Please complete the course evaluation. In particular, your notes on what you though went well in the course and what might be improved will be helpful for the instructor and future students in the course.
**Exam: Project presentations will be given in-person on Monday May 5th, from 1:30-4pm.
**Final projects and project reports are due the following Monday (May 8th) by 11:59pm.
**Extension: Assignment 4 is due Saturday evening (with late deadline ending the evening before Reading Day).
The final research paper will be discussed in-class on Thursday (read and bring questions/comments to class). The paper summary is due Friday at 5pm (the day after our final lecture).
Best of luck with the end of term.
Week 14
Project proposals will be graded and returned soon.
The final research paper is posted on MyCourses. The final paper summary will be due next Friday at 5pm (the day after our final lecture).
Assignment 4 will be released Tuesday, and will be due next Tuesday (with late deadline ending the evening before Reading Day).
Quiz 10 (last one!) will be released by Wednesday, and will be Thursday at 11:59pm.
Topics and Readings this week: Learning to rank, Neural IR (associated reading will be posted on MyCourses).
Week 13
Project proposals will be graded and returned this week. Groups are strongly encouraged to continue working and ask any questions that they have in the meantime.
Assignment 3 is due Friday at 5pm.
Quiz 9 is due Tuesday at 11:59pm.
Topics and Readings this week: PyTerrier materials (see Assignment 3), learning to rank.
Week 12
Project proposals are due Monday at 11:59pm. We will grade these by the early part of next week.
Assignment 3 has been released, and is due next Friday at 5pm. Assignment 4 will be due Friday of the following Week (in Wk 14) -- see the Schedule. Both involve PyTerrier.
Quiz 8 is due Thursday at 11:59pm.
Topics and Readings this week: Search 'hit' (document) summarization, relevance feedback, retrieval models (Chs. 6 and 7 in Croft; see Schedule for details)
The final research paper summary will be discussed during our final lecture, with a summary due the next day (Friday 5pm).
Week 11
Quiz 7 is due Thursday at 11:59pm.
Extension: Assignment 2 now due Monday at 11:59pm. Related schedule update: Project proposal and A3 deadlines have been moved forward from Fridays to the following Monday (this will provide a weekend to complete each). Final paper summary moved to Wk 13.
Extension: Project Proposals are due Monday (Apr 3) at 5pm. The dropbox should be assigned to your group (i.e., all group members can submit for their team). Please see the discord channel for information on where to look for papers/systems and how to obtain papers from RIT library if necessary. I recommend that teams try running multiple systems in parallel: remember also that you will need to include a 'viability test' as part of your project proposal.
Topics and Readings this week: Query expansion, retrieval models (see readings for Wk 11 in Schedule link).
Week 10
There will be no quiz this week. Next week we will resume weekly quizzes.
Assignment 2 due Saturday at 11:59pm.
Project Proposals are due next Friday (Mar 31) at 5pm. The dropbox should be assigned to your group (i.e., all group members can submit for their team). Please see the discord channel for information on where to look for papers/systems and how to obtain papers from RIT library if necessary. I recommend that teams try running multiple systems in parallel: remember also that you will need to include a 'viability test' as part of your project proposal.
Topics and Readings this week: Finishing up text processing, starting on query expansion, and revisiting retrieval models (see Weeks 6-8 in the schedule for readings).
Week 8
Project: Groups must register in MyCourses by Friday, 5pm.
Topics: evaluation and text processing
Reading: see Weeks 6 and 7 in the Schedule (link above)
Quiz 6 given out early in the week. There will be no quiz after we return from break. Last quiz will be given out in Week 14.
Assignment 2 will be released this week, and will be due at the end of the week after break (i.e., Week 10). Assignments 3 & 4 have moved later in the schedule (see link above)
Enjoy spring break next week, and best of luck to those participating in the Career Fair.
Week 7
Topics: Query execution and evaluating retrieval effectiveness
Readings: see Weeks 5 and 6 in the Schedule (link above)
Quiz 5 will be released Monday
Assignment 2 is due Tuesday of next week (Wk 8)
Course Project: The course project requirements have been posted on MyCourses (in the 536 shell). Students must sign up for groups by Friday@5pm next week before the break. Project proposals are due Friday, March 31st at 5pm. We will discuss the project in-class on Thursday.
