A Comparison between Page Rank and Hyperlink Induced Topic Search (HITS) Algorithms

Search engines are not only useful for common masses to search their interested topics but also it is also a necessity for the researchers and businesses. There are many web search engines available online handling millions of queries daily. All search engines are based on some search algorithm. Page Rank is most famous search algorithm that is used by the top search engine named Google. At the time Larry Page and Sergey Brin were developing Page Rank another algorithm was under process named as Hyperlink Induced Topic Search (HITS). Almost every web marketing agency focuses on user’s satisfaction and for this purpose HITS can perform with a logical approach.

A theoretical concise difference between these two search algorithms is discussed below:

Hyperlink Induced Topic Search:

• HITS is based on two quality values of “Authority Update” and “Hub Update”. Authority update is calculated by the number of hub links connected with the authority website and Hub update is calculated by the number of authority websites connected by the Hub website. HITS overall result will be based on the connection between these two values. It actually calculates two scores per document.
• HITS operates on small sub graphs representing a linkage between Hub and Authority websites.
• In HITS, increase in the authority weight increases the hub weight of the sites.
• HITS calculate score without indexing.
• HITS has a special use in websites relational analysis specifically.

Page Rank:

• Page Rank is based on number of different factors especially number of quality back links. Quality back links are those links which are relevant to the niche of the website and are placed on high page rank websites. So Page Rank calculates mainly one score per document.
• Page Rank operates on a big web Graph focusing on all the back links and relevance factors.
• In Page Rank, quality back link on high PR website increases the page rank of the website.
• Page Rank calculates score after indexing process.
• Page Rank can be used for multiple factors like Street rank (ranking of places other than websites on the basis of population visits). Similarly Page rank is used in multiple environments from institutes to search engine crawlers.

Both HITS and Page Rank have their plus point and benefits and both can be applied in different scenarios. Page Rank is more popular because it can be utilized in multiple environments other then web search. HITS is very useful because of its special focus on Hub and authority websites categorization.