As contemporary thesauri have become large and complex, it is increasingly difficult to assess the intended meaning of each one of the terms. Thereby the meaning of many descriptors seems to be very similar, and it is often not possible to distinguish...
As contemporary thesauri have become large and complex, it is increasingly difficult to assess the intended meaning of each one of the terms. Thereby the meaning of many descriptors seems to be very similar, and it is often not possible to distinguish among them and to identify the term correctly. Purpose of this article is to induce definitions of descriptors in thesaurus by specifying the characteristics of each concept, locating it in the domain and providing clear and prescriptive information on the meaning of each descriptor in the form of a standardized terminological definition. In this study, a small prototype thesaurus using definition of term in the field of information industry in Korean Standards has been developed. In this thesaurus definitions are written for each descriptor with the help of a proposed defining model and in accordance with defining rules borrowed from the field of terminology. In addition, elements of analyzed definition have been included in the relation structure of descriptors. It is revealed that terminological definition added to thesaurus may permit extraction of separate items of information from definitions for the representation of knowledge structures and makes it easier to confine the scope of descriptors to be included in thesaurus in a given subject field.