IDENTIFYING AND/OR EXTRACTING DATA IN CONNECTION WITH CREATING OR UPDATING A RECORD IN A DATABASE

• US 20100121880A1
• Filed: 01/19/2010
• Published: 05/13/2010
• Est. Priority Date: 02/03/2006
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Bloomberg Finance LP (Bloomberg LP)
• Original Assignee: Bloomberg Finance LP (Bloomberg LP)
• Inventors: Bridge, Jupiter, Ursitti, Michael A.
• Granted Patent: US 11,042,841 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 707/780
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/313 Selection or weighting of terms for indexing
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/34 Browsing; Visualisation therefor
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/10 Office automation; Time management

Abstract

The invention provides systems, methods, and computer programs to improve the accuracy and efficiency with which data analysts can use news stories, press releases, and other sources of information to maintain databases that contain information about individuals and businesses and other organizations. Documents containing material information are acquired in computer-readable form and optionally may then be reduced to raw text. One or more computerized systems process the text and tag important terms such as proper nouns, job titles, awards, and other terms indicating professional, educational, corporate, or other developments. The invention provides a user interface with which a data analyst can review, confirm, remove, modify, introduce, and link the tags, ultimately adding the information and links to a database and storing the source document in an electronic warehouse for future retrieval.

Claims

1. A method of identifying information in an electronic document for use in updating a database, comprising:

based on a set of rules, implemented by at least one computer, automatically identifying information in the electronic document that is possibly relevant to the database;

automatically presenting the identified information on an electronic display device that is operatively coupled to a user computer; and

in response to user input to the user computer, the at least one computer accepting or rejecting the identified information displayed on the display device for use in updating the database.

2. The method of claim 1, comprising the at least one computer providing accepted identified information to the database.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein presenting the identified information comprises presenting text in the identified information in context with neighboring text in the document.

4. The method of claim 3, wherein the text in the identified information is presented on the display device contrasted from the neighboring text.

5. The method of claim 4, wherein text in the identified information is contrasted by highlighting.

6. The method of claim 1, wherein the identified information in the electronic document is text.

7. The method of claim 1, wherein the identified information in the electronic document describes a change in management or staffing of an organization.

8. A computerized method for using textual information to update databases, comprising:

tagging at least one term in an electronic source document according to one or more preconfigured rules;

presenting the source document, with the at least one tagged term having a contrasting appearance, on an electronic display device;

in response to user input through at least one computer input device, providing at least one link associated with the at least one tagged term and at least one related term, external data, or both; and

storing the at least one tagged term and its link or links in one or more databases.

9. The method of claim 8, comprising removing all metadata and non-textual data from the electronic source document.

10. The method of claim 8, wherein tagging the at least one term in the electronic source document comprises generating markup in a markup language.

11. The method of claim 10, wherein the markup language is XML.

12. The method of claim 8, wherein tagging comprises the use of one or more databases of terms that are to be tagged when found in the electronic source document.

13. The method of claim 12, wherein one or more of the one or more databases of terms comprises proper names.

14. The method of claim 8, wherein tagging comprises:

use of one or more preconfigured rules for identifying relationships involving the terms in the source document; and

for one or more of such identified relationships, association with the document of metadata relating to the identified relationship; and

wherein

presenting the document on the electronic display device comprises providing contrast to illustrate the relationships between the tagged terms.

15. The method of claim 14, wherein the one or more preconfigured rules for identifying relationships involving the terms comprise one or more rules based on the proximity of the terms to one another.

16. The method of claim 14, wherein tagging comprises use of one or more computer software programs and/or modules adapted to identification of the grammatical structure of text, and the one or more preconfigured rules for identifying relationships involving the at least one tagged term comprise one or more rules that refer to the grammatical structure of the electronic source document.

17. The method of claim 14, wherein the user input through the at least one computer input device to link the at least one tagged term comprises accepting or rejecting the automatically-identified relationships involving the at least one tagged term.

18. The method of claim 8, comprising:

searching one or more databases for candidate entries that may be associated with each tagged term;

including in the user interface displayed on the electronic display device one or more lists of candidate entries and the terms they are associated with; and

accepting additional user input through the at least one computer input device to associate each tagged term with the correct one of the related candidate entries.

19. The method of claim 18, comprising using the at least one link associated with the at least one tagged term that has been accepted through the user input to update at least one entry in the one or more databases that has been associated with the at least one tagged term.

20. A user interface displayed on an electronic display device, comprising:

a text area displaying a source document;

selectable text within the source document, in which text is selectable through at least one computer input device and receives visual contrasting when that selection takes place;

one or more controls allowing a user to navigate within the source document to text preceding the selected text, following the selected text, or both;

a first look-up area displaying a first list of one or more candidate records from one or more databases, including text that matches or is similar to user-selected text from the electronic source document, from which the user may select one record using at least one computer input device, wherein each record contains information about an entity; and

a control allowing the user to commit to one or more databases one or more associations of selected text and a selected record.

21. The user interface in claim 20, comprising a control allowing a user to tag terms manually.

22. The user interface in claim 20, comprising a control allowing a user to remove an existing tag, to modify an existing tag, or both.

23. The user interface in claim 20, wherein the display of the electronic source document by the text area comprises a contrasting display of a plurality of terms in the source document to indicate that the terms may be related to each other and to the same event.

24. The user interface in claim 23, comprising a second look-up area displaying a second list of one or more candidate records, from one or more databases, wherein each record contains information about an entity with a name that matches or is similar to a second selected term related to the same contrastingly-displayed event with which the first selected word or phrase is associated, from which the user may select a second record using the at least one computer input device.

