Inspired by the actual trend of empowering traditional Web search methodologies by means of novel computational paradigms, in this talk we describe WebClustCube, a novel system that allows OLAP-enabled Web search of complex objects, thus adding new value to the potentialities of current Web search paradigms. In particular, WebClustCube supports the building and the interactive manipulation of OLAP-enabled Web views over complex objects extracted from distributed databases. The data management, OLAP-like support of WebClustCube is provided by ClustCube, a state-of-the-art framework for coupling OLAP methodologies and clustering algorithms with the goal of analyzing and mining of complex database objects. A case study that clearly shows the potentialities of WebClustCube in the context of next-generation Web search environments is provided. ClustCube is a novel computational paradigm for clustering complex database objects extracted from distributed database settings via well-understood OLAP technology. This paradigm conveys in the so-called ClustCube cubes, which define a novel multidimensional data cube model according to which (data) cubes store clustered complex database objects rather than conventional SQL-based aggregations. A major contribution of this research is represented by effective and efficient algorithms for computing ClustCube cubes that, surprisingly, are capable of reducing computational efforts significantly with respect to traditional approaches.

Alfredo Cuzzocrea is Associate Professor at the DIA Department, University of Trieste, Italy, but holds 50 Visiting Professor positions worldwide (Europe, USA, Asia, Australia). His current research interests include, among others, multidimensional data modeling and querying, data stream modeling and querying, data warehousing and OLAP, OLAM, XML data management, Web information systems modeling and engineering, knowledge representation and management models and techniques. He is author or co-author of more than 350 papers in international conferences, journals and books.