Change detection and classification of digital collections

People develop personal information collections consisting of distributed web resources as both reminders that resources exist and to provide rapid access to these resources. Managing such collections is necessary to preserve their value. Unexpected changes within distributed collections can cause them to become outdated, requiring revisions to or removal of no-longer-appropriate resources and replacements for lost resources. In an effort to alleviate this problem, this paper presents a categorization and classification framework including a tool that supports the management and active curation of distributed collections of Web-based resources. We assess the need for such a system and analyze how current tools affect the management of personal collections with survey of 106 participants from online and offline communities. Results of the survey show that personal collections are common and collection management is an issue for ~20% of respondents. Additionally we examine and categorize the various degrees of change that digital documents endure within the boundaries of a distributed collection. Consequently, this paper will focus on two research questions. First, what facets of the change detection process can be automated? And second, looking at this problem from a user standpoint where each document contributes towards the overall meaning of the collection, what strategies can be used to effectively detect the consequences of the various types of change found in document collections?