Software agent for comparing locally accessible keywords with meta-information and having pointers associated with distributed information

• US 5,931,907 A
• Filed: 07/22/1997
• Issued: 08/03/1999
• Est. Priority Date: 01/23/1996
• Status: Expired due to Term

• Current Assignee: Suffolk Technologies, LLC (Vector Capital Corporation)
• Original Assignee: British Telecommunications PLC (BT Group PLC)
• Inventors: Weeks, Richard, Davies, Nicholas John
• Primary Examiner(s): Maung, Zarni
• Assistant Examiner(s): Thomson, William D.
• Application Number:
  US08/875,091
• Time in Patent Office: 742 Days
• Field of Search: 395/200.48, 395/200.47, 395/200.49, 395/200.58, 395/200.57, 395/200.36, 707/501, 707/513, 707/10, 709/218, 709/219, 709/201, 709/202, 709/203
• US Class Current: 709/218
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/355 Class or cluster creation or modification
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/9535 Search customisation based on user profiles and personalisation
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 2216/01 Automatic library building
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99943 Generating database or data structure, e.g. via user interface

Abstract

A system for accessing information stored in a distributed information database provides a community of intelligent software agents. Each agent can be built as an extension of a known viewer for a distributed information system such as the Internet WorldWide Web. The agent is effectively integrated with the viewer and can extract pages by means of the viewer for storage in an intelligent page store. The text from the information system is abstracted and is stored with additional information, optionally selected by the user. The agent-based access system uses keyword sets to locate information of interest to a user, together with user profiles such that pages being stored by one user can be notified to another whose profile indicates potential interest. The keyword sets can be extended by use of a thesaurus.

Claims

1. An information access system, for accessing information stored in a distributed manner and accessible by means of a communications network, said access system comprising:

at least one software agent for use in accessing said information by means of said network,

data storage locally accessible to said agent for storing meta-information including a pointer associated with pieces of said information where stored in said distributed manner for making it thereafter accessible via said network, and for storing at least one set of keywords,

said agent being triggered on entry of meta-information in said data storage, to compare said at least one set of keywords to said meta-information and to transmit an alert message back to a user associated with said at least one set of stored keywords in the event of a positive comparison result.

2. A system as in claim 1 wherein:

said at least one set of keywords is associated with a specified user, and

said access system comprises means to address the alert message to said specified user.

3. A system as in claim 1 for use by a plurality of users, each of said plurality having at least one associated set of keywords, wherein:

said system has means to respond to a user request to enter meta-information in said data storage,

said at least one set of keywords being associated with a user other than the user making the request, such that said system responds to entry of meta-information by a first user by addressing an alert message to a second user in the vent of a positive match with said second user'"'"'s keyword set.

4. A system as in claim 1 wherein:

said agent is provided with a thesaurus of synonyms for keywords of said sets so as to increase the number of positive matches with said sets of keywords.

5. A system as in claim 1 wherein:

said agent is provided with means to monitor inputs of a user, to detect a change in those inputs and to modify or substitute a keyword set associated with said user on detection of a change.

6. A system as in claim 1 wherein:

said system is provided with means to change a keyword set associated with a user in response to a request by that user.

7. A system as in claim 1 wherein:

said system is provided with means to store at least one data clustering algorithm and to apply the algorithm to one or more keyword sets so as to modify said keyword set or sets prior to comparison with meta-information.

8. A system as in claim 1 comprising:

multiple agents, said multiple agents being allocated to different respective users of said system.

31. An information access system as in claim 1, 13 or 27 wherein said software agent is adaptive so as to alter its method of operation in response to the content of information that it accesses.

32. An information access system as in claim 1, 13 or 27 wherein said software agent pro actively suggests to a user the altering or adding of at least one key word associated with that user in response to the content of information that it accesses using an existing set of key words for that user.

9. A method of monitoring meta-information inputted to a meta-information data store, the input meta-information being requested by any of a plurality of users, for the purpose of alerting a first user to input meta-information requested by a second user in accordance with alert criteria determined at least in part by said first user, said method comprising:

i) storing a user profile for each of said users, which profile comprises at least one set of keywords and an identifier for each of said users;

ii) detecting a request by said second user for meta-information to be entered to said data store;

iii) processing said request with a software agent and generating with said agent said meta-information entry;

iv) automatically comparing said meta-information entry with a keyword set from said user profile for said first user; and

v) in the event of a positive result from said comparison, automatically generating and transmitting by said agent a message addressed to said first user.

10. A method as in claim 9 which further comprises:

monitoring information input requests by respective users and,

on detection of a significant change in said information input requests made by a particular user, changing said keyword set used in step iv) for that particular user in the event of an information input request by a different user.

11. A method as in claim 9 wherein:

each information input includes at least one set of keywords associated with a respective document,

a similarity matrix is generated for at least two of said sets of keywords, and

said similarity matrix is used to extend the scope of a keyword set from a user profile in step iv) so as to obtain an increase in the number of positive results for said associated user.

12. A method as in claim 9 which further comprises the steps of:

applying a clustering algorithm to a keyword set from a user profile so as to divide said keyword set into sub-keyword sets, and

applying at least one of said sub-keyword sets in place of said full keyword set in step iv).

13. An information access system, for accessing sets of information stored in a distributed manner and accessible by means of a communications network, the access system comprising:

i) an input for receiving a set of information;

ii) data storage, or means to access data storage, for storing at least one set of predetermined keywords;

iii) generation means, triggerable;

(a) to generate at least one set of meta-information from the set of information received at the input, the meta-information including at least a pointer for the set of information where stored in said distributed manner, and (b) to locally store the at least one set of meta-information in the data storage;

iv) comparison means for comparing at least one of the at least one set of stored keywords with the at least one set of meta-information; and

v) means for automatically generating and transmitting a message back to a user associated with said at least one set of stored keywords in dependence upon the result of the comparison.

