SCSS-Lie: A novel synchronous collaborative search system with a live interactive engine

Synchronous collaborative search systems (SCSS) refer to systems which support two or more users with similar information need to search together simultaneously. Generally, SCSS provide a social engine to enable users to communicate. However, when the number of users in the social engine is insufficient to collaborate on the search task, the social engine will encounter the cold start problem and can not perform collaborative search well. In this paper, we present a novel Synchronous Collaborative Search System with a Live Interactive Engine (SCSS-LIE). SCSS-LIE proposes to apply a ring topology to add an intelligent auxiliary robot, Infobot, into the social engine to support real-time interaction between users and the search engine to address the cold start problem of the social engine. The reading comprehension model BiDAF (Bi-Directional Attention Flow) is employed in the Infobot in the process of interacting with the search engine to obtain answers to facilitate the acquisition of information. SCSS-LIE can not only allow users with similar information need to be grouped into one chat channel to communicate, but also enable them to conduct real-time interaction with the search engine to improve search efficiency.