Comments on: More progress on soft tags http://mesquilla.com/2009/01/10/more-progress-on-soft-tags/ Messaging with Mozilla by rkent Sun, 18 Jul 2010 18:30:57 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.0 By: rkent http://mesquilla.com/2009/01/10/more-progress-on-soft-tags/comment-page-1/#comment-14 rkent Thu, 05 Feb 2009 17:09:44 +0000 http://mesquilla.com/?p=145#comment-14 I don't come at this with a personal "long history" in Bayesian classification, and the term "feature" is pretty overloaded in the computer world. Even in the example you gave, "feature" has one meaning in the Bayes world, and a different in the spam world. I was trying to select a more neutral term. But had I known that "feature" was a well-understood term in the Bayesian nomenclature, I probably would have left it. Sorry about that ... I don’t come at this with a personal “long history” in Bayesian classification, and the term “feature” is pretty overloaded in the computer world. Even in the example you gave, “feature” has one meaning in the Bayes world, and a different in the spam world. I was trying to select a more neutral term. But had I known that “feature” was a well-understood term in the Bayesian nomenclature, I probably would have left it.

Sorry about that …

]]> By: era http://mesquilla.com/2009/01/10/more-progress-on-soft-tags/comment-page-1/#comment-13 era Thu, 05 Feb 2009 11:53:46 +0000 http://mesquilla.com/?p=145#comment-13 (Found my way here from https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=181866 -- thanks for the link.) In https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=181866#c57 you write: > I've done a number of patches > that allow access to the bayesian filter > for features that are different than > junk, but I use the term "traits" rather > than "features". "Traits"? The use of the term "features" in Bayesian classification and classification theory in general has a long history; moving away from that seems misdirected. However, it seems that you are using "trait" as what is normally called "category". In spam classification the presence of a particular "token" is what is called a "feature". (Found my way here from https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=181866 — thanks for the link.)

In https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=181866#c57 you write:
> I’ve done a number of patches
> that allow access to the bayesian filter
> for features that are different than
> junk, but I use the term “traits” rather
> than “features”.

“Traits”? The use of the term “features” in Bayesian classification and classification theory in general has a long history; moving away from that seems misdirected. However, it seems that you are using “trait” as what is normally called “category”. In spam classification the presence of a particular “token” is what is called a “feature”.

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