LATERAL SEARCH
First Claim
1. A computer implemented method of performing a search to retrieve electronic documents, using general subdomain corpus including general content and one or more vertical subdomain corpuses, each vertical subdomain corpuses including specialized content, the method comprising:
- receiving a search query from a user, wherein the received search query is based on a text query string inputted by the user;
determining personal information for the user;
causing a search to be performed in the general subdomain corpus of general content using the search query, wherein the general content is not organized in specialized categories;
determining a vertical subdomain corpus from the one or more vertical subdomain corpuses based on the personal information of the user; and
causing a search to be performed in the determined vertical subdomain corpus of specialized content using the user search query, wherein the specialized content is organized.
1 Assignment
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Accused Products
Abstract
A search query is received. Personal information for a user is then determined. A search is performed in a general subdomain of general content using the search query. For example, the general subdomain of general content may be a WWW search. Then, a vertical subdomain is determined based on the personal information. A search is then performed in the vertical subdomain of specialized content using the search query. The search performed in the general subdomain and the search performed in the vertical subdomain generate general search results and vertical search results. The results may be combined and outputted to a client.
5 Citations
20 Claims
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1. A computer implemented method of performing a search to retrieve electronic documents, using general subdomain corpus including general content and one or more vertical subdomain corpuses, each vertical subdomain corpuses including specialized content, the method comprising:
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receiving a search query from a user, wherein the received search query is based on a text query string inputted by the user; determining personal information for the user; causing a search to be performed in the general subdomain corpus of general content using the search query, wherein the general content is not organized in specialized categories; determining a vertical subdomain corpus from the one or more vertical subdomain corpuses based on the personal information of the user; and causing a search to be performed in the determined vertical subdomain corpus of specialized content using the user search query, wherein the specialized content is organized. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7)
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8. A search server for performing searches in general content and specialized content to retrieve electronic documents, the search server comprising;
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a query processor coupled to receive a query from a user, wherein the received query is based on a text query string inputted by the user; one or more general search engines configured to perform searches in a general subdomain corpus including at least a part of the general content, wherein the general content is not organized in specialized categories; one or more vertical search engines configured to perform searches in a vertical subdomain corpus including at least a part of the specialized content, wherein the specialized content is organized; and wherein the organization of corresponding vertical engines and the selection of vertical engines into the customized graphic user interface are controlled by the same business owner of the at least one general engine. - View Dependent Claims (9, 10)
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11. A method for personalized information retrieval for use with a plurality of electronic information retrieval engines, at least one of the engines (a “
- general engine”
) supporting general queries against indexed Internet content and a plurality of the other engines (“
vertical engines”
) supporting queries against specialized-content, the method comprising;storing information personalized to a user; receiving a search query from the user; submitting the search query to the general engine; transmitting a response to the user based in part on output from the general engine; and automatically facilitating access to one or more of the vertical engines as a part of the response for the user, in a manner based at least one of part of the personalized information and part of the search query. - View Dependent Claims (12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20)
- general engine”
Specification