Integrating Information Retrieval and Database Functions

The usefulness of an Information Retrieval (IR) system is bounded by the usefulness of the data collection to which it is providing access (van Rijsbergen 1979, pp.145). The usefulness of a data collection is often related to the number of transactions that are performed on the collection. The more transactions performed, the more the data collection reflects the latest facts, which are usually considerably more valuable than old facts. As a consequence, frequently changing data stored in database (DB) systems is often more valuable than the (almost) static data stored in IR systems.