Natural language for data bases

✍ Scribed by R.P. van de Riet

• Book ID: 104309008
• Publisher: Elsevier Science
• Year: 1997
• Tongue: English
• Weight: 162 KB
• Volume: 23
• Category: Article
• ISSN: 0169-023X
• DOI: 10.1016/s0169-023x(97)00007-4

✦ Synopsis

Bringing together DataBases, including alLof what belongs to its broader field of information systems, and Natural Language, in particular techniques around lexicons, is the theme of the annually organized workshop NLDB which has been held from 26 to 28 June 1996 at the Vrije Universiteit in Amsterdam.

More and more people begin to understand that there is a close connection between the field of information systems, including communication aspects, and the field of linguistics. They can profit from each other very much. In information systems one realizes more and more that the applications involve (common) knowledge stored in lexicons; in linguistics one uses more and more techniques from the area of databases.

In the past, consulting databases or getting answers in natural language was a dream for many users. Nowadays, this is an accessible convergent point, mainly due to the large progress of research in natural language and to the development of new technologies which allow the storage of real semantic electronic dictionaries. Each aspect of the lifecycle of the information system may be improved by using natural language techniques: database design (specification, validation, conflict resolution), database query languages and consulting programs that use new software engineering research allowing natural language program specifications.

At the workshop 35 papers were submitted and 22 have been chosen by an international Program Committee of experts. They have been published in a Proceedings*. Of these 22 papers five have been chosen by a small committee, consisting of: