Systems and methods for using anchor text as parallel corpora for cross-language information retrieval

• US 8,190,608 B1
• Filed: 06/30/2011
• Issued: 05/29/2012
• Est. Priority Date: 08/28/2001
• Status: Expired due to Term

• Current Assignee: Google LLC (Alphabet Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Google Inc. (Alphabet Inc.)
• Inventors: Gravano, Luis, Henzinger, Monika H.
• Primary Examiner(s): Jalil, Neveen Abel
• Assistant Examiner(s): Veillard, Jacques
• Application Number:
  US13/174,209
• Time in Patent Office: 334 Days
• Field of Search: None
• US Class Current: 707/736
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/951 Indexing; Web crawling techniques
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/9532 Query formulation
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99934 Query formulation, input preparation, or translation
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99935 Query augmenting and refining, e.g. inexact access

Abstract

A system performs cross-language query translations. The system receives a search query that includes terms in a first language and determines possible translations of the terms of the search query into a second language. The system also locates documents for use as parallel corpora to aid in the translation by: (1) locating documents in the first language that contain references that match the terms of the search query and identify documents in the second language; (2) locating documents in the first language that contain references that match the terms of the query and refer to other documents in the first language and identify documents in the second language that contain references to the other documents; or (3) locating documents in the first language that match the terms of the query and identify documents in the second language that contain references to the documents in the first language. The system may use the second language documents as parallel corpora to disambiguate among the possible translations of the terms of the search query and identify one of the possible translations as a likely translation of the search query into the second language.

Claims

1. A system, comprising:

at least one processor; and

a memory to store instructions, which when executed by the at least one processor, cause the at least one processor to;

search a plurality of documents based on a search query that includes terms in a first language;

identify, based on a content of the search query, one or more documents in the first language that include an anchor that links to one or more documents in a second language, the anchor having anchor text that matches at least one of the terms of the search query, where the second language is different than the first language;

identify the one or more documents in the second language based on the anchor having anchor text that matches at least one of the terms of the search query; and

translate the terms of the search query into the second language using content included in the one or more documents in the second language.

2. The system of claim 1, where, when the at least one processor is to search the plurality of documents, the at least one processor further is to:

match the search query to the anchor text of the identified one or more documents in the first language.

3. The system of claim 1, where, when the at least one processor is to translate the terms of the search query from the first language into the second language, the at least one processor further is to:

perform an initial translation of the terms of the search query, into the second language, to generate possible translations of the search query;

identify possible translations of the terms of the search query; and

disambiguate among the possible translations of the terms of the search query using the content, included in the one or more documents in the second language, to identify one of the possible translations as a likely translation of the search query.

4. The system of claim 3, where, when the at least one processor is to perform the initial translation, the at least one processor further is to:

use a dictionary to identify the possible translations of the terms into the second language.

5. The system of claim 3, where, when the at least one processor is to disambiguate among the possible translations of the terms of the search query, the at least one processor further is to:

use text from the one or more documents in the second language as parallel corpora to disambiguate among the possible translations of the terms of the search query.

6. A system, comprising:

at least one processor; and

a memory to store instructions, which when executed by the at least one processor, cause the at least one processor to;

search a plurality of documents based on a search query that includes terms in a first language;

identify one or more documents in the first language that include an anchor that links to one or more other documents in the first language and that has anchor text that matches at least one of the terms of the search query;

search the plurality of documents to identify one or more documents in a second language that is different than the first language, the one or more documents in the second language including an anchor that links to the one or more other documents in the first language; and

translate the search query into the second language using content included in the one or more documents in the second language.

7. The system of claim 6, where, when the at least one processor is to search the plurality of documents, the at least one processor further is to:

match the search query to the anchor text of the one or more documents in the first language.

8. The system of claim 6, where, when the at least one processor is to translate the terms of the search query from the first language into the second language, the at least one processor further is to:

perform an initial translation of the terms of the search query into the second language to generate possible translations of the search query;

identify possible translations of the terms of the search query; and

disambiguate among the possible translations of the terms of the search query, using the content included in the one or more documents in the second language, to identify one of the possible translations as a likely translation of the search query.

