Method and system for creating a taxonomy from business-oriented metadata content

• US 20070055680A1
• Filed: 07/28/2006
• Published: 03/08/2007
• Est. Priority Date: 07/29/2005
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Ginegar LLC (K.Mizra LLC)
• Original Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Inventors: Statchuk, Craig
• Granted Patent: US 7,885,918 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/367 Ontology
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/50 of still image data

Abstract

A method and system is provided for managing business taxonomy. The system comprises an indexing engine for indexing content of source business oriented metadata. The indexing engine has a content scanner for reading the business oriented metadata, defining taxonomy of the business oriented metadata, and building a content index of the business oriented metadata including a subject index representing the taxonomy of the business oriented metadata. The system also comprises an index store for storing the content index of the business oriented metadata, and a taxonomy engine for providing taxonomy services to users using the content index.

Claims

1. A business taxonomy management system comprising:

an indexing engine for indexing content of source business oriented metadata, the indexing engine having a content scanner for reading the business oriented metadata, defining taxonomy of the business oriented metadata, and building a content index of the business oriented metadata including a subject index representing the taxonomy of the business oriented metadata;

an index store for storing the content index of the business oriented metadata; and

a taxonomy engine for providing taxonomy services to users using the content index.

2. The business taxonomy management system as claimed in claim 1 wherein the content scanner uses a structured hierarchy of reporting elements of the business oriented metadata to define the taxonomy.

3. The business taxonomy management system as claimed in claim 2 wherein

the business oriented metadata includes OLAP or dimensional business data;

and

the content scanner obtains information of the structured hierarchy from the OLAP and dimensional business data to define the taxonomy of the business oriented metadata.

4. The business taxonomy management system as claimed in claim 2 wherein the content scanner uses an index search functions file, and collects primary metadata hierarchies of the business oriented metadata by adding target items to the index search functions file.

5. The business taxonomy management system as claimed in claim 4 wherein the content scanner weights metadata found in the target items higher than metadata found elsewhere.

6. The business taxonomy management system as claimed in claim 1 wherein

the business oriented metadata is included in one or more source metadata documents containing terms to be indexed, and

the content scanner builds the content index to include, for each term in each source metadata document to be indexed, a unique document identifier, a document date, one or more database queries used in structured reporting elements of the source metadata documents, and/or one or more linkages to other structured reporting elements in the source metadata document and/or other source metadata documents.

7. The business taxonomy management system as claimed in claim 1 wherein

the business oriented metadata is included in source metadata documents containing terms to be indexed, and

the content scanner builds, as the content index, a knowledge base document for each term in each source metadata document to store a knowledge base representation of the term along with one or more references to content of the business oriented metadata that uses the term.

8. The business taxonomy management system as claimed in claim 7 wherein the content scanner encodes each knowledge base document in Extensible Markup Language (XML).

9. The business taxonomy management system as claimed in claim 7 wherein the references to content include one or more references indicating relation between the term and the content.

10. The business taxonomy management system as claimed in claim 9 wherein the relation between the term and the content is a parent/child relation.

11. The business taxonomy management system as claimed in claim 1 wherein the taxonomy engine dynamically determines a taxonomy for a search term using the subject index.

12. The business taxonomy management system as claimed in claim 11 wherein the taxonomy engine provides a taxonomy result in response to a search term, the taxonomy result including one or more indexed terms that are parent topic terms, sibling topic terms or child topic terms of the search term.

13. The business taxonomy management system as claimed in claim 7 wherein the taxonomy engine receives a query from a user, the query including one or more search terms, and the taxonomy engine dynamically determines a taxonomy for each search term in the query using the knowledge base documents.

14. The business taxonomy management system as claimed in claim 13 wherein the taxonomy engine weights each search term in the query to build a query specification for searching the knowledge base documents.

15. The business taxonomy management system as claimed in claim 14 wherein the taxonomy engine weights search terms incrementally higher than related parent terms.

16. The business taxonomy management system as claimed in claim 14 wherein the taxonomy engine uses a tem stemming function for stemming terms that are stemmable, and weights non-stemmed terms incrementally higher than stemmed terms.

17. The business taxonomy management system as claimed in claim 11 wherein the query is a drilling request for drilling an item in a report.

18. The business taxonomy management system as claimed in claim 1 further comprising a ranking manager for managing relevance scores for search result items using the content index.

19. The business taxonomy management system as claimed in claim 18 wherein the ranking manager comprises:

a business relevance handler for handling assignment of base scores to individual metadata elements depending on their business relevance determined using data in the content index; and

a score calculator for calculating a relevance score for each search result item by aggregating base scores assigned to individual metadata elements included in the search result item.

20. The business taxonomy management system as claimed in claim 19 wherein the business relevance handler determines a base score of a metadata element based on its metadata type, parent metadata type, uniqueness of metadata element, usage of a target by other users, subscription to target by other users, running/compiling a target, and/or publish and update date of a target.

