A vocabulary is defined here as a limited collection of words and phrases, for use in a limited context.
A vocabulary can be as simple as the labels on a checklist, or as complex as a full-blown indexing thesaurus for a law office. It can be the text of a book index, the keywords in a database, or the labels on the bins of a music store. Not all vocabularies are connected to information storage and retrieval: a glossary of technical terms or a slang dictionary is a thing unto itself.
Usually the terms in a vocabulary have definitions associated with them. The more complex have lexicographical details, called scope notes, to aid indexers and searchers.
Often terms are cross-referenced with pointers such as use: or see also:.
Ideally a vocabulary should completely encompass the subject area, be concise enough to not overwhelm the person using it, and be internally consistent.
 
Boswell Vocabularies
BoswellΓÇÖs Companion has been created as an aid to individuals who desire (or are assigned by reasons of their employment) to create specialized vocabularies. It is for the single-person information department as well as for the individual or organization who wishes to create an authoritative dictionary or glossary reflecting the development of a subject field.
The single-person information department
In many businesses the information department of the person-within-cubicle variety. This is not necessarily to be decried; many of these people run a very efficient cubicle, and although much of industry should view information as a more valued asset than it does, there are many firms where further use of resources would not be justified, and a solitary worker is left to cope as best as he or she can.
Considering how ubiquitous the desktop computer has become in these environments it is surprising that there are few software tools designed to help these individuals in their daily work. BoswellΓÇÖs Companion has been developed to handle one of the central components of this work, namely, determining the right indexing language for the information being handled.
To many the notion of an indexing language will seem outdated. After all, the increasingly rapid evolution of storage speed and efficiency make it easy to search the whole text of documents in response to an enquiry. But free-text-processing has one obvious problem: there may be dozens of ways of expressing the same concept. Provisions are seldom made for words not used by the author but which will be considered by subsequent searchers. Until artificial intelligence has mastered the human ability to create languages (one imagines a new and vast Rosetta Stone) there will be a need for the indexing of documents based upon content.
Do's and don'ts
BoswellΓÇÖs Companion automates the clerical tasks involved in assembling vocabularies, enables hypertext navigation, and provides powerful tools for cross-checking. It greatly speeds up the construction and the continuing development and maintenance of vocabularies.
BoswellΓÇÖs Companion does not do the intellectual work of selecting words, determining their meaning in a particular context, nor clarifying the relationships between words.
What you need to know
This software can't replace the need for an understanding of the theoretical guidelines for thesaurus creation. A brief tutorial is included, along with a bibliography of excellent books on the subject. Once the fundamentals are in place, the best way to learn is by doing.
For whom Boswell isn't
This software is not really intended for use by people working in large information departments nor for those compiling macro-thesauri, whose needs are better suited by products running on microcomputers or mainframes.
