths, gaps and trends within the national and international technology scenes to incorporate into long-term planning.