Get the brief and basic answers to the most common questions about developing and implementing taxonomies in this fast-paced introduction to taxonomies and metadata.Taxonomy Boot Camp assumes attendees already know taxonomy fundamentals,so attend this optional FAQ course if you want to get up-to-speed quickly.

Using tags and categories effectively is a primary challenge to progress in knowledge management and social computing today.  According to David Snowden,we are continuing to use old ways.We are still looking for truth linked to the validity of a tag.We place too much significance on the symbolic nature of language and fail to take advantage of valuable context to increase meaning.In this forward-looking keynote,Snowden discusses new ways of dealing with this issue,suggests how we can create context-rich approaches to organizing and interpreting our knowledge,and takes a controversial look ahead as he forecasts where we may be going in the future.

From blogging to human-response search engines to PowerPoint slide sharing sites,social media is booming in popularity.One important aspect occurring across many different types of social media is social tagging, or the creation of ìfolksonomies.î Although powerful,social tagging can create a disorganized mess since tags are usually not drawn from a well-thought-out vocabulary system.There has been much talk but little academic work on this phenomenon.In this keynote,Marti Hearst will discuss work in progress,including the relationship between faceted metadata and tags and research issues on social tagging for search,and review her qualitative work on tag clouds.

Developing a taxonomy has little or no value until content can be organized using it.Tagging of any kind is better than the words that happen to occur in a piece of content.End-user tagging and tagging by librarians are useful,as are tags automatically assigned by business rules and language processing algorithms.Content should be tagged throughout its life cycleó each time the content is handled and used - so that it accrues value.This session will address the practical considerations and proven approaches to tagging content with a taxonomy.

Novell has successfully established an enterprise taxonomy.Learn how it established a taxonomy review board from across the business,about the processes for managing the taxonomy,and how the taxonomy has become embedded in Novellís content management system and a number of corporate repositories to provide a cohesive language for the companyís knowledge workers.  Hear about the business rules that are now in place to enhance search throughout Novellís knowledge repositories.

It's hard not to be dazzled and baffled by vendors when itís time to purchase software to support your taxonomy development and management efforts.  Yet this may be a critical step to ensuring the success,or the failure,of your taxonomy program.How do you know what you need to avoid buying too much, or too little, functionality? This session presents a data-based process to guide you in selecting the right tool based on your requirements and constraints and provides you with a logical argument supporting your selection of software that will enable a successful taxonomy program.

With the trend toward integrated software solutions,it is becoming difficult to find simple stand-alone taxonomy management tools.  Using examples from recent projects,Tom Reamy discusses selecting the right taxonomy software in the context of developing and applying taxonomies with enterprise search and content management software.Hear the major feature sets that this class of software should have,and understand how to integrate the right variations of features with the other major components such as search and content management.You will learn how to find the best mix of features and software offerings for taxonomy management,distributed taxonomy development, entity extraction,and categorization capabilities.

Developing a hierarchical taxonomy (or set of taxonomies) involves a great deal of decision making.While stakeholders can provide some answers,they often leave decisions to the individual developing the taxonomy,who "knows best."  The taxonomist,therefore,needs to anticipate issues that will arise and know how to make the best decisions for specific applications.This practical how-to session covers a number of issues that require a decision on the part of the taxonomy developer and discusses the advantages and disadvantages of taking alternate approaches. 

Learn about the relationship between taxonomies and ontologies and hear a case study about the challenges Abbott Laboratories faced as it changed the way it manages product information.Jennifer Borrell will describe how Abbott's taxonomy strategy evolved from using a simple hierarchical taxonomy stored in a spreadsheet to using a knowledge management tool to create an ontologica model with rich, semantic relationships.Discover how simple it can be to link disparate information,allowing users to quickly and easily find all the information they need in one place.

This session discusses the ever-increasing use of auto-categorizers to support enterprise applications.Drawing from practical experience, Wendi Pohs will describe the pros and cons of using auto-categorization software,what you should look for in product user interfaces, and the kinds of resources you need to support this work.Hear about her best practices and also learn what to avoid when using auto-categorization tools.

This session will examine issues surrounding the use of auto-categorizers, including when to use these tools (i.e.,when will and when won't auto-categorization work successfully);auto-categorization technologies and their strengths and weaknesses;an overview of auto-categorization techniques and tools;and auto categorization approaches,schemes,and how to write auto-categorization rules.  You will learn when to consider auto-categorization for an application,what you will have to do to make it work correctly,and how to select the right tools.

The full cost of the implementation for an automatic indexing system includes the creation of the rule base or training sets and the time from your purchase to actual productivity enhancementsóin addition to acquisition costs.  Then,once the software is in the production line,what does it cost to keep it current?  Learn about the real and hidden expenses of using auto-classification software so you can make an informed cost-benefit decision for your own project.

Hear how the EPA used Documentumís Content Intelligence Service (CIS) to auto-classify its Web content by loading the EPA controlled vocabulary and then classifying some test documents.The EPA then adjusted the default configuration of the tools to achieve satisfactory results.

Continue the day's discussions with new colleagues and old friends over drinks and hors d'oeuvres.  Meet and talk with the speakers and the conference sponsors.