Travel Itinerary Recommendation Engine Using Inferred Interests and Sentiments

• US 20160125502A1
• Filed: 11/04/2014
• Published: 05/05/2016
• Est. Priority Date: 11/04/2014
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Original Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Inventors: Swift, Mary Diane, Byron, Donna K., Kumar, Ashok, Pikovsky, Alexander
• Granted Patent: US 11,100,557 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 40/30 Semantic analysis
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/025 Coordination of plural reservations, e.g. plural trip segments, transportation combined with accommodation
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0631 Item recommendations
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 50/14 Travel agencies

Abstract

Travel itineraries are automatically prepared based upon user interests and sentiments inferred by deep semantic analysis of user-commented and user-preferred digital works of literature by receiving interests and associated sentiment levels for at least one user according to a deep semantic analysis of a plurality of works of literature, wherein the works of literature have been rated, commented, or both rated and commented by the user; searching repositories of travel items to find one or more matching travel items to the received more interests and associated sentiment levels; and preparing at least one travel itinerary including at least one found matching travel item. Travel itineraries may be prepared responsive to a user-initiated trip planning session, responsive to notification of a new travel item'"'"'s availability, periodically, or a combination thereof.

Claims

1. A method for preparing travel itineraries based upon user interests and sentiments inferred by deep semantic analysis of user-commented and user-preferred digital works of prose comprising:

receiving by a computer one or more interests and associated sentiment levels for at least one user according to a deep semantic analysis of a plurality of works of prose, wherein the works of literature have been rated, commented, or both rated and commented by the user;

searching by the computer one or more repositories of travel items to find one or more matching travel items to the received more interests and associated sentiment levels;

arranging by the computer the matching items which exceed a threshold sentiment levels into one or more travel itineraries using a trip planning server;

receiving by the computer from the trip planning server one or more travel itineraries within one or more digital containers;

scoring by the computer each travel itinerary by accumulating sentiment values for each travel item associated with each travel itinerary; and

providing by the computer travel itineraries which exceed an accumulated sentiment value threshold to a consumer, wherein the consumer may comprise another computer process, a console to a user, or both another computer process and a console to a user.

2. The method as set forth in claim 1 wherein the receiving, searching, arranging, receiving and providing are performed responsive to a user-initiated travel planning session.

3. The method as set forth in claim 2 wherein the user-initiated travel planning session comprises collecting by the computer at least one user-supplied travel item, and wherein the searching and preparing use the user-supplied travel item as a process seed.

4. The method as set forth in claim 1 wherein the receiving, searching, arranging, receiving and providing are performed responsive to at least one event selected from the group consisting of receiving notification by the computer of a newly-available travel item, and searching by the computer for newly-available travel items responsive to a timer expiration.

5. The method as set forth in claim 1 further comprising:

receiving by the computer from the consumer an acceptance of at least one prepared itinerary; and

transmitting by the computer the accepted itinerary to a travel booking system.

6. A computer program product for preparing travel itineraries based upon user interests and sentiments inferred by deep semantic analysis of user-commented and user-preferred digital works of prose comprising:

a tangible, computer-readable storage memory device; and

program instructions embodied by the tangible, computer-readable storage memory device, for causing a computer processor to perform operations comprising;

receiving one or more interests and associated sentiment levels for at least one user according to a deep semantic analysis of a plurality of works of prose, wherein the works of literature have been rated, commented, or both rated and commented by the user;

searching one or more repositories of travel items to find one or more matching travel items to the received more interests and associated sentiment levels;

arranging the matching items which exceed a threshold sentiment levels into one or more travel itineraries using a trip planning server;

receiving from the trip planning server one or more travel itineraries within one or more digital containers;

scoring each travel itinerary by accumulating sentiment values for each travel item associated with each travel itinerary; and

providing travel itineraries which exceed an accumulated sentiment value threshold to a consumer, wherein the consumer may comprise another computer process, a console to a user, or both another computer process and a console to a user.

7. The computer program product as set forth in claim 6 wherein the program instructions for receiving, searching, arranging, receiving and providing comprise program instructions responsive to a user-initiated travel planning session.

8. The computer program product as set forth in claim 7 wherein the program instructions responsive to a user-initiated travel planning session comprise program instructions for collecting at least one user-supplied travel item, and wherein the searching and preparing use the user-supplied travel item as a process seed.

9. The computer program product as set forth in claim 6 wherein the program instructions for receiving, searching, arranging, receiving and providing comprise program instructions responsive to at least one event selected from the group consisting of receiving notification of a newly-available travel item, and searching for newly-available travel items responsive to a timer expiration.

10. The computer program product set forth in claim 10 further comprising program instructions embodied by the tangible, computer-readable storage memory device for causing the processor to perform operations comprising:

receiving from the consumer an acceptance of at least one prepared itinerary; and

transmitting the accepted itinerary to a travel booking system.

11. A system for preparing travel itineraries based upon user interests and sentiments inferred by deep semantic analysis of user-commented and user-preferred digital works of prose comprising:

a computer processor for performing operations under the control of program instructions;

a tangible, computer-readable storage memory device; and

program instructions embodied by the tangible, computer-readable storage memory device, for causing the computer processor to perform operations comprising;

receiving one or more interests and associated sentiment levels for at least one user according to a deep semantic analysis of a plurality of works of prose, wherein the works of literature have been rated, commented, or both rated and commented by the user;

searching one or more repositories of travel items to find one or more matching travel items to the received more interests and associated sentiment levels;

arranging the matching items which exceed a threshold sentiment levels into one or more travel itineraries using a trip planning server;

receiving from the trip planning server one or more travel itineraries within one or more digital containers;

scoring each travel itinerary by accumulating sentiment values for each travel item associated with each travel itinerary; and

providing travel itineraries which exceed an accumulated sentiment value threshold to a consumer, wherein the consumer may comprise another computer process, a console to a user, or both another computer process and a console to a user.

12. The system as set forth in claim 11 wherein the program instructions for receiving, searching, arranging, receiving and providing comprise program instructions responsive to a user-initiated travel planning session.

13. The system as set forth in claim 12 wherein the program instructions responsive to a user-initiated travel planning session comprise program instructions for collecting at least one user-supplied travel item, and wherein the searching and preparing use the user-supplied travel item as a process seed.

14. The system as set forth in claim 11 wherein the program instructions for receiving, searching, arranging, receiving and providing comprise program instructions responsive to at least one event selected from the group consisting of receiving notification of a newly-available travel item, and searching for newly-available travel items responsive to a timer expiration.

15. The system as set forth in claim 11 further comprising program instructions embodied by the tangible, computer-readable storage memory device for causing the processor to perform operations comprising:

receiving from the consumer an acceptance of at least one prepared itinerary; and

transmitting the accepted itinerary to a travel booking system.