MONO91 Other Potentially Related Research chapter Mary Elizabeth Stevens National Bureau of Standards 6.2.1 Devices to Display Associations: EDIAC The interest aroused among some documentalists by the provocative idea of a t!Memex!! to record and display associations between ideas as proposed by Bush in 1945 ([93]) led to specific attempts at Documentation, Inc. in the 1950's to develop a device which would incorporate at least the associations between indexing terms assigned to documents and between documents with respect to their sharing of common indexing terms (1954 [157], 1956 [155, 156]). The first approach to this objective, as reported by Taube, was the idea of a manual dictionary of terms arranged in alphabetical order, with a "page" reserved for each and every indexing term used for any document in the collection. On each page would be listed all other terms that had co-occurred with that term in the indexing of one or more documents. Another idea was to display associations of terms used in a collection through the "superimposition of dedicated positions in a set of cards or plates. . . 1/ Subsequently, an actual device to demonstrate a system for display of term-term, term-document, and document-document associations, was built under an Office of Naval Research contract. 2/ The demonstration model contained a vocabulary of 250 terms which had been used in various combinations to index 100 reports. Interconnections in an elec- trical network provided the associational linkages. A display panel was provided with symbol-indicators which could be lighted up to identify particular terms and particular report numbers. This EDIAC device (for Electronic Display of[OCRerr]Indexing Association and Content) was intended for use both in guiding an indexer to either the extension or refinement of his initial choice of indexing terms and in assisting the searcher. It was claimed that the operation of such a device would be extremely simple. Thus: "For the index question the searcher selects any term in which he is interested and applies a voltage. He is told instantly the number of the repqrts dealing with that subject. Putting voltage in at any term also lights all other terms associated with the first term. .. " 3/ A later analog device, ACORN, will be discussed below in connection with the work of Giuliano and associates, at Arthur D. Little, Inc. 6.2.2 Statistical Association Factors - Stiles The name of H. Edmund Stiles, like those of Luhn, Baxendale, Maron, Swanson, Edmundson and Wyllys, is generally associated with pioneering innovations in those areas of mechanized documentation which are directly related to the use of high-speed computer capabilities. While Stiles! work has been directed primarily to problems of search prescription formulation and renegotiation based on the results of preliminary search, he has specifically recognized that the use of statistical word association techniques in searching operations can provide a logical corollary to automatic indexing procedures. Thus: 1/ 2/ 3/ Taube et al, 1954 [599], p. 102. It is described and illustrated in Taube et al, 1956 [599], p. 63 ff. Documentation, Inc. 1956 [156], p. 7. 119