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Ranking (information retrieval)
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<p>Ranking of query is one of the fundamental problems in <a href="/facts/Information_retrieval/MFSmpeNw">information retrieval</a> (IR), the scientific/engineering discipline behind <a href="/facts/Search_engine/SRntsbz2">search engines</a>. Given a query q and a collection D of documents that match the query, the problem is to rank, that is, sort, the documents in D according to some criterion so that the "best" results appear early in the result list displayed to the user. Ranking in terms of information retrieval is an important concept in computer science and is used in many different applications such as search engine queries and <a href="/facts/Recommender_system/HjodW6nS">recommender systems</a>. A majority of search engines use ranking algorithms to provide users with accurate and <a href="/facts/Relevance_(information_retrieval)/0kkQ6B9A">relevant</a> results. </p>