Method and apparatus for analyzing the semantics and syntax of a sentence or a phrase

• US 5,099,425 A
• Filed: 09/11/1989
• Issued: 03/24/1992
• Est. Priority Date: 12/13/1988
• Status: Expired due to Fees

• Current Assignee: Matsushita Electric Industrial Company Limited (Panasonic Holdings Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Matsushita Electric Industrial Company Limited (Panasonic Holdings Corporation)
• Inventors: Nagao, Kenji, Kanno: Yuji, Udea, Kenichi
• Primary Examiner(s): Shaw, Dale M.
• Assistant Examiner(s): CHUNG TRANS, XUONG MY
• Application Number:
  US07/405,163
• Time in Patent Office: 925 Days
• Field of Search: 364/419, 364/200, 364/900, 364/419
• US Class Current: 704/9
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 40/253 Grammatical analysis; Style critique

Abstract

Meanings of words, phrases, and a sentence are expressed in items. Items, which have equal contents, of a plurality of semantic structures are represented by a common item during the expressing of the meanings. Items, which have different contents, of the semantic structures are written in parallel during the expressing of the meanings. The semantic structures are rewritten into a parallel semantic structure through the representing and the writing. Contents of the parallel semantic structure are examined and corrected in consideration of a parallel characteristic of the parallel semantic structure.

Claims

1. In a computer executing a process of expressing semantic structures wherein semantic structures of morphemes, words, phrases, and a sentence are stored in a storage of the computer in a format of a group having at least zero items, a method of analyzing semantics, comprising the steps of:

reading out the semantic structures from the storage;

collecting at least two of the readout semantic structures into a parallel semantic structure;

storing the parallel semantic structure into the storage;

examining the parallel semantic structure, correcting the parallel semantic structure, generating a new semantic structure on the basis of the parallel semantic structure, and storing the new semantic structure into the storage;

wherein the collecting step comprises deriving the parallel semantic structure in a format of a first group, said first group including therein;

1) all items having equal contents in all noticed semantic structures of morphemes, words, phrases, and a sentence; and

2) a second group obtained for each of the noticed semantic structures by excluding the items contained in

     1) from a third group of items of each said noticed semantic structure.

2. In a computer executing a process of expressing semantic structures wherein semantic structures of morphemes, words, phrases, and a sentence are stored in a storage of the computer in a format of a combination of at least zero arranged names of the semantic structures and zero or more arranged values representing characteristics of the semantic structures, a method of analyzing semantics, comprising the steps of:

reading out the semantic structures from the storage;

collecting at least two of the readout semantic structures, which have a common name, into a parallel semantic structure;

storing the parallel semantic structure into the storage;

examining the parallel semantic structure, correcting the parallel semantic structure, generating a new semantic structure on the basis of the parallel semantic structure, and storing the new semantic structure into the storage;

wherein the collecting step comprises deriving the parallel semantic structure in a format of a combination of the common name and a first arrangement, said first arrangement including therein;

1) all values having equal contents in all noticed semantic structures of morphemes, words, phrases, and a sentence; and

2) values determined in a format of a combination of a second arrangement of values which is obtained by excluding the values contained in

     1) from a third arrangement of;

(i) values of each said noticed semantic structure, (ii) a first specific name representing a portion of a combination of a plurality of semantic structures, and (iii) a second specific name representing a combination of a plurality of semantic structures.

3. The method of claim 2 wherein the collecting step comprises expressing the values in a format of a group of combinations of names representing characteristics to be expressed and an arrangement of values representing more specific characteristics to be expressed.

4. In a semantics analyzing system where each of a plurality of morphemes is represented by characterizing factors, a method of collecting equal characterizing factors of different morphemes into a common expression to increase a semantics analyzing efficiency, the method comprising the steps of:

deriving morphemes from at least part of a sentence;

expressing each morpheme by;

(i) a position of the morpheme relative to said part of the sentence, (ii) a syntactic category of the morpheme, and (iii) a meaning of the morpheme; and

collecting at least two of the morphemes into a composite morpheme, wherein the collected morpheme have equal positions and equal syntactic categories but different meanings, and

wherein the composite morpheme has a parallel semantic structure where the meanings of the collected morphemes are written in parallel but the positions and the categories of the collected morphemes are written in common.

5. In a semantics analyzing system where each of a plurality of morphemes is represented by characterizing factors, an apparatus for collecting equal characterizing factors of different morphemes into a common expression to increase a semantics analyzing efficiency, the apparatus comprising:

means for deriving morphemes from a portion of a sentence;

means for expressing each morpheme by;

(i) a position of the morpheme relative to said part of the sentence, (ii) a syntactic category of the morpheme, and (iii) a meaning of the morpheme; and

means for collecting at least two of the morphemes into a composite morpheme, wherein the collected morphemes have equal positions and equal syntactic categories but different meanings, and wherein the composite morpheme has a parallel semantic structure where the meanings of the collected morphemes are written in parallel but the positions and the categories of the collected morphemes are written in common.