14. A system as in claim 13, wherein said at least one set of predetermined keywords is associated with a specified user and system includes means to address the alert message to that user.

15. A system as in claim 13 for use by a plurality of users, each of the plurality of users having at least one associated set of keywords stored in the data storage, wherein the system is triggerable, on activation of the generation means to generate a set of meta-information by a first user, to compare the at least one set of meta-information with at least one set of predetermined keywords associated with a second user and to address an alert message to the second user in dependence upon the result of the comparison.

16. A system as in claim 13 wherein the system is provided with a thesaurus of synonyms for the sets of keywords so as to increase the number of positive matches with the sets of keywords.

17. A system as in claim 13 wherein the system is provided with monitoring means adapted to monitor information sets selected for input by a user, to detect a change in the information sets so selected and to modify or substitute a keyword set associated with that user on detection of the change.

18. A system as in claim 13 wherein the system is provided with means to change a keyword set associated with a user in response to a request by that user.

19. A system as in claim 13 wherein the system is further provided with at least one data clustering means adapted to operate according to at least one data clustering algorithm and wherein said system is further adapted to apply the data clustering means to one or more keyword sets so as to modify the keyword set or sets prior to comparison with a set of said meta-information.

20. A system as in claim 13 comprising a plurality of software agents, each agent comprising elements i) to v), and each agent being allocated to a different respective user of the system.

21. A system as in claim 13 wherein said pointer comprises at least an address for accessing the information set by means of the communications network.

22. A system as in claim 13 wherein said generation means comprises summary means for generating a summary of the information set.

23. A method of monitoring information sets stored in a distributed manner and accessible by means of a communications network for the purpose of alerting a first user in accordance with alert criteria determined at least in part by the first user to a locally accessible stored corresponding meta-information set identified by a second user, the method comprising:

i) locally accessing a stored user profile for each of said users, which profile comprises at least one set of keywords and an identifier for each of said users;

ii) detecting a request by the second user to store, in a meta-information data store, meta-information relating to the identified information set;

iii) in response to the request, using a software agent to generate a set of meta-information dependent on the identified information set;

iv) automatically comparing the generated set of meta-information with a keyword set from the user profile for the first user; and

v) in dependence upon the result from the comparison, automatically generating and transmitting by said agent a message addressed to the first user.

24. A method as in claim 23 which further comprises monitoring information input requests by respective users and, on detection of a significant change in the information input requests made by a particular user, changing the keyword set used in step iv) for that particular user in the event of an information input request by a different user.

25. A method as in claim 23 wherein each information input includes at least one set of keywords associated with a respective document, and wherein the method further comprises the steps of generating a similarity matrix for at least two of the sets of keywords, and using the similarity matrix to extend the scope of a keyword set from a user profile in step iv) so as to obtain an increase in the number of positive results for the associated user.

26. A method as in claim 23 which further comprises the step of applying a clustering algorithm to a keyword set from a user profile so as to divide the keyword set into sub-keyword sets and applying at least one of the sub-keyword sets in place of the full keyword set in step iv).

33. A method as in claim 9, 23 or 28 wherein said software agent is adaptive so as to alter its method of operation in response to the content of information that it accesses.

34. A method as in claim 9, 23 or 28 wherein said software agent pro actively suggests to a user the altering or adding of at least one key word associated with that user in response to the content of information that it accesses using an existing set of key words for that user.

27. An information access system, for accessing sets of information stored in a distributed manner and accessible by means of a communication network, the access system comprising:

i) an input for receiving a set of information;

ii) means to locally access data storage storing at least one set of predetermined keywords;

iii) generation means, triggerable;

(a) to generate at least one set of meta-information from the set of information received at the input, the meta-information including at least a pointer for the set of information when stored in said distributed manner, and (b) to store said set of meta-information when stored in the data storage;

iv) clustering means, adapted to operate according to at least one keyword clustering algorithm, arranged to operate on a stored set of keywords to modify the keyword set with reference to meta-information stored in the data storage; and

v) searching means to apply a keyword set modified by the clustering means to search for further information sets.

28. A method of accessing sets of information stored in a distributed manner and accessible by means of a communications network, the method including the steps of:

i) locally accessing, for each of one or more users, a stored user profile comprising at least one set of keywords and an identifier for the user;

ii) receiving a plurality of information sets identified by one or more users and using an adaptive software agent to generate and store a set of meta-information in respect of each said identified information set;

iii) applying, to keywords in a user profile, a keyword clustering algorithm operating with reference to the stored meta-information to modify the user profile; and

iv) using the modified user profile from step iii) with said agent to identify one or more further sets of information,

wherein said adaptive agent provides storing locally accessible said meta-information including a pointer and keywords based on information gathered from a distributed network.

29. A method as in claim 28 wherein at step iii), the clustering algorithm calculates a measure of the relationship between a selected pair of keywords in terms of the frequency of occurrence of one or both keywords in information sets referenced by the stored meta-information, thereby associating keywords having the closest measured relationship and dividing the user profile into sub-sets of associated keywords.

30. A method as in claim 28 wherein at step iii), the clustering algorithm is arranged to identify one or more keywords in the store, other than those in the user profile, clustered in close association with one or more keywords in the user profile, and wherein the user profile is modified through addition of the one or more identified keywords to the profile.