Findex: improving search result use through automatic filtering categories

Long result lists from web search engines can be tedious to use. We designed a text categorization algorithm and a filtering user interface to address the problem. The Findex system provides an overview of the results by presenting a list of the most frequent words and phrases as result categories next to the actual results. Selecting a category (word or phrase) filters the result list to show only the results containing it. An experiment with 20 participants was conducted to compare the category design to the de facto standard solution (Google-type ranked list interface). Results show that the users were 25% faster and 21% more accurate with our system. In particular, participants' speed of finding relevant results was 40% higher with the proposed system. Subjective ratings revealed significantly more positive attitudes towards the new system. Results indicate that the proposed design is feasible and beneficial.