Week 6
*The Course Schedule has been updated, pushing deliverables back by a week but maintaining the same Tues/Fri rhythm for deliverables. Please see the link above for details.
Topics: Skip lists, query execution, and text processing (esp. tokenization)
Readings: Please see the course schedule
Research Paper #2: We will discuss the paper in-class on Thursday. 1-page summaries following the same guidelines as the previous summary are due Friday at 5pm.
Quiz 5 will be released Tuesday evening.
Week 5
Topics: Indexing efficiently and executing queries
Readings: Please see the course schedule
Research Paper: The second research paper, exploring differences in retrieval between BM25, BERT, and their combination, is available through MyCourses. We will discuss the paper in class next Thursday.
Quiz 4 was released Monday.
Assignment 2 has been delayed due to the untimely death of the instructor's laptop.
Week 4
Topics: Indexing documents, efficiency considerations (e.g., compressing posting lists), and the AdNaseum paper.
Quiz 3 was released Monday, and is due before class on Tuesday. Answers to previous quizzes are available through MyCourses (536 shell).
Our first research paper (on AdNauseam) and summary requirements are available in the 536 course shell under "Readings." Read the paper and bring notes/questions to class on Thursday. Paper summaries are due Friday at 5pm.
Office Hours Reminder: Sergei's office hours are after class, from 3:30-5:30pm Tues/Thurs. Prof. Zanibbi's office hours are Fridays from 11am-2pm.
Reading this Week: AdNauseam paper, see Week 4 lecture readings in the course schedule page (Croft , Zobel & Moffat).
Assignment 2 will be posted later this week.
Week 3
Topics: This week we will finish our brief overview of approaches for evaluating search user interfaces, and then talk about indices used for token ('word-ish')-based text retrieval methods, in particular the inverted index.
Assignment 1 is available in the 536 MyCourses shell, and is due Friday at 5pm. Please check the discord channels for related updates/discussion.
The first research paper and the requirements for your written summaries of the paper are available in the 536 course shell under "Readings." Please plan to read the paper before class next Thursday when we will discuss the paper in class. Paper summaries will be due next Friday.
Office Hours: Both the TA (Sergei) and Prof. Zanibbi have office hours this week. Sergei's office hours are after class, from 3:30-5:30pm Tues/Thurs. Prof. Zanibbi's office hours are Fridays from 11am-2pm. Both meetings are in-person and over Zoom (links available under "Zoom" in the 536 course shell). Please click on the "Contact" link above for more details (e.g., for meetings rooms and emails).
Quiz 2 was released Monday and due before class on Tuesday. Answers to quiz questions will be posted later in the week.
Reading this Week: see Week 3 in the course schedule page (from Croft , Zobel & Moffat)
Week 2
Assignment 1 is available in the 536 course shell, and is due next Friday (Wk 3) at 5pm. Please check the discord channels for related updates/discussion.
Quiz 2 will be released on Monday.
Our focus this week is search user interfaces, particularly techniques for their design and evaluation
Quiz 1 will be released Monday, and is due Tuesday by 1pm (through MyCourses, 1 hr before lecture).
Reading this Week: see Weeks 1 and 2 in the course schedule page.
Reminder - Lecture Materials: Lecture slides and Zoom recordings are available through the CSCI 536 (undergraduate) MyCourses shell.
Week 1
Quiz 1 will be released Monday of Wk 2 by 12pm, and is due Tuesday of Wk 2 by 1pm (through MyCourses, 1 hr before lecture).
Welcome to the web pages for the information retrieval course being offered by the Department of Computer Science at RIT in Spring 2023. The course is cross-listed (see Syllabus for details). CSCI 536 is the undergraduate version, and CSCI 636 the graduate version.
Readings for Week 1 are listed on the Schedule page. Students should also join the class discord server (link available through MyCourses).
Prof. Zanibbi is the course instructor. Sergei Chuprov is the TA for the course.
These web pages will be used to communicate information about the course, along with news, deadlines, etc. Assignments and projects will be distributed and submitted using MyCourses.
Lectures: Tuesdays and Thursdays, 2:00pm - 3:15pm James E Gleason Hall (GLE) Room 3139 *outside GCCIS!
Lectures will both be in-person and over Zoom, and lectures will be recorded. Lecture attendance in-person is strongly recommended.
For those interested in information retrieval research, a list of conferences and journals is provided on the Resources page.