Query generation system for an information retrieval system

• US 20090030893A1
• Filed: 05/29/2008
• Published: 01/29/2009
• Est. Priority Date: 05/29/2007
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Brainspace Corporation (Reveal Data Corp.)
• Original Assignee: Brainspace Corporation (Reveal Data Corp.)
• Inventors: Keys, Adam K., Copps, David S., Jernigan, Stephen S.
• Granted Patent: US 9,069,861 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/2423 Interactive query statement specification based on a database schema
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/9032 Query formulation
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/951 Indexing; Web crawling techniques
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/9535 Search customisation based on user profiles and personalisation
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/9538 Presentation of query results
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/0482 Interaction with lists of selectable items, e.g. menus
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/04842 Selection of displayed objects or displayed text elements G06F3/0482 takes precedence
• CPC Class Codes: G06N 5/04 Inference or reasoning models

Abstract

According to one embodiment of the disclosure, a query generation system generally includes an element rank and inference engine in communication with a computing system and a user interface. The element rank and inference engine is operable to receive a user supplied element from the user interface, the user supplied element being associated with a first filter criterion. The element rank and inference engine is also operable to create, using the first filter criterion, at least one second element and rank according to their relative importance, the at least one first element and the at least one second element according to their associated first filter criterion and second filter criterion. Next, the element rank and inference engine may output the at least one first filter element and the second filter element to the computing system.

Claims

1. An query generation system comprising:

an element rank and inference engine in communication with a computing system and a user interface, the element rank and inference engine operable to;

receive a plurality of elements from the user interface;

rank the plurality of elements according to a level of importance;

derive one or more inferred terms from the plurality of elements;

filter one or more of the plurality of elements according to a specified criteria;

display the remaining plurality of elements and the one or more inferred terms on the user interface, the plurality of elements and the one or more inferred terms having a visual characteristic that varies according to their specified criteria;

receive another linguistic term from the user interface;

generate a query in accordance with the remaining plurality of elements, the one or more inferred terms, and the another linguistic term; and

transmit the query to the web search engine.

2. An query generation system comprising:

an element rank and inference engine in communication with a computing system and a user interface, the element rank and inference engine operable to;

receive a plurality of elements from the user interface;

modify the plurality of elements according to a specified criteria;

display the modified plurality of elements on the user interface, the plurality of elements having a visual characteristic that varies according to their specified criteria;

generate a query in accordance with the modified plurality of elements; and

transmit the query to the web search engine.

3. The query generation system of claim 2, wherein modifying the plurality of elements further comprises ranking the plurality of elements according to a level of importance.

4. The query generation system of claim 2, wherein modifying the plurality of elements further comprises deriving one or more inferred elements from the plurality of elements and displaying the modified plurality of elements and the one or more inferred elements according to the specified criteria.

5. The query generation system of claim 2, wherein modifying the plurality of elements further comprises filtering one or more of the plurality of elements and displaying the remaining plurality of elements according to the specified criteria.

6. The query generation system of claim 2, wherein the query generation system is further is further operable to receive, following display of the modified plurality of elements on the user interface, another element from the user interface.

7. The query generation system of claim 2, wherein the query generation system is further is further operable to remove, following display of the modified plurality of elements on the user interface, one or more of the plurality of elements from the user interface according to a request from the user interface.

8. The query generation system of claim 7, wherein the query generation system is further operable to separately store the removed one or more elements in a memory.

9. The query generation system of claim 2, wherein the query generation system is further operable to store the generated query in a memory for use at a later time.

10. The query generation system of claim 2, wherein the visual characteristic is selected from the group consisting of a spatial order, a color, a size, a shape, an order, a relative proximity, a relative boldness, and a relative texture.

11. A method comprising:

receiving a plurality of elements from a user interface;

modifying the plurality of elements according to a specified criteria;

displaying the modified plurality of elements on the user interface, the plurality of elements having a visual characteristic that varies according to their specified criteria;

generating a query in accordance with the modified plurality of elements; and

transmitting the query to a web search engine.

12. The method of claim 11, wherein modifying the plurality of elements according to a specified criteria further comprises ranking the plurality of elements according to a level of importance.

13. The method of claim 11, wherein modifying the plurality of elements according to a specified criteria further comprises deriving one or more inferred elements from the plurality of elements and displaying the modified plurality of elements and the one or more inferred elements according to the specified criteria.

14. The method of claim 11, wherein modifying the plurality of elements according to a specified criteria further comprises filtering one or more of the plurality of elements and displaying the remaining plurality of elements according to the specified criteria.

15. The method of claim 11, further comprising, following display of the modified plurality of elements on the user interface, receiving another element from the user interface.

16. The method of claim 11, further comprising, following display of the modified plurality of elements on the user interface, removing one or more of the plurality of elements from the user interface according to a request from the user interface.

17. The method of claim 16, further comprising separately store the removed one or more elements in a memory.

18. The method of claim 11, further comprising storing the generated query in a memory for use at a later time.

19. The method of claim 11, wherein the visual characteristic is selected from the group consisting of a spatial order, a color, a size, a shape, an order, a relative proximity, a relative boldness, and a relative texture.