Exploring XML data is as easy as using maps

For keyword search on XML data, traditionally, a list of query results in the form of subtrees will be returned to users. However, we find that it is still not sufficient to meet users’ information needs because: (1) the search intention of a certain keyword query varies from person to person; (2) amongst the query results, they may have sibling or containment relationships (in the context of whole XML database), which could be important for users to digest the query results and should be shown to users. Therefore, we try to equip the traditional XML keyword search engine with our new exploration model XMAP, providing user an interactive yet novel way to explore the results with better user experience.