CONTENT ITEM QUERY FORMULATION

• US 20080201315A1
• Filed: 02/21/2007
• Published: 08/21/2008
• Est. Priority Date: 02/21/2007
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Corporation
• Inventors: Craswell, Nick, Williams, Hugh J., Lazier, Ariel, Clarke, Charles, Farago, Julie H.
• Granted Patent: US 7,647,338 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 707/5
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/3325 Reformulation based on results of preceding query
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/951 Indexing; Web crawling techniques
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/04812 Interaction techniques based on cursor appearance or behaviour, e.g. being affected by the presence of displayed objects
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/04817 using icons graphical or visual programming using iconic symbols G06F8/34
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/04855 Interaction with scrollbars
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99943 Generating database or data structure, e.g. via user interface

Abstract

A system and method for formulating a related content query are provided. A search engine receives queries having terms for content items and stores the queries and user interaction data in a query log. Also, the search engine provides a collection of content items and related content item queries for each content item within the collection of content items, in response the queries. Each content item in the collection of content items includes terms that match the received queries. The related content item queries are generated by an advisor engine that processes the query log and each content item in the collection of content items to select query terms, different from the received query terms, which previously resulted in a specified content item being accessed or selected.

Claims

1. One or more computer-readable media having computer-executable instructions embodied thereon that perform a method for generating a related content item query, the method comprising:

receiving the first content item query;

storing the first content item query in a query log, the query log having at least one of user interaction data and content item metadata associated with a plurality of content items;

presenting a collection of content items based upon the first content item query; and

for one or more of the content items in the collection of content items, generating a related content item query based upon the at least one of the user interaction data and the content item metadata stored in the query log.

2. The media of claim 1, wherein the related content item query includes terms provided in an alternative text tag associated with the content item or terms that are provided by a visual parser component, wherein the visual parser component is configured to provide terms that are extracted from at least one of a caption text associated with a content item included in a table, a domain name associated with the content item, or a file name associated with the content item.

3. The media of claim 1, wherein the related content item query includes at least one term within a predetermined proximity of the content item.

4. The media of claim 3, wherein the at least one term within the predetermined proximity of the content item is a term that is below, above, to the left, or to the right of the content item.

5. The media of claim 1, wherein generating the related content item query comprises processing the user interaction data to determine whether the content item has been selected or hovered-over in response to one or more other content item queries that differ from the first content item query.

6. The media of claim 5, wherein if the content item has not been selected or hovered-over in response to one or more other content item queries that differ from the first content item query, the method further comprises choosing a different source for query terms for the related content item query.

7. The media of claim 5, wherein if the content item has been selected or hovered-over in response to the one or more other content item queries that differ from the first content item query, the method further comprises choosing at least one query term from the one or more other content item queries to include in the related content item query.

8. The media of claim 7, wherein choosing at least one query term from the one or more other content item queries includes at least one of choosing the longest other content item query, choosing the most frequent other content item query, choosing the other content item query with a high statistical similarity to the content item, choosing content item queries that return a display of one or more popular results included in a group of results available from all content item queries in the query log, or randomly choosing the other content item query.

9. The media of claim 1, wherein the method further comprises generating a uniform resource locator that references the related content item query.

10. The media of claim 9, wherein hovering over the uniform resource locator or the content item triggers presentation of a peek box that includes a subset of content items associated with the related content item query.

11. The media of claim 10, wherein the peek box includes one or more uniform resource locators that reference at least one of a related content item query or a domain query that provides one or more additional content items associated with a domain associated with the content item.

12. One or more computer-readable media having computer-executable instructions embodied thereon that perform a method for tracking location and accessing patterns during a search session, the method comprising:

receiving a content item query;

generating a collection of content items based on the content item query;

for at least one content item in the collection of content items, generating a related content item query; and

presenting the collection of content items and the related content item queries on a single page.

13. The media of claim 12, wherein the method further comprises tracking content items in the content item collection that are selected or hovered over by a user.

14. The media of claim 13, wherein tracking the content items includes at least one of embedding an identifier to indicate that a content item was selected or hovered over, altering a background associated with the content items that were selected or hovered over, or altering a border associated with the content items that were selected or hovered over.

15. The media of claim 12, wherein the single page provides infinite scroll capability.

16. The media of claim 15, wherein a scroll bar associated with the single page includes at least one of a colored region to indicate relative selection frequencies or hover frequencies for content items within the collection of content items or colored marks to indicate where a selection or hover occurred, wherein a length of the colored mark or colored region indicates a selection frequency or hover frequency for a subset of content items of the collection in content items.

17. The media of claim 12, wherein the method further comprises detecting a connection speed, and wherein presenting the content item includes transmitting at least one thumbnail based, at least in part, on the detected connection speed.

18. The media of claim 17, wherein the at least one thumbnail differs in at least one of size and resolution based upon the detected connection speed.

19. The media of claim 17, wherein transmitting the at least one thumbnail includes generating a visible placeholder prior to transmitting the at least one thumbnail and wherein the method further comprises replacing the at least one visible placeholder with the transmitted at least one thumbnail.

20. The media of claim 19, wherein transmitting the at least one thumbnail comprises transmitting a plurality of thumbnails and includes generating a visible placeholder for each of the plurality of thumbnails prior to transmitting the plurality of thumbnails, and wherein replacing the at least one visible placeholder comprises replacing each of the plurality of visible placeholders with the plurality of thumbnails in accordance with a pre-determined methodology.

21. A system for generating a related content item query, the system comprising:

a query receiving engine configured for receiving one or more content item queries;

a database configured for storing at least one query log of the received one or more content item queries, user interaction data, and content item metadata;

a search engine configured for returning at least one collection of content items based upon a received content item query; and

an advisor engine configured for generating, for at least one content item in the at least one collection of content items, one or more related content item queries based on at least one of user interaction data associated with the content item or content item metadata stored in the database.