9. The system of claim 8, where, when the at least one processor is to identify the possible translations, the at least one processor further is to:

use a dictionary to identify the possible translations of the terms into the second language.

10. The system of claim 8, where, when the at least one processor is to disambiguate among the possible translations of the terms of the search query, the at least one processor further is to:

use text from the one or more documents in the second language as parallel corpora to disambiguate among the possible translations of the terms of the search query.

11. A memory device that stores one or more computer-executable instructions for execution by processing logic, the instructions comprising:

one or more instructions, which, when executed by the processing logic, cause the processing logic to receive a search query that includes terms in a first language;

one or more instructions, which, when executed by the processing logic, cause the processing logic to identify, based on a content of the search query, one or more documents in the first language that include an anchor that links to one or more documents in a second language, the anchor having anchor text that matches at least one of the terms of the search query, where the second language is different than the first language;

one or more instructions, which, when executed by the processing logic, cause the processing logic to identify the one or more documents in the second language based on the anchor having anchor text that matches at least one of the terms of the search query; and

one or more instructions, which, when executed by the processing logic cause the processing logic to translate the terms of the search query into the second language using content included in the one or more documents in the second language.

12. The memory device of claim 11, further comprising:

one or more instructions to cause the processing logic to match the search query to the anchor text of the identified one or more documents in the first language.

13. The memory device of claim 11, further comprising:

one or more instructions to cause the processing logic to perform an initial translation of the terms of the search query, into the second language to generate possible translations of the search query;

one or more instructions to cause the processing logic to identify possible translations of the terms of the search query; and

one or more instructions to cause the processing logic to disambiguate among the possible translations of the terms of the search query using the content, included in the one or more documents in the second language, to identify one of the possible translations as a likely translation of the search query.

14. The memory device of claim 13, further comprising:

one or more instructions to cause the processing logic to use a dictionary to identify the possible translations of the terms into the second language.

15. The memory device of claim 13, further comprising:

one or more instructions to cause the processing logic to use text from the one or more documents in the second language as parallel corpora to disambiguate among the possible translations of the terms of the search query.

16. A memory device that stores one or more computer-executable instructions for execution by processing logic, the computer-executable instructions comprising:

one or more instructions, which, when executed by the processing logic, cause the processing logic to receive a search query that includes terms in a first language;

one or more instructions, which, when executed by the processing logic, cause the processing logic to identify one or more documents in the first language that include an anchor that links to one or more other documents in the first language and that has anchor text that matches at least one of the terms of the search query;

one or more instructions, which, when executed by the processing logic, cause the processing logic to search the plurality of documents to identify one or more documents in a second language that is different than the first language, the one or more documents in the second language including an anchor that links to the one or more other documents in the first language; and

one or more instructions, which, when executed by the processing logic, cause the processing logic to translate the search query into the second language using content included in the one or more documents in the second language.

17. The memory device of claim 16, further comprising:

one or more instructions to cause the processing logic to match the search query to the anchor text of the one or more documents in the first language.

18. The memory device of claim 16, further comprising:

one or more instructions to cause the processing logic to perform an initial translation of the terms of the search query into the second language to generate possible translations of the search query;

one or more instructions to cause the processing logic to identify possible translations of the terms of the search query; and

one or more instructions to cause the processing logic to disambiguate among the possible translations of the terms of the search query, using the content included in the one or more documents in the second language, to identify one of the possible translations as a likely translation of the search query.

19. The memory device of claim 18, further comprising:

one or more instructions to cause the processing logic to use a dictionary to identify the possible translations of the terms into the second language.

20. The memory device of claim 18, further comprising:

one or more instructions to cause the processing logic to use text from the one or more documents in the second language as parallel corpora to disambiguate among the possible translations of the terms of the search query.