 TerminologyExtractor 3.0 Help Index

Overview

General description of the user-interface

Procedure for extracting terms

Supported document types

Definitions

Dictionaries and exclude lists

Common words, uncommon words and expressions

Document lists and working folders

How To ...

Manage document lists

Extract terms from documents

Sort terms

Search terms in documents

Make term lists available to other applications

Making search results available to other applications

Create a user dictionary

Create a user excludelist

Commands

File menu

Edit menu

View menu

Tools menu

Help menu

Options

Term list options

Search options

Language options


General description of the user-interface
Overview

TerminologyExtractor is a tool that the performs the following functions:

•	Extracts terms from documents.

•	Allows the user to view term lists and sort them according to various options.

•	Allows the user to view the contexts in which the terms occur in documents.

•	Allows the user to export term lists and export contexts so that they can be used in other applications.

The user-interface contains the following components:

•	A menu bar from which a number of commands can be executed.

•	A term list window, which contains the terms extracted from the documents.

•	A document list window, which contains the name of the documents that must be processed together.

•	A search result window, which contains term contexts.

•	Two options dialog boxes used for selecting language options and search options. These dialog boxes are accessed from the main menu.

The document list window and the search result window are separated by a slider. One of these two windows can be completely hidden, or they can share the space in the main window. Click on the slider and move it left or right to change the layout. The View menu can also be used to display the document list window or the search result window.

A typical use of TerminologyExtractor is as follows:

1. Decide on a set of Word, HTML, rich-text format (RTF) and text documents that must be processed.

2. Launch TerminologyExtractor and insert these documents in the document list.

3. Specify the language in which the documents are written. This is done in the Language Options dialog box.

4. Save the document list in a folder created specifically for this purpose.

5. Run the command that extracts terms from the documents. When this operation is complete, the terms appear in the term list.

6. Examine the term list, sort it using the options provided and possibly export various instances of the term list so that they can be used by other applications.

7. List the contexts of selected terms using the Search command. Possibly export search results so that they can be used by other applications.


Definitions

Dictionaries and exclude lists

Dictionaries are used by TerminologyExtractor to transform plurals into singulars and conjugated verb forms into infinitives. There is one main dictionary per language.

Currently, only the English and French dictionaries are provided with TerminologyExtractor. This does not mean that TerminologyExtractor does not support other languages. However, the transformation from plurals into singulars and conjugated verb forms to infinitives makes the output much cleaner. For example, if a text contains the terms display system and display systems, the term list will feature both terms separately with their respective frequency, and the word list will feature both system and systems with their respective frequency.

Exclude lists contain common words such as prepositions and pronouns. There is one main exclude list per language.

Exclude lists have two main purposes. First, the words from the exclude list do not appear in the term list, making it much cleaner. Second, terms that start or end with a word in the exclude list will be discarded, making the term extraction process much faster and the output much cleaner. For example, word groups such as in the and of the will be discarded. This kind of word group is very frequent in any text.

It is possible to define a user dictionary and a user exclude list for each language. See the corresponding section in this help file.

Common words, uncommon words and expressions

If a main or user dictionary is used, common words are by definition the words that appear in the main dictionary or in the user dictionary, but not in one of the exclude lists. Uncommon words are by definition the words that are not common words and that do not appear in one of the exclude lists. The list of uncommon words produced by TerminologyExtractor typically includes proper nouns and abbreviations. However, if a proper noun is also a regular word (such as Bell, Taylor or New as in New York), then TerminologyExtractor cannot make the distinction and the word in question will appear in the common word list.

In other words, TerminologyExtractor performs the following tests in sequence:

1. If a word is in one of the exclude lists, discard it.

2. If a word is in one of the dictionaries, it is placed in the common word list.

3. Otherwise, it is placed in the uncommon word list.

If no main or user dictionary is used, all words except the ones from the exclude lists are considered common words.

Expressions are groups of adjacent words that are found more than once in the texts.

Document lists and working folders

The documents that must be processed together are grouped in document lists. For example, document lists can include all chapters of a larger document or all documents related to a specific project.

Document lists are created, saved by the user. They can be reloaded at any time into TerminologyExtractor using the File+Open menu command. They have the file extension .mlp. The folder into which they are saved by the user will be used by TerminologyExtractor to store all its internal data related to the documents included in the list. Only one document list can exist at any time in a folder. Therefore, it is good practice to store a document list in a dedicated folder created specifically for this purpose.


Extracting terms
Procedure for extracting terms

Run TerminologyExtractor by selecting the application in the Start menu. Then:

Step 1 - Add documents

From the Windows Explorer, select the desired documents and drag-and-drop them into TerminologyExtractor.

