Model driven optimization of annotator execution in question answering system

1. A computer program product comprising a non-transitory computer readable storage medium having a computer readable program stored therein, wherein the computer readable program, when executed on a computing device, causes the computing device to:

use a model to represent a system of annotators of a Question and Answer (QA) system pipeline, wherein the model represents each annotator in the system of annotators as a node having one or more performance parameters for indicating a performance of an execution of an annotator corresponding to the node, wherein each annotator in the system of annotators is a program that takes a portion of unstructured input text, extracts structured information from the portion of the unstructured input text, and generates annotations or metadata that are attached by the annotator to a source of the unstructured input text, wherein, for each node in the model, the one or more performance parameters corresponding to the node comprise an arrival rate parameter and a service rate parameter of the annotator associated with the node, wherein the arrival rate parameter indicates a number of jobs arriving in the node per second, and wherein the service rate parameter indicates a number of jobs being serviced by the node per second;

determine, for each annotator in a set of annotators of the system of annotators, an effective response time for the annotator based on the one or more performance parameters;

calculate a pre-execution start interval for a first annotator based on an effective response time of a second annotator, wherein execution of the first annotator is sequentially after execution of the second annotator; and

schedule execution of pre-execution operations associated with the first annotator based on the calculated pre-execution start interval for the first annotator.

2. The computer program product of claim 1 , wherein at least one node in the model represents a plurality of annotators comprising an aggregate annotator.

3. The computer program product of claim 1 , wherein the system is modeled as a tandem open queuing network in which each node in the model is modeled as a queue in the tandem open queuing network.

4. The computer program product of claim 1 , wherein each annotator of the QA system pipeline is defined, in a data structure, as a sub-system of the QA system pipeline and is designated as either having or not having one or more non-dependent pre-execution operations that may be executed with the results of the one or more non-dependent pre-execution operations being stored/cached for use by the annotator, and wherein the computer readable program causes the computing device to schedule execution of pre-execution operations associated with the first annotator in response to the data structure indicating that the pre-execution operations associated with the first annotator are non-dependent pre-execution operations.

5. The computer program product of claim 1 , wherein the computer readable program causes the computing device to calculate the pre-execution start interval for the first annotator based on an effective response time of the second annotator at least by calculating the pre-execution start interval based on a difference of a current execution time and an effective response time of the second annotator.

6. The computer program product of claim 1 , wherein the scheduling generates a scheduling data structure, and wherein the computer readable program further causes the computing device to:

receive a job for processing by the QA system pipeline;

select a set of annotators in the system of annotators to execute the job, the set of annotators comprising the first annotator and the second annotator;

schedule the set of annotators, including the pre-execution operation of the first annotator, based on the scheduling data structure; and

process the job based on the scheduling of the set of annotators.

7. An apparatus comprising:

a processor; and

a memory coupled to the processor, wherein the memory comprises instructions which, when executed by the processor, cause the processor to:

use a model to represent a system of annotators of a Question and Answer (QA) system pipeline, wherein the model represents each annotator in the system of annotators as a node having one or more performance parameters for indicating a performance of an execution of an annotator corresponding to the node, wherein each annotator in the system of annotators is a program that takes a portion of unstructured input text, extracts structured information from the portion of the unstructured input text, and generates annotations or metadata that are attached by the annotator to a source of the unstructured input text, wherein, for each node in the model, the one or more performance parameters corresponding to the node comprises an arrival rate parameter and a service rate parameter of the annotator associated with the node, wherein the arrival rate parameter indicates a number of jobs arriving in the node per second and wherein the service rate parameter indicates a number of lobs being serviced by the node per second;

determine, for each annotator in a set of annotators of the system of annotators, an effective response time for the annotator based on the one or more performance parameters;

calculate a pre-execution start interval for a first annotator based on an effective response time of a second annotator, wherein execution of the first annotator is sequentially after execution of the second annotator; and

schedule execution of pre-execution operations associated with the first annotator based on the calculated pre-execution start interval for the first annotator.

8. The apparatus of claim 7 , wherein the system is modeled as a tandem open queuing network in which each node in the model is modeled as a queue in the tandem open queuing network.

9. The apparatus of claim 7 , wherein each annotator of the QA system pipeline is defined, in a data structure, as a sub-system of the QA system pipeline and is designated as either having or not having one or more non-dependent pre-execution operations that may be executed with the results of the one or more non-dependent pre-execution operations being stored/cached for use by the annotator, and wherein instructions cause the processor to schedule execution of pre-execution operations associated with the first annotator in response to the data structure indicating that the pre-execution operations associated with the first annotator are non-dependent pre-execution operations.

10. The apparatus of claim 7 , wherein the instructions cause the processor to calculate the pre-execution start interval for the first annotator based on an effective response time of the second annotator at least by calculating the pre-execution start interval based on a difference of a current execution time and an effective response time of the second annotator.

11. The apparatus of claim 7 , wherein the scheduling generates a scheduling data structure, and wherein the instructions further cause the processor to:

receive a job for processing by the QA system pipeline;

select a set of annotators in the system of annotators to execute the job, the set of annotators comprising the first annotator and the second annotator;

schedule the set of annotators, including the pre-execution operation of the first annotator, based on the scheduling data structure; and

process the job based on the scheduling of the set of annotators.