METHOD, SYSTEM AND SOFTWARE FOR SEARCHING, IDENTIFYING, RETRIEVING AND PRESENTING ELECTRONIC DOCUMENTS
First Claim
1. A computer-implemented method of improving performance of a computer to enhance relevance ranking of results in a computer-implemented search of a corpus of documents, the method comprising:
- a. operating at the search-controller level to mediate between a request function and an underlying generic text-search system and electronically receiving a query containing a search clause from the request function;
b. by a processor, transforming the received search clause into an automatically generated, intentionally redundant set of search clauses representing a nesting of scopes of focus related to a determined topic related to the received search clause, the set of search clauses to be connected by a distribution-biased OR operator and submitted as a single request to an underlying search engine and being executed against a database associated with the search engine;
c. applying the set of search clauses, by the search engine, such that the nesting of scopes of focus induce the underlying search engine to return a set of responsive documents representative of the broadest of the set of search clauses and to relevance-score the set of responsive documents based on degree of focus on the determined topic suggested by the received search clause, the relevance-score being directly related to the degree of focus on the determined topic than achieved by merely counting occurrences, in each responsive document, of text satisfying the received search clause.
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Accused Products
Abstract
The present invention provides a method and system for identifying, retrieving and presenting electronic documents responsive to user queries. The three distinct inventive concepts are relevancy ranking of responsive documents based on component query technique; cross-lingual searching; and search expansion using analytics of initial results to derive and generate a modified query. Each of these inventions enhances document search and retrieval systems and the three solutions may be used separately or in any combination. The three inventions apply in layers above an underlying search system, controlling the submission of requests to the underlying system in support of received search requests, typically originating with an end user. Invention (I) involves use of focus-spectrum expanded search queries and either of two general types of enhanced OR operator that may be offered by the underlying search system. Processing of the content domain informs automated generation of elaborated queries using these operators for submitting to such an underlying system so as to yield improved relevance ranking
98 Citations
20 Claims
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1. A computer-implemented method of improving performance of a computer to enhance relevance ranking of results in a computer-implemented search of a corpus of documents, the method comprising:
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a. operating at the search-controller level to mediate between a request function and an underlying generic text-search system and electronically receiving a query containing a search clause from the request function; b. by a processor, transforming the received search clause into an automatically generated, intentionally redundant set of search clauses representing a nesting of scopes of focus related to a determined topic related to the received search clause, the set of search clauses to be connected by a distribution-biased OR operator and submitted as a single request to an underlying search engine and being executed against a database associated with the search engine; c. applying the set of search clauses, by the search engine, such that the nesting of scopes of focus induce the underlying search engine to return a set of responsive documents representative of the broadest of the set of search clauses and to relevance-score the set of responsive documents based on degree of focus on the determined topic suggested by the received search clause, the relevance-score being directly related to the degree of focus on the determined topic than achieved by merely counting occurrences, in each responsive document, of text satisfying the received search clause. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10)
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11. A facility including a computer-based search system configured to improve operational search performance of the search system to enhance relevance ranking of results in a computer-implemented search of a corpus of documents, the facility comprising:
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A generic text-search engine; a search-controller in communication with the generic text-search engine and an applications services layer connected to a communications network for receiving a search query, the search-controller configured to mediate between a request function and the generic text-search engine and to electronically receive a query containing a search clause from the request function, the search-controller comprising; a search federator adapted to transforming the received search clause into an automatically generated, intentionally redundant set of search clauses representing a nesting of scopes of focus related to a determined topic related to the received search clause, the set of search clauses to be connected by a distribution-biased OR operator and submitted as a single request to the generic text-search engine, the generic text-search engine adapted to execute the set of search clauses against a database and return a set of search results comprising a result set for each nested scope of focus, the returned set of search results being broader than would be achieved by merely counting occurrences, in each responsive document, of text satisfying the received search clause; and a search results analyzer adapted to receive and analyze the returned set of search results and to relevance-score the set of results based on degree of focus on the topic suggested by the received search clause. - View Dependent Claims (12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20)
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Specification