Where did information retrieval come from?

Question

Automated information retrieval systems were introduced in the 1950s: one even featured in the 1957 romantic comedy, Desk Set. In the 1960s, the first large information retrieval research group was formed by Gerard Salton at Cornell.

How did information retrieval begin?

Information retrieval, or rather machines which were able to fetch some information were first heard of in 1948, and Holmstrom described the first one, called a Univac. This machine was able to record specific symbols on a magnetic steel tape and fetch a document under those symbols, then retype its content.

When was information retrieval coined?

The term 'information retrieval' was coined by Calvin Mooers in 1950. It gained popularity in the research community from 1961 onwards, when computers were introduced for information handling.

What is the main concept of information retrieval?

Information retrieval is intended to support people who are actively seeking or searching for information, as in Internet searching. Information retrieval typically assumes a static or relatively static database against which people search.

What is the purpose of information retrieval?

The aim of information retrieval is to provide the user with the “best possible'' information from a database. The problem of information retrieval is determining what constitutes the best possible information for a given user query. A common form of interaction for information retrieval is for the user query.

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