(See also: managing document lists)

Step 2 - Select the language

From the main menu, select Tools and then Language Options. This brings up the language options dialog box. At the top, select the language in which the documents are written. If the only option is "other", TerminologyExtractor did not find a dictionary and an exclude list for any language.

Step 3 - Save the document list

Save the document list by selecting Main and then Save Document List from the main menu. In the File Save dialog box, create a new folder specifically for TerminologyExtractor and save the document list in that folder. Note that a folder may contain only one document list.

Step 4 - Refresh term database

From the main menu, select Tools and then Refresh Term Database. This launches the term extraction process. When this operation is complete, the terms identified by TerminologyExtractor appear in the list at the left of the main window.

(See also: extracting terms)

Once the term lists have been created, you may perform a number of operations such as sorting the terms, searching them in documents and exporting them for use by other applications. The operations are described in the "how to" sections.


Managing document lists

Document lists contain the name of a set of documents chosen by the user. The documents included in a document list are processed together by TerminologyExtractor.

To create a document list, select File and then New Document List from the main menu.

To add documents to the list, drag-and-drop them from the Windows explorer or select Edit and then Insert Document from the main menu.

To remove documents from the list, select one or more of them in the list and then select Edit and then Remove Selected Document(s) from the main menu.

To save a document list, select File and then Save Document List or Save Document List As from the main menu.

To open a previously saved document list, select File and then Open Document List from the main menu.

Note that document lists must be saved before TerminologyExtractor can process the documents.


Extracting terms
Extracting terms from documents

Once a document list has been created, documents have been added to the list and the document list has been saved, TerminologyExtractor is ready to extract terms from all documents in the list. This is accomplished by selecting Tools and then Refresh Term Database from the main menu.

This operation may take a long time depending on the size of the documents. TerminologyExtractor displays the name of each document, as it is being processed, in the status bar at the bottom of the main window.

Important note: the language in which the document are written should be selected before the term extraction process is launched. This can be done from the language options, which are displayed by selecting Tools and then Language Options from the main menu.


Sorting terms

After TerminologyExtractor has processed a document list or when an existing document list is opened, TerminologyExtractor displays the list of terms in the window on the left.

The terms can be sorted and selected using the controls appearing at the top left. The following options are available:

- Select expressions, common words and/or uncommon words.

- Display frequency.

- Sort alphabetically or by frequency.

- Display only the terms that include a specified character string.

After any of these options is modified, the button labeled "Apply" must be pressed in order for the new options to take effect.

See also: Term sort and search commands


Searching terms
Searching terms in documents

Searching terms in document is performed in two steps. First, select one or more terms from the list on the left, then click on "Search". The results appear in the search results window. Selecting more than one term is equivalent to an "OR" operation. That is, the search results window displays all occurrences of any of the terms that are selected.

To select more than one term in the list, click on the first term, then hold down the control key and click on the additional terms.

A number of search options are available. They are accessed by selecting Tools and then Search Options from the main menu. The search options include:

- Display the name of the documents in the result window.

- Display the index of occurrence of each term.

- Include a defined number of words on each side of the term to illustrate its context.


Exporting term lists
Making term lists available to other applications

Term lists can be exported from TerminologyExtractor so that they can be used by other applications such as Microsoft Word, Microsoft Excel or any text editor such as Notepad and Wordpad.

To export term lists, first ensure that the term list includes the terms to export. (See the section on sorting terms for information on how to perform this operation.) Then select File and then Export Terms from the main menu. This brings up a dialog box in which the name of a text file can be specified. TerminologyExtractor will write the terms in this text file exactly as they appear in the term list.


Exporting search results
Making search results available to other applications

Search results can be exported from TerminologyExtractor so that they can be used by other applications such as Microsoft Word, Microsoft Excel or any text editor such as Notepad and Wordpad.

To export search results, first perform a search in the document list. (See the section on searching terms for information on how to perform this operation.) Then select File and then Export Terms from the main menu. This brings up a dialog box in which the name of a text file can be specified. TerminologyExtractor will write the search results in this text file as they appear in the term list with one exception. Instead of being highlighted in red, the searched terms will be surrounded by special markers as specified in the Search Options dialog box.


Creating a user dictionary

A user dictionary is a text file that contains one dictionary entry per line. Use Microsoft Word, Notepad, Wordpad or any other text editor to create a user dictionary. Be sure to save the user dictionary in text format so that it can be read by TerminologyExtractor.

User dictionary entries may be specified in two ways:

a. A single word.

Example:

preprocessor

b. An inflected form, followed by a slash ('/') and its corresponding canonical form.

Example:

preprocessors/preprocessor

In case (a), preprocessor, the inflected and the canonical form of the word are assumed to be the same.

Once the user dictionary is defined, it can be associated with a language in the Language Options.


