Recommending objects to a user of a social networking system based on the location of the user

A non-transitory computer program product comprising a computer-readable storage medium containing computer program code for:

• obtaining, by a social networking system having one or more computing devices, location information identifying a location of a user of a social networking system;
• identifying, by the social networking system, based on the location information, one or more levels of geographical partitions that are associated with the user, each level representing a geographical area encompassing the location of the user identified by the location information, each level of geographic partitions being within a hierarchy of levels of geographic partitions;
• accessing, by the social networking system, for each level of geographical partitions associated with the user, relevant objects, each relevant object connected to a number of users of the social networking system, wherein the relevant object has location information identifying a location within the level of geographical partitions;
• merging, by the social networking system, the relevant objects accessed at each of the levels of geographical partitions associated with the user, wherein the merging is based on a computed rank of each of the relevant objects, wherein the computed rank of each relevant object that is within a geographical partition is proportional to a number of edges stored in the social networking system that connect the relevant object with user profiles that are within the geographical partition, the user profiles stored in the social networking system, and wherein each of the levels of geographic partitions have location information identifying a location of the user within that level of geographical partitions;
• and
• selecting, by the social networking system, one or more of the merged relevant objects for presentation to the user.

A system comprising:

• a processor;
• a non-transitory computer readable storage medium, comprising instructions, that when executed by the processor, cause the processor to:
• obtain, by a social networking system having one or more computing devices, location information identifying a location of a user of a social networking system;
• identify, by the social networking system, based on the location information, one or more levels of geographical partitions that are associated with the user, each level representing a geographical area encompassing the location of the user identified by the location information, each level of geographical partitions being within a hierarchy of levels of geographical partitions;
• access, by the social networking system, for each level of geographical partitions associated with the user, relevant objects, each relevant object connected to a number of users of the social networking system, wherein the relevant object has location information identifying a location within the level of geographical partitions;
• merge, by the social networking system, the relevant objects accessed at each of the levels of geographical partitions associated with the user, wherein the merging is based on a computed rank of each of the relevant objects, wherein the computed rank of each relevant object that is within a geographical partition is proportional to a number of edges stored in the social networking system that connect the relevant object with user profiles that are within the geographical partition, the user profiles stored in the social networking system, and wherein each of the levels of geographic partitions have location information identifying a location of the user within that level of geographical partitions;
• and
• select, by the social networking system, one or more of the merged relevant objects for presentation to the user.