Information Sciences 181(2011)1503-1516 Contents lists available at Science Direct Information sciences ELSEVIER journalhomepage:www.elsevier.com/locate/ins A google wave-based fuzzy recommender system to disseminate information in University Digital Libraries 2.0 Jesus Serrano-Guerrero Enrique Herrera-Viedma, Jose A Olivas Andres Cerezo francisco P. romero a echnologies and Systems, University of Castilla-La Mancha, 13071 Ciudad ReaL Spain b Department of Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence, University of Granada, 18071 Granada, Spain ARTICLE IN FO A BSTRACT Nowadays Digital Libraries 2.0 are mainly based on the interaction between users through collaborative applications such as wikis, blogs, etc or new possible paradigms like the d in revised form 17 December 2010 1 January 2011 vaves proposed by Google. This new concept, the wave, represents a common space where online 9 January 2011 resources and users can work together. The problem arises when the number of resources In this case a fuzzy linguistic recommender system based on the Google Wave capabilities ender system is proposed as tool for communicating researchers interested in common research line The system allows the creation of a common space by means a wave as a way of collabo- rating and exchanging ideas between several researchers interested in the same topic. In 2-Tuple fuzzy linguistic modeling addition, the system suggests, in an automatic way, several researchers and useful esources for each wave. These recommendations are computed following several previ- usly defined preferences and characteristics by means of fuzzy linguistic labels. Thus he system facilitates the possible collaborations between multi-disciplinar researchers Ind recommends complementary resources useful for the interaction. In order to test he effectiveness of the proposed system, a prototype of the system has been developed and tested with several research groups from the same university achieving successful e 2011 Elsevier Inc. All rights re Digital information allows the storage, access and transmission of millions of resources in an easy way but at the same time this fact involves problems for finding the suitable information. This problem is present in digital libraries Digital libraries are an extension of the classic libraries where information about different topics can be found easily, all available information is accessible through the Web[ 44. The apparition of digital libraries has changed the perception of traditional libraries [31]. Digital libraries can be focused on different contexts. In our case, we are especially interested in the University Digital Libraries (UDL). These kinds of libraries store information about books, electronic papers, electronic journals or official dailies [42, 47 and user profiles. The advent of University Digital Libraries meant a change in the life of the researchers, the amount of information avail- able grew amazingly and the necessary time to access to that information was considerably reduced. However the continued Corresponding author. Tel:+34 651504322 doi:10.1016ins201101.012A google wave-based fuzzy recommender system to disseminate information in University Digital Libraries 2.0 Jesus Serrano-Guerrero a,⇑ , Enrique Herrera-Viedma b , Jose A. Olivas a , Andres Cerezo a , Francisco P. Romero a aDepartment of Information Technologies and Systems, University of Castilla-La Mancha, 13071 Ciudad Real, Spain bDepartment of Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence, University of Granada, 18071 Granada, Spain article info Article history: Received 19 February 2010 Received in revised form 17 December 2010 Accepted 1 January 2011 Available online 9 January 2011 Keywords: Recommender system University Digital Library Google wave 2-Tuple fuzzy linguistic modeling abstract Nowadays Digital Libraries 2.0 are mainly based on the interaction between users through collaborative applications such as wikis, blogs, etc. or new possible paradigms like the waves proposed by Google. This new concept, the wave, represents a common space where resources and users can work together. The problem arises when the number of resources and users is high, then tools for assisting the users in their information needs are necessary. In this case a fuzzy linguistic recommender system based on the Google Wave capabilities is proposed as tool for communicating researchers interested in common research lines. The system allows the creation of a common space by means a wave as a way of collabo￾rating and exchanging ideas between several researchers interested in the same topic. In addition, the system suggests, in an automatic way, several researchers and useful resources for each wave. These recommendations are computed following several previ￾ously defined preferences and characteristics by means of fuzzy linguistic labels. Thus the system facilitates the possible collaborations between multi-disciplinar researchers and recommends complementary resources useful for the interaction. In order to test the effectiveness of the proposed system, a prototype of the system has been developed and tested with several research groups from the same university achieving successful results. 2011 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. 1. Introduction Digital information allows the storage, access and transmission of millions of resources in an easy way but at the same time this fact involves problems for finding the suitable information. This problem is present in digital libraries. Digital libraries are an extension of the classic libraries where information about different topics can be found easily, all available information is accessible through the Web [44]. The apparition of digital libraries has changed the perception of traditional libraries [31]. Digital libraries can be focused on different contexts. In our case, we are especially interested in the University Digital Libraries (UDL). These kinds of libraries store information about books, electronic papers, electronic journals or official dailies [42,47] and user profiles. The advent of University Digital Libraries meant a change in the life of the researchers, the amount of information avail￾able grew amazingly and the necessary time to access to that information was considerably reduced. However the continued 0020-0255/$ - see front matter 2011 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. doi:10.1016/j.ins.2011.01.012 ⇑ Corresponding author. Tel.: +34 651504322. E-mail address: jesus.serrano@uclm.es (J. Serrano-Guerrero). Information Sciences 181 (2011) 1503–1516 Contents lists available at ScienceDirect Information Sciences journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/ins