The Morpheus Visualization System : a general-purpose RDF results browser

Abstract

As the amount of information available on the deep web grows, finding ways to make this information accessible is growing increasingly problematic. As some have estimated that the content in the deep web is several orders of magnitude greater than that in the shallow web, there is a clear need for an effective tool to search the deep web. While many have attempted a solution, none have been successful in effectively addressing the problem of deep web searching. The Morpheus project presents a unique approach to the problem as it integrates the deep web with the shallow web while preserving the semantics of the deep web sites it accesses. At the heart Morpheus is its visualization system which allows users to access the deep web information. The visualization system makes use of clustering algorithms, visual information techniques, as well as the semantics of the deep web sites stored by Morpheus to present deep web results to users in an effective manner. User testing was also conducted to identify problematic areas of the system during development as well as to evaluate the usability of the system's design. Results indicate that users find that the Morpheus visualization system is a highly usable and learnable interface for searching the deep web for results as well as for processing those results.