Methods, apparatus, and data structures for annotating a database design schema and/or indexing annotations

• US 20050256889A1
• Filed: 07/22/2005
• Published: 11/17/2005
• Est. Priority Date: 05/03/2000
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Corporation
• Inventors: McConnell, Christopher Clayton
• Granted Patent: US 7,512,609 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/20 of structured data, e.g. relational data
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/24522 Translation of natural language queries to structured queries
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/288 Entity relationship models
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/353 into predefined classes
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/90 Details of database functions independent of the retrieved data types
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99932 Access augmentation or optimizing
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99933 Query processing, i.e. searching
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99935 Query augmenting and refining, e.g. inexact access
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99937 Sorting
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99943 Generating database or data structure, e.g. via user interface
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99953 Recoverability

Abstract

An authoring tool (or process) to facilitate the performance of an annotation function and an indexing function. The annotation function may generate informational annotations and word annotations to a database design schema (e.g., an entity-relationship diagram or “ERD”). The indexing function may analyze the words of the annotations by classifying the words in accordance with a concordance and dictionary, and assign a normalized weight to each word of each of the annotations based on the classification(s) of the word(s) of the annotation. A query translator (or query translation process) to (i) accept a natural language query from a user interface process, (ii) convert the natural language query to a formal command query (e.g., an SQL query) using the indexed annotations generated by the authoring tool and the database design schema, and (iii) present the formal command query to a database management process for interrogating the relational database.

Claims

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21. A method of indexing annotations to an information storage to generate a list of indexed annotations, the method comprising steps of:

a) classifying words of the annotations based on a concordance so that the words have an associated classification; and

b) assigning a normalized weight to words of each annotation, based on the classifications associated with the words.

22. The method of claim 21 wherein the step of classifying words is based on a degree to which the words are distinct.

23. The method of claim 22 wherein more distinct words are weighted more heavily than less distinct words.

24. The method of claim 21 wherein the step of classifying words includes a step of classifying the words into one of a group of classifications including “

unique”

, “

proper”

, “

rare”

, “

infrequent”

, “

frequent”

, “

common”

, “

stop”

, and “

class”

.

25. The method of claim 24 wherein, in an annotation, words classified as “

unique”

share a fixed amount of a normalized weight, and remaining words of the annotation share a remaining amount of the normalized weight.

26. The method of claim 25 wherein the remaining words of the annotation share the remaining amount of the normalized weight such that the more distinct a remaining word is, the larger its share of the remaining amount of the normalized weight.

27. A system for indexing annotations to information, the system comprising:

classification means for classifying words of the annotations based on at least one of a dictionary and a concordance such that each individual word of the words is associated with a classification; and

assignment means for assigning a normalized weight to each individual word of the annotations responsive to the classification associated with each individual word by the classification means.

28. At least one machine-readable medium storing processor-executable instructions, the processor-executable instructions comprising:

an annotating facility, the annotating facility adapted to annotate a database design schema using at least word annotations; and

an indexing facility, the indexing facility adapted (i) to classify individual words of the word annotations such that the individual words of the word annotations are associated with individual classifications and (ii) to assign a weight to the classified individual words of the word annotations responsive to the individual classifications associated therewith.

29. The at least one machine-readable medium storing processor-executable instructions of claim 28 wherein the word annotations include at least one of manually-generated word annotations and automatically-generated word annotations.

30. The at least one machine-readable medium storing processor-executable instructions of claim 28 wherein the annotating facility is further adapted to annotate the information using at least informational annotations.

31. The at least one machine-readable medium storing processor-executable instructions of claim 28 wherein the indexing facility is further adapted (ii) to assign a normalized weight to the classified individual words of the word annotations responsive to the individual classifications associated therewith.

32. The at least one machine-readable medium storing processor-executable instructions of claim 28 wherein the indexing facility is further adapted (ii) to assign a normalized weight to the classified individual words of the word annotations responsive to the individual classifications associated therewith with respect to weights assigned to other individual words in a given particular annotation.