INFORMATION REPOSITORY SEARCH SYSTEM

• US 20140207767A1
• Filed: 03/24/2014
• Published: 07/24/2014
• Est. Priority Date: 03/26/2008
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: PayPal, Inc. (PayPal Holdings, Inc.)
• Original Assignee: eBay Inc.
• Inventors: Miller, Craig
• Granted Patent: US 9,535,998 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 707/723
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/951 Indexing; Web crawling techniques
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/9537 Spatial or temporal dependent retrieval, e.g. spatiotemporal queries
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/954 Navigation, e.g. using categorised browsing

Abstract

Systems and methods for an information repository search system are disclosed. The system receives search criteria from users and associates the search criteria with source information. The source information identifies sources via which the search criteria are being received. The system further maintains counts of instances for the plurality of search criteria in association with the respective source information.

Claims

1. (canceled)

2. A method comprising:

receiving a plurality of search criteria from a plurality of users;

associating the plurality of search criteria with source information, the source information identifying a plurality of sources via which the plurality of search criteria are being received; and

maintaining a plurality of counts of instances for the plurality of search criteria in association with the respective source information.

3. The method of claim 2, further comprising:

associating the plurality of search criteria with category information, the category information including a plurality of categories into which information in an information repository is categorized; and

storing each of the plurality of search criteria in association with the source information and the category information.

4. The method of claim 2, wherein the plurality of sources includes a plurality of websites via which the plurality of search criteria are being received from the plurality of users and wherein each of the plurality of websites is associated with a user demographic.

5. The method of claim 4, wherein the user demographic is at least one of a geographic, language, cultural or interest demographic.

6. The method of claim 3, wherein the plurality of search criteria includes a first search criterion, the method further comprising, for each of a plurality of unique source information and category information combinations, maintaining a count of instances for the first search criterion the plurality of counts of instances fur the plurality of search criteria including the count of instances for the first search criterion.

7. The method of claim 6, further comprising:

maintaining the count of the instances over a time interval; and

modifying the time interval based on a rate at which instances of the first search criterion are being received.

8. The method of claim 6, farther comprising, for each he plurality of unique source information and category information combinations:

generating the ranked set of search criteria from the plurality of search criteria based on matching associated source information and category information; and

presenting, over a network, a user interface including the ranked set of search criteria.

9. The method of claim 2, wherein each search criterion of the plurality of search criteria is received as part of a search query and wherein the search query includes a source identifier and a category identifier.

10. The method of claim 9, wherein the plurality of search criteria includes a search criterion and wherein the associating the plurality of search criteria with category information includes associating the search criterion with category information based on the category identifier.

11. The method of claim 9, wherein the associating the plurality of search criteria with source information includes associating the search criterion with source information based on the source identifier.

12. A system comprising:

a communication module to receive a plurality of search criteria from a plurality of users;

an association module to associate the plurality of search criteria with source information, the source information identifies a plurality of sources via which the plurality of search criteria are received; and

a counting module to maintain a plurality of counts of instances for the plurality of search criteria in association with the respective source information.

13. The system of claim 12, wherein the association module associates the plurality of search criteria with category information, the category information including a plurality of categories into which information in an information repository is categorized, the association module to store each of the plurality of search criteria in association with the source information and the category information.

14. The system of claim 12, wherein the plurality of sources includes a plurality of websites via which the plurality of search criteria are received from the plurality of users and wherein each of the plurality of websites is associated with a user demographic.

15. The system of claim 14, wherein the user demographic is at least one of a geographic, language, cultural or interest demographic.

16. The system of claim 13, wherein the plurality of search criteria includes a first search criterion, and wherein the counting module maintains a count of instances for the first search criterion, wherein the plurality of counts of instances for the plurality of search criteria includes the count of instances for the first search criterion.

17. The system of claim 16, wherein the counting module is to maintain the count of the instances over a time interval and modify the time interval based on a rate at which instances of the first search criterion are received.

18. The system of claim 16, further comprising:

a ranking module to generate a ranked set of search criteria from the plurality of search criteria based on matching associated source information and category information; and

a user interface module to present, over a network, a user interface including the ranked set of search criteria.

19. The system of claim 13, wherein each search criterion of the plurality of search criteria is received as part of a search query and wherein the search query includes a source identifier and a category identifier.

20. The system of claim 12, wherein the plurality of search criteria includes a search criterion and wherein the association module associates the search criterion with category information based on the category identifier.

21. A machine-readable medium including instructions, which when executed by one or more processors, causes the one or more processors to execute actions comprising:

receiving a plurality of search criteria from a plurality of users;

associating the plurality of search criteria with source information, the source information identifying a plurality of sources via which the plurality of search criteria are being received; and

maintaining a plurality of counts of instances for the plurality of search criteria in association with the respective source information.