Abstract: Software that answers questions asked of question answering systems, by performing the following steps: (i) identifying a hierarchy of question and answer pairs, where a first answer paired to a first question in the hierarchy of question and answer pairs includes at least a second answer paired to a second question in the hierarchy of question and answer pairs; (ii) receiving, by a question answering system, an input question from a first user; (iii) identifying first user contextual information pertaining to the first user; and (iv) answering the input question, by the question answering system, based, at least in part, on the hierarchy of question and answer pairs and the first user contextual information.

Abstract: Collaborative annotation of a document. A GUI is generated by a host computer that displays a document to annotate. The GUI is transmitted by the host computer to a plurality of client computers. Real time communication modes are established by the host computer between the client computers, each including communication channels between all the client computers. The host computer receives annotations entered into the GUIs at the client computers, each annotation identifying a span of words in the document to annotate and including an associated annotation type. The host computer updates the GUI to include for display the received annotations and inter-rater agreement statistics indicating the level of agreement between annotations received from each client computer and annotations received from the other client computers. The updated GUI is then transmitted by the host computer to the plurality of client computers.

Abstract: Mechanisms are provided, in a Question and Answer (QA) system, for identifying a related previously processed question. A first question is processed by the QA system to generate an answer to the first question and a supporting evidence passage that supports the answer to the first question being a correct answer to the first question. The QA system performs a lookup operation in a question repository based on an identifier of the supporting evidence passage to identify an entry corresponding to a previously processed question, different than the first question, that previously had an answer generated based on the supporting evidence passage. The QA system returns the previously processed question and the answer to the first question to a submitter of the first question.

Abstract: Software that answers questions asked of question answering systems, by performing the following steps: (i) identifying a hierarchy of question and answer pairs, where a first answer paired to a first question in the hierarchy of question and answer pairs includes at least a second answer paired to a second question in the hierarchy of question and answer pairs; (ii) receiving, by a question answering system, an input question from a first user; (iii) identifying first user contextual information pertaining to the first user; and (iv) answering the input question, by the question answering system, based, at least in part, on the hierarchy of question and answer pairs and the first user contextual information.

Abstract: Collaborative annotation of a document. A GUI is generated by a host computer that displays a document to annotate. The GUI is transmitted by the host computer to a plurality of client computers. Real time communication modes are established by the host computer between the client computers, each including communication channels between all the client computers. The host computer receives annotations entered into the GUIs at the client computers, each annotation identifying a span of words in the document to annotate and including an associated annotation type. The host computer updates the GUI to include for display the received annotations and inter-rater agreement statistics indicating the level of agreement between annotations received from each client computer and annotations received from the other client computers. The updated GUI is then transmitted by the host computer to the plurality of client computers.

Abstract: Mechanisms are provided for managing a corpus of content. A question is processed by a Question Answering (QA) system to generate an answer to the question and a supporting evidence passage. A corpus value metric is calculated for the supporting evidence passage based on a determined number of times the supporting evidence passage is used to generate a high ranking answer to questions submitted to the QA system. A first corpus management operation is performed on the supporting evidence passage in response to determining that the corpus value metric meets or exceeds a first threshold, the first corpus management operation increasing a relative importance of the supporting evidence passage within the corpus. A second corpus management operation on the supporting evidence passage is performed in response to determining that the corpus value metric meets or falls below a second threshold, the second corpus management operation decreasing the passage's relative importance.

Abstract: Mechanisms are provided, in a Question and Answer (QA) system, for identifying a related previously processed question. A first question is processed by the QA system to generate an answer to the first question and a supporting evidence passage that supports the answer to the first question being a correct answer to the first question. The QA system performs a lookup operation in a question repository based on an identifier of the supporting evidence passage to identify an entry corresponding to a previously processed question, different than the first question, that previously had an answer generated based on the supporting evidence passage. The QA system returns the previously processed question and the answer to the first question to a submitter of the first question.

Abstract: Mechanisms are provided for managing a corpus of content. A question is processed by a Question Answering (QA) system to generate an answer to the question and a supporting evidence passage. A corpus value metric is calculated for the supporting evidence passage based on a determined number of times the supporting evidence passage is used to generate a high ranking answer to questions submitted to the QA system. A first corpus management operation is performed on the supporting evidence passage in response to determining that the corpus value metric meets or exceeds a first threshold, the first corpus management operation increasing a relative importance of the supporting evidence passage within the corpus. A second corpus management operation on the supporting evidence passage is performed in response to determining that the corpus value metric meets or falls below a second threshold, the second corpus management operation decreasing the passage's relative importance.

Abstract: At least a first application program interface (API) may be provided to support retrieval of data from a plurality of disparate data sources. A directory from which data from at least one of the disparate data sources is exposed may be provided. Requested data may be automatically provided in response to the data being available via the directory.