25. The user interface in claim 23 or 24, comprising:

in response to user selection, through the at least one computer input device, of one of the one or more candidate records displayed in the first list of one or more candidate records or of one of the one or more candidate records displayed in the second list of candidate records, if present;

presenting the selected record with a contrasting appearance; and

displaying, on a second electronic display device, information related to the selected record.

26. The user interface in claim 20, comprising one or more controls, from which a user may choose, through user input through the at least one computer input device, the type of event.

27. The user interface in claim 20, 23, or 24, wherein the displayed electronic source document includes tags to identify significant terms, the tagged terms being identifiable visually in the text area and selectable using the at least one computer input device.

28. A computerized system for using textual information to update databases, comprising:

a tagging engine, comprising one or more software programs and/or modules, adapted to tag at least one term in an electronic source document according to one or more preconfigured rules;

an electronic display device on which may be presented the source document with the at least one tagged term appearing contrasted;

at least one computer input device;

a first computer software module adapted to accept user input through the at least one computer input device and, in response to the user input, to provide at least one link associated with the at least one tagged term and at least one related term, external data, or both, based on the user input;

one or more databases; and

computer software programmed to store the at least one tagged term and its link or links in the one or more databases.

29. The system of claim 28, comprising computer software programmed to remove all metadata and non-textual data from the electronic source document.

30. The system of claim 28, wherein the tagging engine is adapted to generate tags in the form of markup expressed in a markup language.

31. The system of claim 30, wherein the markup language is XML.

32. The system of claim 28, comprising a text analysis engine, which comprises one or more software programs and/or modules, that is adapted to refer to one or more databases of text to identify terms in the electronic source document for tagging when found in the electronic source document, wherein the tagging engine is adapted to refer to the text analysis engine.

33. The system of claim 32, wherein one or more of the one or more databases of text comprises proper names.

34. The system of claim 28, wherein:

the tagging engine is adapted to use one or more preconfigured rules for identifying relationships involving terms, and, for one or more of such identified relationships, to associate metadata relating to an identified relationship with the electronic source document; and

the electronic display device is adapted to display additional contrast to illustrate the relationships between the tagged terms.

35. The system of claim 34, wherein the one or more preconfigured rules for identifying relationships comprise one or more rules based on proximity of terms to one another.

36. The system of claim 34, wherein the tagging engine is adapted to identify the grammatical structure of text, and the rules for identifying relationships comprise one or more rules that refer to the grammatical structure of the electronic source document.

37. The system of claim 34, comprising computer software adapted to accept or reject the automatically-identified relationships between the terms depending upon the user input received through at least one computer input device.

38. The system of claim 28, comprising:

computer software adapted to search one or more databases for candidate entries that may be associated with one or more terms;

including in the user interface, when the user interface is displayed on the electronic display device, one or more lists of the candidate entries and the tagged terms they are associated with; and

computer software adapted to accept additional user input through at least one computer input device and to use the additional user input to associate at least one of the at least one of the at least tagged term with one of the related candidate entries.

39. The system of claim 38, comprising computer software adapted to use the at least one link associated with the at least one tagged term that has been accepted through the user input to update each entry in the one or more databases that has been associated with each of the tagged terms.

40. A computer program product, comprising a computer readable medium or media encoded with computer-readable instructions that, when executed on a processor, cause a computer system to perform a method, comprising:

tagging at least one term in an electronic source document according to one or more preconfigured rules;

presenting the source document, with the at least one tagged term having a contrasting appearance, on an electronic display device;

in response to user input through at least one computer input device, providing at least one link associated with the at least one tagged term and at least one related term, external data, or both; and

storing the at least one tagged term and its link or links in one or more databases.

41. The computer program product of claim 40, wherein the method comprises removing all metadata and non-textual data from the electronic source document.

42. The computer program product of claim 40, wherein tagging the at least one term in the electronic source document comprises generating markup in a markup language.

43. The computer program product of claim 42, wherein the markup language is XML.

44. The computer program product of claim 40, wherein tagging comprises the use of one or more databases of terms that are to be tagged when found in the electronic source document.

45. The computer program product of claim 44, wherein one or more of the one or more databases of terms comprises proper names.

46. The computer program product of claim 40, wherein tagging comprises:

use of one or more preconfigured rules for identifying relationships involving the terms in the source document; and

for one or more of such identified relationships, association with the document of metadata relating to the identified relationship; and

wherein

presenting the document on an electronic display device comprises providing contrast to illustrate the relationships between the tagged terms.

47. The computer program product of claim 46, wherein the one or more preconfigured rules for identifying relationships between terms comprise one or more rules based on the proximity of terms to one another.

48. The computer program product of claim 46, wherein tagging comprises use of one or more computer software programs and/or modules adapted to identification of the grammatical structure of text, and the one or more preconfigured rules for identifying relationships involving the at least one tagged term comprise one or more rules that refer to the grammatical structure of the electronic source document.

49. The computer program product of claim 46, wherein the user input through the at least one computer input device to link the at least one tagged term comprises accepting or rejecting the automatically-identified relationships involving the at least one tagged term.

50. The computer program product of claim 40, wherein the method comprises:

searching one or more databases for candidate entries that may be associated with each tagged term;

including in the user interface displayed on the electronic display device one or more lists of candidate entries and the tagged terms they are associated with; and

accepting additional user input through the at least one computer input device to associate each term with the correct one of the related candidate entries.

51. The computer program product of claim 50, comprising using the at least one link associated with the at least one tagged term that has been accepted through the user input to update at least one entry in the one or more databases that has been associated with the at least one tagged term.