SYSTEM AND METHOD FOR OPTIMIZING THE STORAGE OF DATA

• US 20090248711A1
• Filed: 03/28/2008
• Published: 10/01/2009
• Est. Priority Date: 03/28/2008
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: R2 Solutions LLC (Acacia Research Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Yahoo! Inc. (Apollo Global Management, Inc.)
• Inventors: Davis, Marc Eliot, Higgins, Christopher William, Martinez, Ronald, O'Sullivan, Joseph James
• Granted Patent: US 8,745,133 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/10 File systems; File servers

Abstract

The disclosure describes systems and methods for optimizing the storage of data collected from a plurality of communication channels including social data, spatial data, temporal data and logical data. Based on user data collected from past interactions with the network, clusters of objects that include common information are combined into single objects in order to save storage space and reduce the number of objects managed by the system. The combination method may also be used to dynamically identify events or conditions which are related to a plurality of entities.

Claims

1. A method for storing information objects (IOs) comprising:

generating a plurality of first IOs, each first IO containing data describing a communication transmitted via one of a plurality of communication channels, the data in each first IO identifying a user being at a location at a time;

temporarily storing the plurality of first IOs;

analyzing the plurality of first IOs to identify a subset of first IOs containing data identifying locations within a selected distance from a first location and a determined time within a first time period;

generating an event IO comprising data identifying the locations within the selected distance from the first location, the determined time within the first time period and each of the users identified in the subset of first IOs; and

storing the event IO; and

deleting the subset of first IOs.

2. The method of claim 1 further comprising:

defining the first time period based upon a number of users within the determined time at the first location.

3. The method of claim 1 further comprising:

defining the first distance based on a number of users within the selected distance from the first location.

4. The method of claim 1 further comprising:

storing, in the event IO, any additional data stored in each of the subset of first IOs.

5. The method of claim 1 further comprising:

generating an event description for the event IO based on information contained in the subset of first IOs.

6. The method of claim 5 further comprising:

generating a plurality of second IOs, each second IO containing data describing a communication transmitted via one of a plurality of communication channels, the data in each second IO containing a future event definition containing an event time and an event title;

searching the plurality of second IOs for future event definitions with an event time within the first time period; and

generating the event description based on titles of future event definitions having an event time within the first time period.

7. The method of claim 6 further comprising:

selecting one of the event titles from the future event definitions having an event time within the first time period.

8. The method of claim 5 further comprising:

generating the event description based on the first location.

9. Tie method of claim 2 further comprising:

generating the event IO if the number of users within the selected distance from the first location is greater than a predetermined threshold.

10. The method of claim 1 further comprising:

for at least one communication detected, identifying a sending device that transmitted the communication, a transmission time the transmission was sent and a device location of the sending device at the time the transmission was sent;

determining that the sending device is a proxy for a location of a first user; and

generating a first IO identifying the first user being at the device location at the transmission time.

11. A method for storing information objects (IOs) comprising:

monitoring a plurality of communications transmitted via one of a plurality of communication channels;

identifying a subset of related communications based on an analysis of the content of the plurality of communications;

generating an information object (IO) from the subset of related communications, the IO containing data from the plurality of communications; and

storing the IO as a record of the subset of related communications.

12. The method of claim 11 further comprising:

retrieving the non-redundant data obtained from each of the subset of related communications from the IO; and

storing non-redundant data.

13. The method of claim 11 further comprising:

determining that the subset of related communications contains content indicating that a plurality of users were co-located during a specified time period; and

generating an event IO containing the content from the subset of related communications, wherein the event IO identifies the plurality of users, an event location and the specified time period.

14. The method of claim 11 further comprising:

determining that the subset of related communications contains additional content indicating that a plurality of users were performing a specified activity during the specified time period;

generating an activity IO containing the additional content of the subset of related communications, the activity IO identifies the specified activity, the plurality of users and the specified time period.

15. The method of claim 11 further comprising:

determining that the subset of related communications contain information indicating that a plurality of locations were associated with a specified condition during the specified time period;

generating a condition IO containing the information from the subset of related communications, the condition IO identifying the specified condition, the plurality of locations and the specified time period.

16. The method of claim 12 further comprising:

storing a communication identifier in the IO for each communication in the subset of related communications and the associated communication channel.

17. A computer-readable medium tangibly encoding instructions for performing a method for storing information objects (IOs) comprising:

generating a plurality of IOs containing data describing a communication transmission via one of a plurality of communication channels, wherein the data in the plurality of IOs identifies social data, spatial data, temporal data and logical data that fall within predetermined threshold;

temporarily storing the plurality of IOs;

comparing the plurality of IOs to identify a subset of IOs containing related social data, spatial data, temporal data and logical data;

creating an event IO based upon the subset IOs, wherein the event IO is stored and the subset of IOs are deleted.

18. The computer-readable medium of claim 17 further comprising:

storing within in the event IO, additional data associated with the subset of IOs.

19. The computer-readable medium of claim 17 further comprising:

generating an event description for the event IO based on information contained in the subset of IOs.

20. The computer-readable medium of claim 17 further comprising:

identifying a sending device that transmitted the communication, a transmission time the transmission was sent and a device location of the sending device at the time the transmission was sent.

21. The computer-readable medium of claim 20 wherein

storing only non-redundant data obtained from the subset IOs in the event IO, wherein the data obtained from each of the subset IOs can be retrieved from the plurality of IOs.

22. The computer-readable medium of claim 21 wherein the event IO contains data from each communication in the subset of related communications, the event IO identifies a plurality of users, an event, an event location, a condition and a specified time period.

23. A system for optimizing the storage of information objects (IOs) comprising:

a correlation engine, connected via at least one communication channel to a plurality of computing devices, that identifies relationships between the IOs and associated real-world entities (RWEs) including the plurality of computing devices;

storage connected to the correlation engine that stores at least one of social data, spatial data, temporal data and logical data associated with the RWEs; and

a data optimization engine that determines redundant data contained with the IOs based upon the correlated relationships between the IOs and the RWEs identified by the correlation engine, and generates a combined IO with at least a portion of the IOs.

24. The system of claim 23, wherein the combined IO is stored on a data backbone of a network through which the at least one communication channel communicates.

25. The system of claim 24, wherein the redundant data with the IOs are deleted upon the combined IO accumulating all of the data.