Google updates core search engine algorithm

Google has updated its core algorithm controlling the answers served up to queries on its search engine, in an exercise aimed at improving the results for longer, more complex questions.

The update, code-named Hummingbird, comes as the biggest change to the working of the world's leading search engine since early 2010, when the search company upgraded its algorithm to one it called Caffeine.

The company introduced the  change about a month ago, and announced it at a press event in the garage of the Menlo Park (California) house where Google started, which also coincided with the 15th anniversary of Google's founding, which is tomorrow.

The difference to search results would not be noticeable to most people, but with more people making more complex queries, especially with the voice input for searches through smartphones, there was a need for new mathematical formulas to handle them.

The update to the algorithm was focused more on ranking sites for better relevance by tapping further into the company's Knowledge Graph, its encyclopedia of 570 million concepts and relationships among them, according to Amit Singhal, Google's senior VP of search.

The update has already been in use for about a month, and affects about 90 per cent of Google searches.

Hummingbird was more capable of understanding concepts and the relationships between them rather than simply words, which led to more fluid interactions, and was in that sense an extension of Google's "Knowledge Graph" concept introduced last year aimed at making interactions more human.

In an example, shown at the presentation, a Google executive showing off a voice search through her mobile phone, asked for pictures of the Eiffel Tower, and after the pictures appeared asked how tall it was.

After Google correctly spoke back the search engine was asked to show pictures of the construction - at which point a list of images was returned.

One search expert though cautioned that it was too early to determine Hummingbird's impact.

BBC quoted Danny Sullivan, founder of Search Engine Land, as saying, for him this was more of a coming out party, rather than making him think 'wow'.

If one had been watching this space, one would have already seen how they had integrated it into the [predictive search app] Google Now and conversational search, he added.

Sullivan added, to know that they had put this technology further into their index might have some big payoffs but one would just have to see how it played out.

The event, also saw the search giant announce an updated search app on Apple's iOS, as also a more visible presence for voice search on its home page, BBC reported.