A Learning Agent for the World Wide Web - LAW

David Bayer & Pete Edwards

LAW helps a user find new and interesting information on the World Wide Web. It provides assistance in two ways: by interactively suggesting links to the user as they browse the Web, and through the use of a separate Web robot that attempts to find pages that might be of interest. An existing graphical Web browser Chimera was modified to incorporate the agent.

As the user browses the Web using the modified browser, data is collected about the documents viewed and any actions taken, such as whether the user saved the location of a page as a bookmark or printed a page. The user can also give direct feedback by pressing an agent button, which indicates that they found a page interesting. This information is used to create two profiles. The first profile represents the links which the user followed or found interesting; the second describes interesting pages. The two are referred to as the link profile and page profile respectively. The IBPL instance-based learner is used to acquire these profiles.

LAW results - dessert recipes.

Click on the thumbnail above for an illustrative screendump. WARNING: Image may take some time to download.

Publications:

• Exploiting Learning Technologies for World Wide Web Agents
  IEE Colloquium on Intelligent World Wide Web Agents, Digest No: 97/118, IEE, Savoy Place, London, 3/1 - 3/7, 1997
  P Edwards, C L Green, P C Lockier & T C Lukins

• Using Machine Learning to Enhance Software Tools for Internet Information Management
  A Franz & H Kitano (Eds), AAAI-96 Workshop on Internet-Based Information Systems, WS-96-06, AAAI Press, 48-55, 1996.
  C L Green & P Edwards

• Experience with Learning Agents which Manage Internet-Based Information
  M A Hearst & H Hirsh (Eds), AAAI 1996 Stanford Spring Symposium on Machine Learning in Information Access, SS-96-05, AAAI Press, 31-40, 1996.
  P Edwards, D Bayer, C L Green & T R Payne

Funding:

Internal MSc Project.