Systems and methods for ranking documents based upon structurally interrelated information

• US 20050060297A1
• Filed: 09/16/2003
• Published: 03/17/2005
• Est. Priority Date: 09/16/2003
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Corporation
• Inventors: Najork, Marc A.
• Granted Patent: US 7,739,281 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/951 Indexing; Web crawling techniques
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/9538 Presentation of query results

Abstract

Systems and methods for ranking Web pages based on hyperlink information in a manner that is resistant to nepotistic links are provided. In one embodiment, a Web search service is provided for returning quality query results. The vulnerability of existing ranking algorithms, such as PageRank, to Web pages that are artificially generated for the sole purpose of inflating the score of target page(s) is addressed. Intuitively, it is recognized that it is less likely to reach a particular page on a Web server having many pages via a random jump than it is to reach a particular page on a Web server having few pages, which implies that the influence of such a page upon another page by linking to, or endorsing, the other page is diminished. Thus, in various non-limiting embodiments, each Web server, not each Web page, is assigned a guaranteed minimum score. This minimum score assigned to a server can then be divided among all the pages on that Web server.

Claims

1. A method for assigning a score to a document of a plurality of structurally linked documents wherein the document is located on a Web server defined by at least one of:

(A) a server comprising a plurality of Web pages with the same symbolic host name, (B) a server comprising a plurality of Web pages associated with the same domain, and (C) a server having a plurality of Web pages associated with the same IP address and the document has at least one backlink from at least one other document of the plurality of structurally linked documents, wherever located, comprising;

assigning the score to the document in inverse proportion to the number of documents located on said Web server.

2. A method according to claim 1, further including:

assigning the score to the document in proportion to the number of said at least one other document.

3. A method according to claim 1, further including:

assigning the score in proportion to at least one score assigned to at least one of said at least one other document.

4. A method according to claim 1, further including:

assigning the score in proportion to (A) the number of said at least one other document and (B) at least one score assigned to at least one of said at least one other document.

5. A method according to claim 2, further including:

assigning the score to the document in inverse proportion to the number of outlinks of at least one of said at least one other document.

6. A method according to claim 1, wherein said assigning includes assigning the score to the document in inverse proportion to the number of documents located on the same domain as said document.

7. A method according to claim 1, wherein said assigning includes assigning the score to the document in inverse proportion to the number of documents having the same symbolic host name as said document.

8. A method according to claim 1, wherein said assigning includes assigning the score to the document in inverse proportion to the number of documents associated with the same internet protocol (IP) address as said document.

9. A method according to claim 1, further comprising:

assigning the score to the document based upon summing the scores of the at least one other document linking to said first document.

10. A method according to claim 1, wherein the plurality of structurally linked documents are Web pages having hyperlinks and the document is a Web page.

11. A method according to claim 1, further including outputting the score of the document to a component of a Web search service.

12. A method according to claim 1, further including assigning a preferred set of documents scores higher than an average minimum score.

13. A method according to claim 12, wherein the set of preferred documents is based on at least one of Nielsen ratings, ratings assigned by humans, Web page usage patterns extracted from ISP proxy logs, Web page usage patterns extracted from a search engine and documents specified according to a user preference.

14. A method according to claim 1, further including altering the score of the document based upon a second scoring technique.

15. A method according to claim 1, further including comparing the score against a second scoring technique to discover anomalous results.

16. An application programming interface comprising computer executable modules having computer executable instructions for carrying out the method of claim 1.

17. A computing device comprising means for carrying out the method of claim 1.

18. A modulated data signal carrying computer executable instructions for performing the method of claim 1.

19. A method for assigning a score to a document of a plurality of structurally linked documents wherein the document is located on a Web server defined by at least one of:

(A) a server comprising a plurality of Web pages with the same symbolic host name, (B) a server comprising a plurality of Web pages associated with the same domain, and (C) a server having a plurality of Web pages associated with the same IP address and the document has at least one backlink from at least one source document of the plurality of structurally linked documents, wherein the score of the document is calculated in proportion to at least one score associated with at least one of the at least one source document, and wherein the score is calculated inversely proportional to the number of said at least one source document located on said Web server.

20. A method according to claim 19, wherein the score is calculated inversely proportional to the number of said at least one source document located on the same Web server.

21. A method according to claim 20, wherein the score is calculated inversely proportional to the number of said at least one source document having the same symbolic host name.

22. A method according to claim 20, wherein the score is calculated inversely proportional to the number of said at least one source document associated with the same domain.

23. A method according to claim 20, wherein the score is calculated inversely proportional to the number of said at least one source document associated with the same internet protocol (IP) address.

24. A method according to claim 19, wherein the plurality of structurally linked documents are Web pages having hyperlinks and the document is a Web page.

25. An application programming interface comprising computer executable modules having computer executable instructions for carrying out the method of claim 19.

26. A computing device comprising means for carrying out the method of claim 19.

27. A modulated data signal carrying computer executable instructions for performing the method of claim 19.

28. A server object, comprising:

an application programming interface for use with a search engine comprising a query mechanism for querying a database of Web page information and associated scores based upon a query request, whereby the results retrieved from the database are ordered by the scores associated with each result, wherein the scores reflect the quality of the Web pages satisfying the query; and

a scoring object that generates the scores associated with the Web page information, wherein, for a Web page having at least one backlink to at least one corresponding source Web page, the scoring object assigns a score to the Web page in proportion to at least one score associated with at least one of the at least one corresponding source Web page, and wherein the score is calculated inversely proportional to the number of said at least one corresponding source Web page located on the same Web server.

29. A server object according to claim 28, wherein the scoring object operates independent of the querying mechanism.

30. A server object according to claim 28, wherein a Web server is defined based upon a common symbolic host name.

31. A server object according to claim 28, wherein a Web server is defined based upon a common domain.

32. A server object according to claim 28, wherein a Web server is defined based upon a common internet protocol (IP) address.

33. A computer readable medium comprising computer executable modules comprising computer executable instructions for assigning a score to a document of a plurality of structurally linked documents wherein the document is located on a Web server and has at least one backlink from at least one other document of the plurality of structurally linked documents, the modules comprising:

means for assigning the score to the document in inverse proportion to the number of documents located on said Web server.

34. A computer readable medium according to claim 33, further including:

means for assigning the score to the document in proportion to the number of said at least one other document.

35. A computer readable medium according to claim 33, further including:

means for assigning the score in proportion to at least one score assigned to at least one of said at least one other document.

36. A computer readable medium according to claim 33, further including:

means for assigning the score in proportion to (A) the number of said at least one other document and (B) at least one score assigned to at least one of said at least one other document.

37. A computer readable medium according to claim 34, further including:

means for assigning the score to the document in inverse proportion to the number of outlinks of at least one of said at least one other document.

38. A computer readable medium according to claim 33, wherein said means for assigning includes means for assigning the score to the document in inverse proportion to the number of documents located on a Web server with the same symbolic host name as said document.

39. A computer readable medium according to claim 33, wherein said means for assigning includes means for assigning the score to the document in inverse proportion to the number of documents located on the same domain as said document.

40. A computer readable medium according to claim 33, wherein said means for assigning includes means for assigning the score to the document in inverse proportion to the number of documents associated with the same internet protocol (IP) address as said document.