Rendering discriminator members from an initial set of result data

• US 6,668,251 B1
• Filed: 11/01/2000
• Issued: 12/23/2003
• Est. Priority Date: 11/01/2000
• Status: Expired due to Term

• Current Assignee: Oracle International Corporation (Oracle Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Tacit Software, Inc. (Oracle Corporation)
• Inventors: Goldberg, Jonathan M.
• Primary Examiner(s): Robinson, Greta
• Assistant Examiner(s): Black, Linh
• Application Number:
  US09/704,423
• Time in Patent Office: 1,147 Days
• Field of Search: 707/1-10, 707/100-104, 709/206
• US Class Current: 707/706
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/3326 using relevance feedback from the user, e.g. relevance feedback on documents, documents sets, document terms or passages
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99931 Database or file accessing
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99932 Access augmentation or optimizing
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99933 Query processing, i.e. searching
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99934 Query formulation, input preparation, or translation
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99935 Query augmenting and refining, e.g. inexact access

Abstract

A search is refined, where a user enters a keyword, and a database comprising terms is searched for terms comprising the keyword. Every unique member in the terms is assigned an importance value to produce a set of discriminator members. The discriminator members are presented to the user, and the user may select one or more of the discriminator members to refine the search. If the user selects any keywords, a new keyword is created using the original keyword and the selected discriminator members. A new search is conducted based on the new keyword.

Claims

1. A method to refine a search, comprising:

receiving a keyword;

accessing a database comprising terms, each term comprising one or more members;

finding associated terms in the database, the associated terms comprising the keyword;

creating a set of discriminator members, each discriminator member comprising a member of one or more of the associated terms and a corresponding importance value, said creating comprising;

extracting all members from the terms in the database and creating a set of members unique from each other; and

determining an importance value for each unique member; and

returning the discriminator members.

2. A method as in claim 1, wherein said determining of the importance value of a unique member comprises any one or more of the following:

determining the number of terms in which the unique member occurs;

determining the value of the term in which the unique member occurs; and

determining the value of the unique member in each of the terms.

3. A method as in claim 2, wherein the terms comprise associated terms.

4. A method as in claim 2, wherein said determining the value of the term in which the member occurs comprises determining a confidence level of the term in which the member occurs.

5. A method as in claim 2, wherein said determining of the importance value of the member in each of the terms comprises any one or more of the following:

determining a weight assigned to the part of speech of the member in the term;

determining a weight assigned to the part of speech of the other members in the term; and

determining a total number of members in the term.

6. A method as in claim 1, wherein said returning the discriminator members comprises displaying the discriminator members.

7. A method as in claim 6, wherein said displaying the discriminator members comprises displaying the discriminator members in an order of importance.

8. A method as in claim 7, wherein said displaying the discriminator members in the order of importance comprises displaying the discriminator members in an order of decreasing frequency.

9. A method as in claim 1, additionally comprising removing from any discriminator members those members that match the keyword prior to returning the discriminator members.

10. A method as in claim 1, additionally comprising removing from any discriminator members those members that match the keyword prior to creating a set of discriminator members.

11. A method to refine a search, comprising:

receiving a request to conduct a first search using a keyword;

accessing a database comprising terms, each term comprising one or more members;

finding associated terms in the database, the associated terms comprising the keyword;

returning the associated terms;

receiving a request to refine the first search;

creating a set of discriminator members, each discriminator member comprising a member of one or more of the associated terms and a corresponding importance value, said creating comprising;

extracting members from the database and creating a unique set of members; and

determining an importance value for each unique member; and

returning the discriminator members.

12. A method as in claim 11, additionally comprising:

receiving one or more selected discriminator members; and

generating a second search using the keyword in conjunction with the one or more selected discriminator members.

13. A method as in claim 11, wherein said determining the importance of a given member comprises any one or more of the following:

determining a number of terms in which the member occurs;

determining a value of the term in which the member occurs; and

determining a value of the member in each of the terms.

14. A method as in claim 13, wherein said determining of the value of the term in which the member occurs comprises determining a confidence level of the term in which the member occurs.

15. A method as in claim 13, wherein said determining of the value of the member in each of the terms comprises any one or more of the following:

determining a weight assigned to a part of speech of the member in the term;

determining a weight assigned to a part of speech of the other members in the term; and

determining a total number of members in the term.

16. A method as in claim 13, wherein said determining of the value of the term in which the member occurs comprises determining a confidence level of the term in which the member occurs.

17. A system to refine a search, comprising:

a database comprising terms, each term comprising one or more members;

a search engine to process a keyword to conduct a first search of a database, the search engine to create a set of discriminator members by;

extracting terms from the database that are associated terms;

determining an importance value for each unique member of every term in the database; and

returning the discriminator members.

18. A system as in claim 17, the search engine additionally to:

receive a request to conduct a second search;

receive one or more selected discriminator members; and

conduct the second search using the keyword in conjunction with the selected discriminator members.

19. A machine-readable medium having stored thereon data representing sequences of instructions, the sequences of instructions which, when executed by a processor, cause the processor to perform the following:

receive a keyword;

access a database comprising terms, each term comprising one or more members;

find associated terms in the database, the associated terms comprising the keyword;

create a set of discriminator members, each discriminator member comprising a member of one or more of the associated terms and a corresponding importance value, said creating comprising;

extracting all members from the terms in the database and creating a set of members unique from each other; and

determining an importance value for each unique member; and

returning the discriminator members.

20. A medium as in claim 19, wherein said determining of the importance value of a unique member comprises any one or more of the following:

determining a number of terms in which the unique member occurs;

determining a value of the term in which the unique member occurs; and

determining a value of the unique member in each of the terms.

21. A medium as in claim 20, wherein the terms comprise associated terms.

22. A medium as in claim 20, wherein said determining the value of the term in which the member occurs comprises determining the confidence level of the term in which the member occurs.

23. A medium as in claim 20, wherein said determining the value of the member in each of the terms comprises any one or more of the following:

determining the weight assigned to the part of speech of the member in the term;

determining the weight assigned to the part of speech of the other members in the term; and

determining the total number of members in the term.

24. A medium as in claim 19, wherein said returning the discriminator members comprises displaying the discriminator members.

25. A method comprising:

identifying associated terms in a database, the associated terms comprising one or more term members, wherein the associated terms include a received keyword;

determining an importance value for each unique term member of the identified associated terms and assigning the importance value to each unique term member; and

creating discriminator terms, each discriminator term including one more unique term members of the associated terms and corresponding importance value for each unique term member of the associated terms.

26. The method of claim 25, wherein the determining of the importance value for each unique member comprises one or more of the following:

determining the number of terms in which the unique member occurs;

determining the value of the term in which the unique member occurs; and

determining the value of the unique member in each of the terms.

27. The method of claim 25, wherein the determining of the importance value for each member in each of the terms comprises one or more of the following:

determining a weight assigned to the part of speech of the member in the term;

determining a weight assigned to the part of speech of the other members in the term; and

determining a total number of members in the term.

28. The method of claim 25 further comprising displaying discriminator members to a user.

29. The method of claim 28 wherein the displaying the discriminator members comprises displaying the discriminator members in an order of importance.

30. The method of claim 28 further comprising removing from discriminator members those members that match the keyword prior to displaying the discriminator members to a user.