Finding and approximating top-k answers in keyword proximity search

Various approaches for keyword proximity search have been implemented in relational databases, XML and the Web. Yet, in all of them, an answer is a Q-fragment, namely, a subtree T of the given data graph G, such that T contains all the keywords of the query Q and has no proper subtree with this property. The rank of an answer is inversely proportional to its weight. Three problems are of interest: finding an optimal (i.e., top-ranked) answer, computing the top-k answers and enumerating all the answers in ranked order. It is shown that, under data complexity, an efficient algorithm for solving the first problem is sufficient for solving the other two problems with polynomial delay. Similarly, an efficient algorithm for finding a θ-approximation of the optimal answer suffices for carrying out the following two tasks with polynomial delay, under query-and-data complexity. First, enumerating in a (θ+1)-approximate order. Second, computing a (θ+1)-approximation of the top-k answers. As a corollary, this paper gives the first efficient algorithms, under data complexity, for enumerating all the answers in ranked order and for computing the top-k answers. It also gives the first efficient algorithms, under query-and-data complexity, for enumerating in a provably approximate order and for computing an approximation of the top-k answers.