Text Clustering as a Mining Task

In this chapter we introduce readers to the various aspects of cluster analysis performed on textual data in a mining framework. We first provide a brief overview on the techniques and the background notions on general clustering. Then, we focus on the importance and on the goals of clustering in a text mining scenario, analyzing and describing the issues which are specific to this particular field. Effective information extraction from highly dimensional textual data, clustering algorithms specifically designed to efficiently work on very large unstructured and, possibly, hyperlinked data sets, and comprehension of the clustering output are among the covered topics.