Phrase-based generation of document descriptions

• US 20060020571A1
• Filed: 07/26/2004
• Published: 01/26/2006
• Est. Priority Date: 07/26/2004
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Google LLC (Alphabet Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Google Inc. (Alphabet Inc.)
• Inventors: Patterson, Anna Lynn
• Granted Patent: US 7,584,175 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/335 Filtering based on additional data, e.g. user or group profiles filtering in web context G06F16/9535, G06F16/9536
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/345 Summarisation for human users
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99933 Query processing, i.e. searching
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99935 Query augmenting and refining, e.g. inexact access

Abstract

An information retrieval system uses phrases to index, retrieve, organize and describe documents. Phrases are identified that predict the presence of other phrases in documents. Documents are the indexed according to their included phrases. Related phrases and phrase extensions are also identified. Phrases in a query are identified and used to retrieve and rank documents. Phrases are also used to cluster documents in the search results, create document descriptions, and eliminate duplicate documents from the search results, and from the index.

Claims

1. A method of automatically generating a description of a document, the method comprising:

retrieving a document in response to a query, the query comprising at least one query phrase;

determining for sentences of the document, a count of the at least one query phrase in the sentences;

selecting a plurality of sentences based on their respective phrase counts; and

forming a description of the document from the selected sentences.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the count of the at least on query phrase comprises a first count, the method further comprising:

determining a second count of related phrases of the query phrase in a sentence;

determining a third count of phrase extensions of the query phrase in a sentence; and

selecting a plurality of sentences based on their respective first, second and third counts.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein selecting a plurality of sentences based on their respective phrase counts, comprises:

sorting the sentences in declining order of their respective phrase counts; and

selecting a number of sentences having the highest phrase counts.

2. Personalized topics

4. A method of automatically generating a personalized description of a document, the method comprising:

storing a user model comprising a plurality of phrases contained in documents accessed by the user;

receiving a query from the user, the query comprising at least one query phrase;

selecting a document responsive to the query;

determining phrases that are related to the query and present in the user model; and

generating a document description comprising selected sentences of the document, wherein the sentences are selected and ordered in the document description as a function of a number of the determined phrases in each sentence.

5. A method of automatically generating a personalized description of a document, the method comprising:

storing a user model comprising a plurality of phrases contained in documents accessed by the user;

receiving a query from the user, the query comprising at least one query phrase;

selecting a document responsive to the query;

determining phrases that are related to the query and present in the user model;

ordering the determined phrases with respect to the user model;

determining for sentences of the document, a count of each of the ordered phrases in the sentences;

selecting a plurality of sentences based on their respective phrase counts; and

forming a description of the document from the selected sentences.