Synapsys Blog - Distributed classification systems: making sense of information

Distributed classification systems: making sense of information

One of the big dilemmas in managing access to knowledge is how to classify it in a way that is meaningful to users. Traditional approaches usually involve developing frameworks of topics or themes that are currently recognised as 'appropriate' for the group. Problems inherent in this approach include:
- A lot of information is not easily classified into a neat box.
- What seemed like a logical framework at the time of creation rapidly loses currency
- People don't necessarily understand such frameworks in the same way, they put different meanings to the same words. This blog entry explores the use of distributed classification systems (DCSs). Essentailly, users classify information in whatever way that makes sense to them using tags. The framework of links between artefacts grows out of the group of users and how they interpret those artefacts......