Table 5.3.2.1: A Taxonomy of User Tasks/Questions
1. Pragmatic Dimension
(Context/Situation)
1.1. Goal
learn something new (fill gap,
single to exhaustive)
verify
judge/evaluate/compare
explore
referral/intermediate result (system use or information
as a waypoint in a larger task, e.g. I need to find out the agency to look
into further)
ongoing
planning/forecasting
1.2 Constraints (on the task)
time (information from a
particular time period wanted)
amount (a particular amount of
information is wanted)
geographic (information from a
particular geographic area wanted)
1.3 System
appropriateness of database to task (which system needs
to describe to user)
location and extraction facilities
formats available
user preferred entry point into system or optimal path
to information
2. Semantic Dimension
2.1 Topic
2.2 concrete/abstract
2.3 specific/unspecific
2.4
faceted/non-faceted, number of facets
3. Syntactic Dimension
3.1 Expression Type
what
where
who
how
why
3.2 Goal Type
closed (fact, known item)
open/intrepretive
accretional
3.3 Specificity of Expression
inclusion of
information about the user's situation and about how that user interacts with
the system.