Evaluating search features of Google Knowledge Graph and Bing Satori: Entity types, list searches and query interfaces

Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to better understand three main aspects of semantic web search engines of Google Knowledge Graph and Bing Satori. The authors investigated: coverage of entity types, the extent of their support for list search services and the capabilities of their natural language query interfaces.

Design/methodology/approach

The authors manually submitted selected queries to these two semantic web search engines and evaluated the returned results. To test the coverage of entity types, the authors selected the entity types from Freebase database. To test the capabilities of natural language query interfaces, the authors used a manually developed query data set about US geography.

Findings

The results indicate that both semantic search engines cover only the very common entity types. In addition, the list search service is provided for a small percentage of entity types. Moreover, both search engines support queries with very limited complexity and with limited set of recognised terms.

Research limitations/implications

Both companies are continually working to improve their semantic web search engines. Therefore, the findings show their capabilities at the time of conducting this research.

Practical implications

The results show that in the near future the authors can expect both semantic search engines to expand their entity databases and improve their natural language interfaces.

Originality/value

As far as the authors know, this is the first study evaluating any aspect of newly developing semantic web search engines. It shows the current capabilities and limitations of these semantic web search engines. It provides directions to researchers by pointing out the main problems for semantic web search engines.

Citation

Uyar, A. and Aliyu, F.M. (2015), "Evaluating search features of Google Knowledge Graph and Bing Satori: Entity types, list searches and query interfaces", Online Information Review, Vol. 39 No. 2, pp. 197-213. https://doi.org/10.1108/OIR-10-2014-0257