Purpose – To suggest that a theory of classification for information retrieval (IR), asked for by Spärck Jones in a … “classical” versus Kuhnian understandings of concepts. Findings – Classification, both manual and automatic, for retrieval …/value – Provides, emphasizing a pragmatic understanding, insights of importance to classification for retrieval, both manual and …

classification in different research communities (machine learning, information retrieval and library science), and point to problems … with the approaches and automated classification as such. Design/methodology/approach – A range of works dealing with … automated classification of full‐text web documents are discussed. Explorations of individual approaches are given in the …

, classification, and indexing to solve problems of information retrieval and design usable information products and services for human …