Google Revealed: We've Got Algorithm!
The amazing rise of Google as a billion-dollar company has created wealth for hundreds of company computer whizzes and become such a popular application that the term "Google" can now be used as a verb, as in "I Googled him to see if we should make the hire." The idea that built Google came out of a master's thesis by the company's founders and Juniata math professor Jerry Kruse uses the math behind the search engine as a teaching example for one of his mathematics courses "Algorithms and Analysis."
Question
What was the billion-dollar idea that brought Google to the forefront of the business world?
Answer
The idea behind Google is based on a fairy easy linear algebra problem. Their idea was set up a matrix of pages in which the popularity of the page (its rank) is based not on the content but who points to it. The linear algebra application they used to rank pages is called an eigenvector which allowed the company to create a matrix out of the entire World Wide Web.
Q
If it's such an easy concept to teach, why didn't someone think of it before, like you?
A
The typical reaction after my talk about Google is 'Why didn't I think of that!' and the answer is that it was a simple idea but the application is huge. They're solving a huge mathematics problem -- gathering the data for the entire Web.
Q
With students coming into college with literally decades of computing experience, are college students better at math than they used to be?
A
When I went through high school and college, math and computers sort of went hand-in-hand. It was thought if you were good at math you would be good at computer science. I don't see that as strongly now. Kids sort of bypass the mathematical basis for computing now that computers have become ubiquitous.
Q
Are there any other computer applications that are based on interesting algorithms?
A
There is an Web site based on the party game "Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon" that allows you to enter two actors names and the program produces the shortest number of links to Kevin Bacon for both actors. That's also based on a linear algebra algorithm.
Q
Is there any easy way to explain algorithms to people who fear math?
A
I always use a music analogy. The first half of my class teaches basic algorithms that have been used over and over. These would be similar to classic rock, where songs from Led Zeppelin sound as good now as they did in 1973. The second half of the class goes over algorithms that use principles from those classic algorithms in new ways. This would be similar to new wave or hip-hop music, which samples or uses tried-and-true music in new ways.
- John Wall, Director of Media Relations