Abstract
Type-ahead search is a new information-access paradigm, in which systems can find answers to keyword queries “on-the-fly” as a user types in a query. It improves traditional autocomplete search by allowing query keywords to appear at different places in an answer. In this paper we study the problem of automatic URL completion and prediction using fuzzy type-ahead search. That is, we interactively find relevant URLs that contain words matching query keywords, even approximately, as the user types in a query. Supporting fuzzy search is very important when the user has limited knowledge about URLs. We describe the design and implementation of our method, and report the experimental results on Firefox.
Publication
Automatic URL Completion and Prediction Using Fuzzy Type-Ahead Search
[Paper] [Poster]
Firefox ADD-ON

Description:

IFSearch is a Firefox extension which adds interactive fuzzy search capabilities to the Firefox 3 address bar. The URL data is not only from those that the user typed before, but also from a http server.

Download:

  • Download the ADD-ON for Firefox.
  • Download the video of using our add-on.

Requirements:

Firefox 3.0 or higher

Features:

  • Seamless Integration: Our extension seamlessly integrated on Firefox AwesomeBar(i.e. UrlBar bar)
  • Customizable:
    We support three types of URL search. By default, it reserved what Firefox AwesomeBar did (Menu:History). You can choose search URL only from server (i.e. filter the results generated locally) by right-clicking the magnifier icon and change the menu item to IFSearch. In a similar way, you can change it to History&IFSearch if you would like to merge the local URL and the server URL.

    For the reason that some users dislike the Awesome Bar that Firefox 3 supported, our extension can makes the location (URL) bar look like Firefox 2 by selecting the "Old URL Bar" menu item. By default, we select the "Old URL Bar".

Important:

All the configuration wouldn't take effect unless you restart the Firefox!
Contact
This study is part of the TASTIER project.
For any questions about this study, please contact Jiannan Wang.