System and method for geocoding diverse address formats

• US 7,685,108 B2
• Filed: 10/05/2005
• Issued: 03/23/2010
• Est. Priority Date: 05/31/2001
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Precisely Software Incorporated
• Original Assignee: Pitney Bowes Software Incorporated (Böwe Systec AG)
• Inventors: Schwerin, Chuck, Miller, Julia K.
• Primary Examiner(s): Ehichioya; Fred I
• Application Number:
  US11/242,920
• Publication Number:
  US 20060041573A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,630 Days
• Field of Search: 707/1, 707/3, 707/6, 707/100, 707/101, 707/200, 701/201, 701/202, 701/207, 701/211, 701/217, 709/202, 715/737, 715/738, 715/764
• US Class Current: 707/706
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/29 Geographical information databases
• CPC Class Codes: G09B 29/106 using electronic means
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99934 Query formulation, input preparation, or translation
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99936 Pattern matching access
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99939 Privileged access
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99943 Generating database or data structure, e.g. via user interface
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99945 Object-oriented database structure processing

Abstract

A method and system for providing geocodes in response to complete or partial address information is disclosed. The disclosure teaches embodiments that are naturally upgraded to integrate changing spatial information due to addition of countries, better data, political changes, and other similar changes in geographical data. A single geocoding engine is capable of handling the various address formats in use in different countries and jurisdictions. The disclosed embodiments are error tolerant and capable of overcoming many errors due to spelling, variety of languages and formats used to provide and address. The diversity in addresses due to, for instance country-specific formats such as postal-codes are naturally integrated into existing database of geocoding information. Preferably, the embodiments are based on JAVA to allow platform independence and use XML based communication to use networks without requiring excessive resources while providing fast services.

Claims

1. A computer geocoding engine for providing geocodes in response to receiving address information from a remote user, the geocoding engine comprising:

a processor configured with computer readable instructions, said processor further comprising,

a module for detecting a country code designation in a request to provide a geocode a module for invoking a parser corresponding to the country code from the received request to provide a parsed input address;

a module for detecting a postal-code corresponding to the country code in the received request;

a module for detecting a world city name in the received request;

a module for obtaining a candidate list corresponding to at least one member of a set consisting of the postal-code, the parsed input address, and the world city name;

a module for invoking a matcher module for evaluating the candidate list by matching it to the input address;

a module for invoking an interpolator corresponding to the country code for generating a geocode corresponding to a selected candidate; and

a module for generating a set of ordered matches corresponding to the parsed input address for responding to the request.

3. The computer-implemented method of claim 1 further including the step of selecting a parser corresponding to the country code.

4. The computer-implemented method of claim 1 further including the step of interpolating between know geographical points to generate geographical data corresponding to a selected match from the set of ordered matches for responding to the user request.

5. The computer-implemented method of claim 1 further including the step of interpolating to determine a geocode of a desired type from the selected match form the set of ordered matches for responding to the user request.

2. A computer-implemented method stored on a computer which allows a computer to execute a method for providing geographical information to a plurality of users, the plurality of users employing a plurality of formats of address inputs, the computer-implemented method comprising steps of:

encoding geographical data to generate default data in a parent class;

overriding at least a portion of the default data via a sub-class so that access via the sub-class accesses customized data rather than the overridden;

determining, in response to a user request specifying a country code, the sub-class for processing geographical data corresponding to the country code;

processing the user request via a sub-class implemented parser to generate a parsed object; and

matching the parsed object to generate a set of ordered matches corresponding to the parsed object for responding to the user request.