Flexible Querying in Geo-Finder

The evaluation of queries specifying both content based conditions and spatial conditions on documents contents in Geographic Information Retrieval requires representing the vagueness and context dependency of spatial conditions and the personal user’s preferences. The Geo-Finder system [1] implements a Geo-Retrieval model that evaluates flexible spatial queries combined with content queries. The spatial condition is interpreted as the soft constraint “close” on the user’s perceived distance. Two distinct semantics can be used to combine the spatial and the content conditions: and possibly or average; in both cases it is possible to modify the relative weight (preference) of conditions.