System for Natural Language Interaction with Financial Data

• US 20170228377A1
• Filed: 02/10/2017
• Published: 08/10/2017
• Est. Priority Date: 02/10/2016
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Refinitiv US Organization, LLC (Refinitiv US Holdings, Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Refinitiv US Organization, LLC (Refinitiv US Holdings, Inc.)
• Inventors: Plachouras, Vassilis, Leidner, Jochen Lothar, Smiley, Charese, Bretz, Hiroko
• Granted Patent: US 10,754,881 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/3329 Natural language query formulation or dialogue systems
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 40/00 Finance; Insurance; Tax strategies; Processing of corporate or income taxes

Abstract

The present invention is directed toward a system for database querying using natural language generation, which comprises identifying a first set of entities corresponding to an indexed data set in response to a user query, generating a ranked list of query intents using the first set of entities, wherein each item of the list of query intents represents a second set of entities associated with the user query and iterating over the ranked list of query intents to identify a top ranked intent associated to one of a set of predefined query plans. The predefined query plan associated with the top rank intent is executed using the set of entities corresponding to the top ranked intent, the predefined query plan comprising one or more search actions against the indexed data set. A first set of results is then received and a description is generated and transmitted.

Claims

1. A computer-implemented method comprising:

identifying a first set of entities corresponding to an indexed data set in response to a user query;

generating a ranked list of query intents using the first set of entities, wherein each item of the list of query intents represents a second set of entities associated with the user query;

iterating over the ranked list of query intents to identify a top ranked intent associated to one of a set of predefined query plans;

executing the predefined query plan associated with the top rank intent using the set of entities corresponding to the top ranked intent, the predefined query plan comprising one or more search actions against the indexed data set;

receiving a first set of results in response to one or more search actions;

generating a description of the first set of results received from the search engine; and

transmitting the description in response to the user query.

2. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, further comprising transforming data stored in a database to an indexed data set using one or more parametric templates.

3. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein the second set of entities associated with the user query is generated by disambiguation of the first set of entities.

4. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein the predefined query plan further comprises at least one of filtering results according to a specified condition, ranking results according to the values of a given field or aggregating associated values.

5. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein the description further comprises an overview and context of the first set of results.

6. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein generating a description of the first set of results further comprises selecting one or more language templates for text generation and populating the one or more language templates with one or more data items from the first set of results.

7. A system comprising:

a non-transient memory; and

a server including a processor configured to;

identify a first set of entities corresponding to an indexed data set in response to a user query;

generate a ranked list of query intents using the first set of entities, wherein each item of the list of query intents represents a second set of entities associated with the user query;

iterate over the ranked list of query intents to identify a top ranked intent associated to one of a set of predefined query plans;

execute the predefined query plan associated with the top rank intent using the set of entities corresponding to the top ranked intent, the predefined query plan comprising one or more search actions against the indexed data set;

receive a first set of results in response to one or more search actions;

generate a description of the first set of results received from the search engine; and

transmit the description in response to the user query.

8. The system of claim 7, wherein the server if further configured to transform data stored in a database to an indexed data set using one or more parametric templates.

9. The system of claim 7, wherein the second set of entities associated with the user query is generated by disambiguation of the first set of entities.

10. The system of claim 7, wherein the predefined query plan further comprises at least one of filtering results according to a specified condition, ranking results according to the values of a given field or aggregating associated values.

11. The system of claim 7, wherein the description further comprises an overview and context of the first set of results.

12. The system of claim 7, wherein generating a description of the first set of results further comprises selecting one or more language templates for text generation and populating the one or more language templates with one or more data items from the first set of results.