International Business Machines Corporation
Column-based query expansion for table retrieval

Abstract:

In a computerized information retrieval system: executing a search based on a query, to retrieve a set of tables ranked according to their relevancy to the query, wherein each of the tables includes one or more columns; selecting, from the retrieved tables, a predefined number of highest-ranking tables; scoring each column in the highest-ranking tables using a link analysis algorithm, and selecting, from the scored columns, a predefined number of highest-scoring columns; scoring terms contained within each of the highest-scoring columns, and selecting, from the scored terms, a predefined number of highest-scoring terms; re-ranking the highest-ranking tables by using the highest-scoring terms as pseudo relevance feedback that expands the query; and providing, as a response to the query, at least one of: the re-ranked tables, ordered according to the re-ranking, and data contained in at least one of the re-ranked tables, wherein the data are ordered according to the re-ranking.