User Interface For Geographic Search

• US 20070011150A1
• Filed: 06/28/2006
• Published: 01/11/2007
• Est. Priority Date: 06/28/2005
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: III Holdings 3, LLC
• Original Assignee: Metacarta, Inc.
• Inventors: Frank, John
• Granted Patent: US 8,200,676 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/29 Geographical information databases
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/9537 Spatial or temporal dependent retrieval, e.g. spatiotemporal queries

Abstract

A computer-implemented method of processing a geotext query, said method involving: receiving a first free-text query string from a user; and decomposing the first free-text query into a non geographic query and a geographic query, wherein the non geographic query is a second free-text query string derived from the first free-text query string and the geographic query is a geographical location description.

Claims

1. A computer-implemented method of processing a geotext query, said method comprising:

receiving a first free-text query string from a user; and

decomposing the first free-text query into a non geographic query and a geographic query, wherein the nongeographic query is a second free-text query string derived from the first free-text query string and the geographic query is a geographical location description.

2. The method of claim 1, further comprising using both of the non geographic query and the geographic query as a basis for conducting a search of documents that are responsive to the free-text query.

3. The method of claim 1, further comprising displaying the nongeographic query and the geographic query to the user.

4. The method of claim 2, wherein using both of the non geographic query and the geographic query to conduct a search of documents that are responsive to the free-text query involves:

submitting the non-geographic query to a text search engine to identify documents that are responsive thereto; and

submitting the geographic query to a geographic search engine to find documents that are responsive thereto.

5. The method of claim 2, wherein using both of the non geographic query and the geographic query as a basis for conducting a search of documents that are responsive to the free-text query involves providing an interface that enables the user to refine the geographic query to produce a refined geographic query.

6. The method of claim 1, further comprising generating a confidence score for the geographic query, and wherein displaying the non-geographic query and the geographic query to the user comprises displaying the confidence score for the geographic query.

7. The method of claim 6, further comprising providing an interface to the user which enables the user to adjust the displayed confidence score.

8. A computer-implemented method comprising:

receiving user input that selects a document;

requesting from another service geotags for the selected document;

displaying on a visual display device a map for the selected document; and

marking the map with the geotags obtained from the service.

9. The method of claim 8, wherein the other service is a geoparser.

10. The method of claim 9, wherein requesting the geotags involves identifying the document to the geoparser.

11. The method of claim 9, wherein requesting the geotags involves sending the document to the geoparser.

12. The method of claim 8, further comprising:

submitting a query to a search engine;

receiving search results from the search engine, said search results being a list of documents that are responsive to the query, wherein the first-mentioned document is among the documents in the list of documents;

displaying the search results via a visual interface that is displayed on visual display device; and

presenting to the user a tool that is accessible through the visual interface which enables the user to select the document from among the search results.

13. The method of claim 12, wherein presenting the tool that is accessible through the visual interface involves displaying a button on the visual interface which when selected by the user accesses the functionality of the tool.

14. A computer-implemented method of representing a plurality of documents on a map, wherein all of said plurality of documents refer to a particular geographical area, said method comprising:

displaying the map on a visual display;

representing the plurality of documents by a single icon located at the particular geographical area on the map;

in a region associated with the icon, displaying information about a selected one of the documents among the plurality of documents; and

providing a navigational control which enables a user to page through the plurality of documents and successively display in said region information about each of the other documents among the plurality of documents represented by that icon.

15. The method of claim 14, wherein the region is a popup bubble.

16. The method of claim 15, further comprising in response to receiving an input from the user selecting the icon, generating the popup bubble.

17. The method of claim 14, wherein the displayed information about each document is an extract from that document.

18. The method of claim 14, wherein the navigational control includes a first control for enabling the user to step forward through the plurality of documents.

19. The method of claim 18, wherein the navigational control includes a second control for enabling the user to step backwards through the plurality of documents.

20. The method of claim 15, wherein the popup bubble also displays the number of documents within the plurality of documents.

21. The method of claim 20, wherein the popup bubble also displays a number of the selected document.

22. A computer-implemented method of representing a plurality of documents that are responsive to a query, said method comprising:

displaying a map on a visual display;

displaying a plurality of icons on the map, said icons having a visual characteristic, each icon representing a set of one or more documents among the plurality of documents, each icon located at a corresponding geographical location on the map to which the documents of the corresponding set of documents refer and wherein the set of documents for each icon has associated therewith a measure of its relevance to the query; and

adjusting the visual characteristic of each icon to reflect the relevance measure for the set of documents represented by that icon.

23. The method of claim 22, wherein the visual characteristic is transparency.

24. The method of claim 22, wherein the icon with the highest measure of relevance is displayed with the least transparency.

25. The method of claim 22, wherein the icon with the lowest measure of relevance is displayed with the highest transparency.

26. The method of claim 22, wherein each document has a relevance score and the relevance measure that is used for each set of documents is the highest relevance score among the documents in that set.

27. A computer-implemented method comprising:

receiving a query;

in a first window pane of a displayed user interface, displaying a list of documents that are responsive to the query;

in a second pane of the displayed user interface, displaying a map, said first and second panes displayed concurrently;

within the map, displaying markers identifying geographical locations associated with the documents among the list of documents; and

in response to the user selecting one of the documents identified in the displayed list of documents, highlighting a subset of the plurality of markers that correspond to that selected document.

28. The method of claim 27, wherein highlighting involves changing the size of the corresponding marker.

29. The method of claim 28, wherein highlighting involves making the corresponding marker larger.

30. A computer-implemented method comprising:

receiving a query;

in a first window pane of a displayed user interface, displaying a list of documents that are responsive to the query;

in a second pane of the displayed user interface, displaying a map, said first and second panes displayed concurrently;

within the map, displaying markers identifying geographical locations on the map that are associated with each of the documents among the list of documents; and

in response to the user selecting one of the markers displayed on the map, highlighting among the list of documents a subset of those documents that correspond to that selected marker.

31. The method of claim 30, wherein highlighting involves applying a shading for at least a portion of the corresponding one or more entries on the list of documents.

32. The method of claim 31, wherein the shading is a background color.

33. A computer-implemented method comprising:

using a geoparser engine to tag a document with a plurality of tags;

on visual display, displaying at least portions of the document to a user with the tags associated with those portions;

providing an interface that enables the user to change any of the displayed tags among the plurality of tags; and

sending any changes made to the plurality of tags by the user back to the geoparser engine to modify the performance of the geoparser engine.

34. The method of claim 33, wherein the plurality of tags includes a plurality of labels presenting relevance and/or confidence scores and a plurality of text markers.

35. The method of claim 34, wherein the enabled change includes deletion.

36. The method of claim 34, wherein the enabled change includes extending or reducing a range of characters.

37. The method of claim 34, wherein the enabled change includes changing the confidence score of a selectable one of the displayed tags.

38. The method of claim 34, wherein the enabled change includes changing a location to which the tag refers.

39. The method of claim 34, wherein the enabled change includes improving precision of a location definition.

40. A computer-implemented method comprising:

submitting a geotext query to a search engine;

receiving search results from the search engine, said search results including a document that is responsive to the geotext query;

displaying a map on a visual display device;

displaying a marker on the map that corresponds to the document and is located at a geographical location on the map to which the document refers, wherein the marker presents information about the document; and

enabling a user to select at least some of said information from the marker and generate a tag that is associated with said geographical location irrespective of whether any markers shown on the displayed map.