Creating a user exclude list

A user exclude list is a text file that contains one word per line. Use Microsoft Word, Notepad, Wordpad or any other text editor to create a user dictionary. Be sure to save the user exclude list in text format so that it can be read by TerminologyExtractor.

Once the user exclude list is defined, it can be associated with a language in the Language Options.


File menu commands

TerminologyExtractor keeps track of documents that must be processed together in special files called Document Lists. These files are managed from the File menu.

The File menu offers the following commands:

New Document List

Removes all documents from the document list displayed in the main window.

Open Document List

Opens an existing Document List.

Save Document List

Saves the current list in the Document List.

Save Document List As

Saves the document list in a new file.

The File menu also gives access to the commands that make search results and terms available to other applications:

Export Search Results

Writes the contents of the search results window to a text file. This file can be opened using any standard word processor or editor. The format of the output can be controlled by setting options in the search options dialog box.

Export Terms

Writes the term list to a text file. This file can be opened using any standard word processor or editor. The term list will appear exactly as it does in the term window.


Edit menu commands

The Edit menu offers the following commands:

Insert Document

Opens a dialog box from which a document can be selected. The selected document is added to the current document list.

Remove Selected Document(s)

Deletes the selected documents from the document list.


View menu commands

The view menu allows the user to switch between the document list window and the search results window. Selecting one of these two commands from the view menu displays the corresponding window.

The layout of these two windows can also be modified by clicking and draging the window separator that appears at the edge of the windows.


Tools menu commands

The tools menu offers the following commands:

Language Options

Displays the language options dialog box, from which the current language, the user dictionary and the user exclude list can be selected.

Search Options

Displays the search options dialog box from which the search parameters can be defined.

Refresh Term Database

Scans the documents and creates the term lists.


Language Options

The language options dialog box is used for specifiying the following options:

Language

Indicates the source language of the documents in the list. Only the languages for which a system dictionary and a system exclude list are available are displayed in the list.

TerminologyExtractor expects to find language dictionaries and exclude lists in two places. (1) In the folder specified during their installation. (2) In the folder in which the TerminologyExtractor application is located.

User dictionary

Specifies the name of the user dictionary, which contains a list of words with their infinitive or singular form. See also the help information on how to create a user dictionary.

User exclude list

Specified the name of the user exclude list, which contains a list of words to exclude when identifying collocations and establishing word lists. See also the help information on how to create a user exclude list.


Search Options

Include source document name

When this option is selected, the source document name is included in the search results.

Include index

When this option is selected, the search results are numbered.

Number of words to display on each side of a term

Indicates how many words on each side of the search term must be included. If this value is set to zero, the entire sentence is included.

Term surround strings

These two options indicate the character strings to insert before and after the search term when the search results are exported to a file.


Help menu commands

The Help menu offers the following commands, which provide you assistance with this application:

Help Index

Gives access to the main index and the find function in TerminologyExtractor help.

Help Topics

Display the list of all topics available in TerminologyExtractor help.

About TerminologyExtractor

Displays information about the current version of TerminologyExtractor.

Registration Information

Opens a dialog box from which information about registration can be found. The registration key is entered using this dialog box. The expiry date of the key is also displayed.


Term sort and search
Term sort and search commands

Note: the sort options take effect only after the "Apply" button is pressed.

Show common words

When this option is selected, all words included in the system dictionary or in the user dictionary are displayed in the list. If no system and user dictionaries are present, all words belong to this category.

Show uncommon words

When this option is selected, all words that were not found in the system dictionary and in the user dictionary are displayed in the list. If no system and user dictionaries are present, the list of uncommon words is empty.

Show expressions

When this option is selected, all collocations are displayed in the list.

Include frequency

When this option is selected, the frequency of each word and expression is displayed.

Sort method

Defines how words and expressions are sorted in the list.

Minimum frequency

Defines the minimum frequency of the words and expressions in the list. Note: This option is active even if the option "Include Frequency" is not selected.

Text filter

Defines a character string that must be present in all the words and expressions in the list. Does not apply if the character string is empty.

Apply command

Sorts the word and term list according to the options specified.

Search command

Finds the selected words in the documents and displays the result in the search window.


Document types
Supported document types

TerminologyExtractor 3.0 handles the following document types:

.doc	Microsoft Word 97 and Word 2000.

.rtf	Microsoft Rich-Text Format.

.html	HTML.

.htm	HTML.

.txt	Plain text.

Documents that do not have one of the types listed above should be converted using third-party applications into one of the supported document types.

Important Note

In order to be able to process .doc, .rtf, .html and .htm documents, Word 97 or Word 2000 must be installed on the system. If one of these applications is not available, documents should be converted into plain text on another system.