Reduction of perceived DNS lookup latency

• US 8,533,260 B1
• Filed: 06/30/2011
• Issued: 09/10/2013
• Est. Priority Date: 09/10/2003
• Status: Expired due to Term

• Current Assignee: Google LLC (Alphabet Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Google Inc. (Alphabet Inc.)
• Inventors: Badros, Greg
• Primary Examiner(s): SALL, EL HADJI MALICK
• Application Number:
  US13/174,569
• Time in Patent Office: 803 Days
• Field of Search: 709/203, 709/224, 709/217
• US Class Current: 709/203
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/951 Indexing; Web crawling techniques
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/953 Querying, e.g. by the use of web search engines
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/957 Browsing optimisation, e.g. caching or content distillation
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/9574 of access to content, e.g. by caching
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 61/4511 using domain name system [DNS]
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 61/58 Caching of addresses or names

Abstract

Perceived domain name service (DNS) lookup latency can be reduced for the user of a browser program. A server determines domain names that the user is likely to request in the future. In one implementation, a list of these domain names is transmitted to the browser program as a separate command. The browser program may then lookup up the domain names in the background before the user selects a link corresponding to the domain names. In another implementation, the domain names are transmitted to the browser program by embedding the domain names in a web document, in which the embedded information is not visible in the rendered version of the web document.

Claims

1. A method, performed by a client device, the method comprising:

transmitting a search query to a search engine;

receiving a response to the search query from the search engine,

the response including a plurality of domain names associated with documents identified by the search engine based on the search query;

resolving the plurality of domain names included in the response in an order that is based on a relevance of the documents, with which the plurality of domain names are associated, to the search query,

a first domain name, associated with a first one of the documents, being resolved before resolving a second domain name, associated with a second one of the documents,

the first domain name and the second domain name being included in the plurality of domain names, and

the first one of the documents being more relevant to the search query than the second one of the documents; and

displaying a link to each of one or more of the documents,

the first domain name being resolved prior to the displaying.

2. The method of claim 1, where the response is a hyper-text transfer protocol (HTTP) response header.

3. The method of claim 1, where the response further includes domain names referenced by the documents identified by the search engine.

4. The method of claim 1, where the method is implemented in a browser program of the client device.

5. The method of claim 1, where displaying the link to each of the one or more of the documents includes:

displaying a search results page, responsive to the search query, that includes the link to each of the one or more of the documents.

6. A system, comprising:

one or more client devices to;

transmit a search query to a search engine;

receive a response to the search query from the search engine,

the response including a plurality of domain names associated with documents identified by the search engine based on the search query;

resolve the plurality of domain names included in the response in an order that is based on a relevance of the documents, with which the plurality of domain names are associated, to the search query,

a first domain name, associated with a first one of the documents, being resolved before resolving a second domain name, associated with a second one of the documents,

the first domain name and the second domain name being included in the plurality of domain names, and

the first one of the documents being more relevant to the search query than the second one of the documents; and

display a link to each of one or more of the documents,

the first domain name being resolved prior to the displaying.

7. The system of claim 6, where the response is a hyper-text transfer protocol (HTTP) response header.

8. The system of claim 6, where the response further includes domain names referenced by the documents identified by the search engine.

9. The system of claim 6, where when displaying the link to each of the one or more of the documents, the one or more client devices are to:

display a search results page, responsive to the search query, that includes the link to each of the one or more of the documents.

10. A non-transitory computer-readable medium storing computer-executable instructions, the computer-executable instructions comprising:

one or more instructions to transmit a search query to a search engine;

one or more instructions to receive a response to the search query from the search engine,

the response including a plurality of domain names associated with documents identified by the search engine based on the search query;

one or more instructions to resolve the plurality of domain names included in the response in an order that is based on a relevance of the documents, with which the plurality of domain names are associated, to the search query,

a first domain name, associated with a first one of the documents, being resolved before resolving a second domain name, associated with a second one of the documents,

the first domain name and the second domain name being included in the plurality of domain names, and

the first one of the documents being more relevant to the search query than the second one of the documents; and

one or more instructions to display a link to each of one or more of the documents,

the first domain name being resolved prior to the displaying.

11. The non-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 10, where the response is a hyper-text transfer protocol (HTTP) response header.

12. The non-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 10, where the response further includes domain names referenced by the documents identified by the search engine.

13. The non-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 10, where the one or more instructions to display the link to each of the one or more of the documents include:

one or more instructions to display a search results page, responsive to the search query, that includes the link to each of the one or more of the documents.