21. A method of managing business taxonomy, the method comprising the steps of:

reading content of source business oriented metadata;

defining taxonomy of the business oriented metadata;

building a content index of the business oriented metadata including a subject index representing the taxonomy of the business oriented metadata;

storing the content index of the business oriented metadata; and

providing taxonomy services to users using the content index.

22. The method as claimed in claim 21 wherein the taxonomy defining step uses a structured hierarchy of reporting elements of the business oriented metadata to define the taxonomy.

23. The method as claimed in claim 22 wherein

the business oriented metadata includes OLAP or dimensional business data;

and

the taxonomy defining step obtains information of the structured hierarchy from the OLAP and dimensional business data to define the taxonomy of the business oriented metadata.

24. The method as claimed in claim 22 wherein the taxonomy defining step uses an index search functions file, and collects primary metadata hierarchies of the business oriented metadata by adding target items to the index search functions file.

25. The method as claimed in claim 24 wherein the taxonomy defining step weights metadata found in the target items higher than metadata found elsewhere.

26. The method as claimed in claim 21 wherein

the business oriented metadata is included in one or more source metadata documents containing terms to be indexed, and

the index building step builds the content index to include, for each term in each source metadata document to be indexed, a unique document identifier, a document date, one or more database queries used in structured reporting elements of the source metadata documents, and/or one or more linkages to other structured reporting elements in the source metadata document and/or other source metadata documents.

27. The method as claimed in claim 21 wherein

the business oriented metadata is included in source metadata documents containing terms to be indexed, and

the index building step builds, as the content index, a knowledge base document for each term in each source metadata document to store a knowledge base representation of the term along with one or more references to content of the business oriented metadata that uses the term.

28. The method as claimed in claim 27 wherein the index building step encodes each knowledge base document in Extensible Markup Language (XML).

29. The method as claimed in claim 27 wherein index building step includes in the knowledge base document one or more references indicating relation between the term and the content.

30. The method as claimed in claim 29 wherein index building step includes in the knowledge base document one or more references indicating a parent/child relation.

31. The method as claimed in claim 21 wherein the taxonomy service providing step dynamically determines a taxonomy for a search term using the subject index.

32. The method as claimed in claim 31 wherein the taxonomy service providing step comprises the steps of:

receiving a search term,

finding any indexed terms that are parent topic terms, sibling topic terms or child topic terms of the search term; and

providing a taxonomy result indicating the indexed terms found in response to the search term.

33. The method as claimed in claim 27 wherein the taxonomy service providing step comprises the steps of:

receiving a query from a user, the query including one or more search terms; and

dynamically determining a taxonomy for each search term in the query using the knowledge base documents.

34. The method as claimed in claim 33 wherein the taxonomy service providing step further comprises the steps of:

weighting each search term in the query;

building a query specification based on weights of search terms; and

searching the knowledge base documents using the query specification.

35. The method as claimed in claim 34 wherein the weighting step weights search terms incrementally higher than related parent terms.

36. The method as claimed in claim 34 wherein the weighting step uses a tem stemming function for stemming terms that are stemmable, and weights non-stemmed terms incrementally higher than stemmed terms.

37. The method as claimed in claim 32 wherein the query service providing step receives a drilling request for drilling an item in a report, the drilling request including one or more search terms.

38. The method as claimed in claim 21 further comprising the step of managing relevance scores for search result items using the content index.

39. The method as claimed in claim 38 wherein the relevance scores managing step comprises the steps of:

assigning base scores to individual metadata elements depending on their business relevance determined using data in the content index; and

calculating a relevance score for each search result item by aggregating base scores assigned to individual metadata elements included in the search result item.

40. The method as claimed in claim 39 wherein the base scores assigning step comprises the step of determining a base score of a metadata element based on its metadata type, parent metadata type, uniqueness of metadata element, usage of a target by other users, subscription to target by other users, running/compiling a target, and/or publish and update date of a target.

41. A computer readable medium storing instructions or statements for use in the execution in a computer of a method of managing business taxonomy, the method comprising the steps of:

reading content of source business oriented metadata;

defining taxonomy of the business oriented metadata;

building a content index of the business oriented metadata including a subject index representing the taxonomy of the business oriented metadata;

storing the content index of the business oriented metadata; and

providing taxonomy services to users using the content index.

42. A propagated signal carrier carrying signals containing computer executable instructions that can be read and executed by a computer, the computer executable instructions being used to execute a method of managing business taxonomy, the method comprising the steps of:

reading content of source business oriented metadata;

defining taxonomy of the business oriented metadata;

building a content index of the business oriented metadata including a subject index representing the taxonomy of the business oriented metadata;

storing the content index of the business oriented metadata; and

providing taxonomy services to users using the content index.