An Introduction to Professional Search

Abstract

Today, in the early 21^st century, for most people, if one talks about “search” people tend to automatically think of the use of modern internet search engines like Google, Bing!, Baidu or Yandex. Further people think of either general members of the public, or people whose primary job function is not search, undertaking the searches. However, for most of the history of information retrieval, searching has been done by professional information specialists, whose training and skills were and are focussed on locating and retrieving information for and on behalf of others. This volume is focussed on recent research, principally undertaken in the context of the EU-funded COST network MUMIA, reviewing new, mainly technological, research intended to address the needs of professional searchers.