Abstract: An online system uses a model to determine affinities of users for geographical locations. Using the affinities, which may indicate travel-related preferences of the users, the online system may customize content items to include content captured by client devices of other users of the online system. For example, the online system presents to a particular user a content item including a photo or video of a geographical location captured by a camera of a client device of another user who is connected to the particular user. The model may implement, for example, collaborative filtering or other machine learning techniques to determine commonalities between users' travel affinities. Additionally, the model may determine latent properties or temporal trends of user preferences based on training data including historical actions performed on the online system or social data. The model may also classify different types of geographical locations.

Abstract: A method is disclosed which includes: receiving, from a third-party content provider, a link to a structured document on an external server, where the link is associated with a post of the online social network by the third-party content provider, and retrieving the structured document from the external server, where the structured document includes content and input fields. This step is followed by extracting a predefined set of information from the structured document about the content and input fields of the structured document. The extracted set of information from the structured document are then evaluated to determine one or more feature-values of the structured document. A machine learning model is used to classify the structured document as an external lead-generation type page based on the one or more feature-values of the structured document and a notification is sent to the third-party content provider if the structured document is classified as an external lead-generation type page.

Abstract: In one embodiment, a method includes receiving a plurality of uniform resource identifiers (URI's) associated with a particular domain. Each of the URI's identifies a content page comprising one or more signature elements. The method further includes, for each URI in the plurality of URI's, successively testing the URI to identify a core of the URI and any unnecessary elements of the URI. The core of the URI is sufficient to retrieve a version of the content page including all of its signature elements. The method additionally includes, for each URI in the plurality of URI's, updating a set of rules based on the identified core and the identified unnecessary elements. The set of rules establishes a normalized version of the URI.

Abstract: Systems and methods for ranking one or more products in online shopping. One or more products are identified based on a search query received from user. The one or more products are ranked based on terms present in the search query. Each of the one or more products has one or more attributes associated with it. An attribute score for each of the one or more products is determined. Further, based on the attribute score, the relevancy of the one or more products is determined. Based on the relevancy, a marginal relevancy score for each of the one or more products is determined. The one or more products are re-ranked based on the marginal relevancy score. The rank of the one or more products can also be modified to optimize revenue generation.

Abstract: An online system provides navigation information customized using travel preferences of users. The online system receives actions performed by users that may indicate their geographical locations of interest. The online system may use a model to predict a user's level of interest in destination geographical locations. The online system generates navigation information or travel information that describes routes from origin geographical locations of users to destination geographical locations to which the users are likely to travel. The online system transmits the navigation information to client devices for presentation as personalized or dynamically-created content items to users. The online system may generate navigation information using catalogs describing routes between geographical locations. For instance, the catalog indicates a vehicle for navigation along a route, as well as origin and destination geographical locations.

Abstract: An online system provides navigation information customized using travel preferences of users. The online system receives actions performed by users that may indicate their geographical locations of interest. The online system may use a model to predict a user's level of interest in destination geographical locations. The online system generates navigation information or travel information that describes routes from origin geographical locations of users to destination geographical locations to which the users are likely to travel. The online system transmits the navigation information to client devices for presentation as personalized or dynamically-created content items to users. The online system may generate navigation information using catalogs describing routes between geographical locations. For instance, the catalog indicates a vehicle for navigation along a route, as well as origin and destination geographical locations.

Abstract: An online system provides navigation information customized using travel preferences of users. The online system receives actions performed by users that may indicate their geographical locations of interest. The online system may use a model to predict a user's level of interest in destination geographical locations. The online system generates navigation information or travel information that describes routes from origin geographical locations of users to destination geographical locations to which the users are likely to travel. The online system transmits the navigation information to client devices for presentation as personalized or dynamically-created content items to users. The online system may generate navigation information using catalogs describing routes between geographical locations. For instance, the catalog indicates a vehicle for navigation along a route, as well as origin and destination geographical locations.

Abstract: In one embodiment, a method includes generating a query based on a seed product offer that describes a product being offered for sale and executing the query, using a search engine that normalizes search terms in the query, on a plurality of product offers to determine candidate offers. The candidate offers are likely associated with the product. The method further includes determining one or more common attribute values across corresponding attributes of the candidate offers. The method additionally includes for each attribute value of each candidate offer, scoring the attribute value based on whether it matches one or more of the common attribute values, and updating a set of normalized attribute values for the product to include the attribute value based on whether the score is greater than a predetermined threshold.

Abstract: In one embodiment, a method includes receiving a set of normalized attribute values that define a particular item being offered and a corresponding threshold score for each of the normalized attribute values. The method further includes, for each attribute value of a candidate item listing, determining a score for the attribute value based on whether it matches a corresponding normalized attribute value, and determining whether the score is above or below the corresponding threshold score for the normalized attribute value. The method still further includes determining whether the candidate item listing describes the particular item being offered based on a set of rules that define an acceptable number of scores that are allowed to be below the threshold scores.

Abstract: In one embodiment, a method includes receiving a plurality of candidate offers that are likely associated with a product being offered for sale. Each candidate offer is associated with a common set of attributes, wherein at least one of the attributes in the common set uniquely identifies the product being offered for sale. The method further includes, for each attribute value of each candidate offer, scoring the attribute value based on an aggregate number of times that the attribute value is found across corresponding attributes of other candidate offers in the plurality, and adding the scores for a first pair of attributes to determine a cumulative score for the candidate offer. One of the attributes in the first pair is the at least one attribute that uniquely identifies the product. The method still further includes updating a set of normalized attribute values for the product to include the attribute values for the first pair of attributes from a highest scoring candidate offer.

