This is the last post in the IZE series. In the previous installment, I looked at two ways to generalize the IZE algorithm itself: preferring consistent facets and searching for trees with better goodness scores. Here I want to ask a different question: what does the AI revolution of the last few years actually change …

In the previous installment of this series, I looked at what came after IZE -- faceted search, clustering algorithms, and the various ways web search, personal information management, and e-commerce tried to solve similar problems to what IZE was attacking. None of them ended up doing what IZE did. The question I want …

In the previous post in this series, I discussed the technical details of IZE and its reception. Here I want to look at what came after — and where IZE-like ideas might still have potential.

The short version: IZE was forgotten, but the ideas it embodied — hierarchical clustering, single-word splits, dynamic navigation …

In the first post in this series, I introduced IZE -- a DOS-era personal information manager with a novel approach to search and navigation. Here I want to go deeper into how it actually worked, what its limits were, and how it was received at the time.

The algorithm

The core of IZE was patented by Paul Kleinberger …

Sometimes revisiting old technology is the best way to understand how we got where we are -- and to see what alternative paths might have looked like. This is the first in a series of posts about IZE, a DOS-era personal information manager that I think has some interesting lessons for modern search and discovery.

I'll …