Patent ID: 8095545

Claim:
A method for processing a query, comprising: in a multi-site search engine comprising a first search site and a second search site, the first search site associated with a first set of resources, the second search site associated with a second set of resources: in response to receiving, at the first search site, a query that comprises one or more search terms, the first search site performing operations comprising: selecting, for inclusion within a subset of the first set of resources, one or more of the first set's resources that contain the one or more search terms; determining, based on the one or more search terms, a ranking score for each resource in the subset; determining, based on the one or more search terms, an upper bound ranking score that represents an upper bound on a ranking score of a highest scoring resource that could be an answer to the query at the second search site; comparing a particular ranking score determined for a particular resource in the subset to the upper bound ranking score; determining, based on the comparing, whether to send the query to the second search site; in response to determining, based on the comparing, not to send the query the second search site, sending, to a querier from which the first search site received the query, search results that indicate one or more resources from the subset without sending the query to the second search site; wherein the method is performed by one or more computing devices.