Analysis and visualisation of structure of smartphone application services using text mining and the set-covering algorithm: a case of App Store

Abstract

This paper analyses and visualises the structure of smartphone application services to identify which smartphone application services are being developed and provided in detail. Using text information contained in web documents, the structure of smartphone application services is quantitatively and systematically analysed through two steps. First, representative services are identified and characterised to find distinctive features of current smartphone application services in the App Store by using text-mining and the set-covering algorithm. Second, based on representative services, three visual forms - grid, tree, and network - are illustrated to illuminate the structure of smartphone application services.