Information retrieval from a collection of data

• US 7,376,641 B2
• Filed: 02/02/2004
• Issued: 05/20/2008
• Est. Priority Date: 05/02/2000
• Status: Expired due to Fees

• Current Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Original Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Inventors: Lau, Raymond, Chang, Jane Wen, McCandless, Michael Kyle
• Primary Examiner(s): Rones; Charles
• Assistant Examiner(s): BETIT, JACOB F
• Application Number:
  US10/770,295
• Publication Number:
  US 20040167889A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,569 Days
• Field of Search: 707 1- 10, 707/100, 715/501.1
• US Class Current: 707/708
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/2228 Indexing structures
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/31 Indexing; Data structures therefor; Storage structures
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/951 Indexing; Web crawling techniques
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/954 Relational
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/956 Hierarchical
• 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 707/99935 Query augmenting and refining, e.g. inexact access
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99936 Pattern matching access

Abstract

A method of accessing information from a collection of data includes receiving a query, generating an inverse index of the collection of data and generating results to the query in conjunction with the inverse index.

Claims

1. A computer-implemented method of accessing information from a collection of data comprising:

receiving a query;

generating an inverse index of the collection of data that is augmented with category hierarchy information, by applying a parser and grammar rules to the collection of data to produce a canonical non-terminal representation of the data, storing the canonical non-terminal representation of the data in the inverse index, and storing the category hierarchical information generated from the collection of data with the inverse index; and

generating results to the query in conjunction with the inverse index by performing a search request of the inverse index, by applying the parser and the grammar rules to the query to produce a query canonical form and matching the query canonical form to the canonical non-terminal representation of the data in the inverse index, and using results from the search request with a search request of a relational database management system, wherein a match to an item in the inverse index also retrieves corresponding category hierarchy information stored with the inverse index, and the category hierarchy information is then mapped to items in the relational database management system in performing the search request of the relational database management system.

2. A computer program, residing on a computer-readable medium, comprising instructions for causing a computer to:

receive a query;

generate an inverse index of a collection of data that is augmented with category hierarchy information, by applying a parser and grammar rules to the collection of data to produce a canonical non-terminal representation of the data, storing the canonical non-terminal representation of the data in the inverse index, and storing the category hierarchical information generated from the collection of data with the inverse index; and

generate results to the query in conjunction with the inverse index by performing a search request of the inverse index, by applying the parser and the grammar rules to the query to produce a query canonical form and matching the query canonical form to the canonical non-terminal representation of the data in the inverse index, and using results from the search request with a search request of a relational database management system, wherein a match to an item in the inverse index also retrieves corresponding category hierarchy information stored with the inverse index, and the category hierarchy information is then mapped to items in the relational database management system in performing the search request of the relational database management system.