Patent · US Expired

Method of identifying the language of a textual passage using short word and/or n-gram comparisons

US7359851B2 · kind B2 · utility

249Cited by
9References
19Claims
0Family size

Assignee

Inventors

Key dates

Filing dateJan 14, 2004
Grant dateApr 15, 2008
Priority date
Expiry dateApr 13, 2026

Classification

  • Technology area (CPC G)Physics
  • CPC primaryG06F40/263
  • WIPO fieldComputer technology
  • WIPO sectorElectrical engineering

Abstract

A method and system identifying the language of a textual passage is disclosed. The method and system includes parsing the textual passage into n-grams and assigning an initial weight to each n-gram, and adjusting the weight initially assigned to a word or n-gram parsed from the textual passage. The initially assigned weight is adjusted in a manner proportionate to the inverse of the number of languages within which such words or n-grams appear. Reducing the weight assigned to such words or n-grams diminishes—without completely eliminating—their importance in comparison to other words or n-grams parsed from the same textual passage when determining the language of a passage. The method and system of the present invention appropriately weighs the short words or n-grams common to multiple languages without affecting the short words or n-grams that are uncommon to several languages.

Source: USPTO / EPO open patent data. Objective bibliographic and citation counts.