Abstract: In one embodiment, a method includes extracting a document object model (DOM) for a content page, wherein the DOM comprises a hierarchical tree-based data structure. The method also includes identifying candidate nodes in the DOM based on a context of the nodes, wherein the candidate nodes may correspond to listing items. The method additionally includes for each of the candidate nodes, locating its parent and child nodes by traversing the DOM from the candidate node, extracting information from the candidate node and its parent and child nodes, and assessing whether the candidate node qualifies as a listing item based on whether the extracted information fulfills a required set of characteristics for a listing item.

Abstract: An online system aggregates content item from third party systems for presentation to users of the online system. To do so, the online system accesses the web pages of third party systems to trigger tracking pixels that have been previously placed by the third party systems. A triggered tracking pixel sends a server call to the online system that includes tracking pixel data such as information about the content item that was available on the web page. Based on the information gathered through various tracking pixels, the online system generates a catalog of the content item that can then be presented to a user of the online system such that the user can browse content items of the third party system while accessing the online system.

Abstract: In one embodiment, a method includes accessing, by a crawling module, a first structured document from an external server, where the first structured document is associated with a first post by a third-party content provider and includes multiple image objects and information associated with the image objects, extracting from the first structured document a sub-set of image objects and information associated with each of the image objects, analyzing the extracted image objects and information to identify categories of image objects based on their features, selecting a first category of image objects that has a highest number of image objects compared to a number of image objects in each other category of image objects, and generating a second post including a multi-image display that includes two or more of the image objects from the first category of image objects.

Abstract: In one embodiment, a method includes extracting a document object model (DOM) for a content page. The DOM comprises a hierarchical tree-based data structure. The method also includes traversing the DOM to identify, in the content page, candidate features of a product page. The method further includes for each of the candidate features, determine candidate feature attributes based on a respective context of the candidate feature in the DOM. The method additionally includes determining whether the content page qualifies as a product page based on whether the candidate features fulfill a required set of characteristics for a product page.

Abstract: In one embodiment, a method includes receiving a plurality of uniform resource identifiers (URI's) associated with a particular domain. Each of the URI's identifies a content page comprising one or more signature elements. The method further includes, for each URI in the plurality of URI's, successively testing the URI to identify a core of the URI and any unnecessary elements of the URI. The core of the URI is sufficient to retrieve a version of the content page including all of its signature elements. The method additionally includes, for each URI in the plurality of URI's, updating a set of rules based on the identified core and the identified unnecessary elements. The set of rules establishes a normalized version of the URI.

Abstract: In one embodiment, a method includes receiving a plurality of uniform resource identifiers (URI's) associated with a particular domain. Each of the URI's identifies a content page comprising one or more signature elements. The method further includes, for each URI in the plurality of URI's, successively testing the URI to identify a core of the URI and any unnecessary elements of the URI. The core of the URI is sufficient to retrieve a version of the content page including all of its signature elements. The method additionally includes, for each URI in the plurality of URI's, updating a set of rules based on the identified core and the identified unnecessary elements. The set of rules establishes a normalized version of the URI.

Abstract: An online system uses a model to determine affinities of users for geographical locations. Using the affinities, which may indicate travel-related preferences of the users, the online system may customize content items to include content captured by client devices of other users of the online system. For example, the online system presents to a particular user a content item including a photo or video of a geographical location captured by a camera of a client device of another user who is connected to the particular user. The model may implement, for example, collaborative filtering or other machine learning techniques to determine commonalities between users' travel affinities. Additionally, the model may determine latent properties or temporal trends of user preferences based on training data including historical actions performed on the online system or social data. The model may also classify different types of geographical locations.

Abstract: In one embodiment, a method includes accessing, by a crawling module, a first structured document from an external server, where the first structured document is associated with a first post by a third-party content provider and includes multiple image objects and information associated with the image objects, extracting from the first structured document a sub-set of image objects and information associated with each of the image objects, analyzing the extracted image objects and information to identify categories of image objects based on their features, selecting a first category of image objects that has a highest number of image objects compared to a number of image objects in each other category of image objects, and generating a second post including a multi-image display that includes two or more of the image objects from the first category of image objects.

Abstract: An online system aggregates content item from third party systems for presentation to users of the online system. To do so, the online system accesses the web pages of third party systems to trigger tracking pixels that have been previously placed by the third party systems. A triggered tracking pixel sends a server call to the online system that includes tracking pixel data such as information about the content item that was available on the web page. Based on the information gathered through various tracking pixels, the online system generates a catalog of the content item that can then be presented to a user of the online system such that the user can browse content items of the third party system while accessing the online system.

Abstract: An online system generates a content item for a user based on products likely to be of interest to the user. The online system receives information about products associated one or more third party systems accessed by users of the online system. When the online system identifies an opportunity to present to a user, the online system identifies candidate products for inclusion in the content item based on products previously accessed by the users. For example, the online system identifies candidate products based on products accessed by the user and by one or more other users. Based on likelihoods of the user accessing content items including different candidate products, the online system selects a candidate product and includes the content item having information about the selected candidate product in one or more selection processes that select content for presentation to the user.