Patent ID: 7299270

Claim:
A computer-implemented inferred relation weighting process for determining a strength of an inferred relation between a first internet object and a second Internet object, where the first and second Internet objects are not directly linked, comprising: a first link weighting process for determining a first strength of a first link between the first Internet object and a common object; a second link weighting process for determining a second strength of a second link between the second Internet object and the common object, the first and second link weighting processes being performed by one or more processors; and an inferred relation weight calculation process for determining the strength of inferred relation based on the first strength and the second strength; wherein the first Internet object comprises a query for retrieving a document and the second Internet object comprises a document, the inferred relation weight calculation process comprising: determining a first array having entries comprising the first and second strengths; determining a second array as a mathematical function of the first array, wherein the first and second arrays are stored in memory; determining a weighted sum of entries selected from the first and second arrays, the weighted sum corresponding to the strength of the inferred relation; and returning a group of Internet objects associated with the first Internet object to a user, the group including the second Internet object, the second Internet object being arranged within the group according to the strength of the inferred relation.