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Connection between Information Gain and Phrase-Based Indexing

Posted: Wed Feb 19, 2025 6:40 am
by Reddi2
Information gain and phrase-based indexing are closely linked in improving the relevance and effectiveness of search engines. The following documents explain how they are related:

1. Identifying good phrases using information gain
Information gain is used as a predictive measure to identify good phrases from a large corpus. A phrase is considered good if it occurs more frequently with other significant phrases than would be expected by chance. This helps in creating a refined list of phrases that are truly relevant and useful.

Co-occurrences and prediction : For each phrase, the system calculates the expected frequency of co-occurrence with other phrases and compares it with the actual frequency of co-occurrence. If the actual rate exceeds a threshold, the phrase is considered to have significant information gain and is retained in the list of good phrases.
Thresholds : Typically, an information gain threshold between 1.1 and 1.7 is used to filter out unconnected phrases and ensure that only meaningful connections are retained.
2. Pruning and clustering based on information gain
Clusters of related phrases are identified based on high information gain values. The phrases within a cluster are related to each other and have significant information relationships. After identifying good phrases, the system further refines the list by removing phrases that do not predict other good phrases or are merely extensions of other phrases.

Pruning incomplete phrases : Incomplete phrases that only azerbaijan cell phone number list predict their extensions are removed to ensure that only phrases that provide a significant information gain remain. For example, "President of" would be removed if it does not predict any other unique phrases beyond its extensions, such as "President of the United States."
Clustering of related phrases : Phrases are clustered based on high information gain between them. This helps in forming semantically meaningful groups of phrases that are frequently used together and improves the contextual relevance of search results.
3. Improving search results through phrase extensions
Phrase-based indexing uses the information gained from phrases to improve search results by suggesting or automatically searching for phrase extensions.

Query expansion : When a user enters a sub-phrase, the search system can use the highest information-gain extensions of that phrase to suggest or perform the search. For example, a query for "President of the United" can automatically suggest "President of the United States."
Reducing ambiguity : By using phrases with high information gain, the system reduces ambiguity and improves the accuracy of search results, ensuring that users find the most relevant documents.
4. Annotation and ranking of documents
The information gained is used to annotate documents with related phrases, which improves the ranking and relevance of search results.

Annotation : Documents are annotated with counts and vectors of related phrases, which helps the search engine understand the primary and secondary topics of the document. This structured data is used to more effectively rank documents based on their relevance to the search query.
Ranking by related phrases : Documents are ranked not only by the occurrence of search phrases, but also by the presence of related phrases with high information gain. This layered approach ensures that documents are ranked higher if they cover the topic more comprehensively.