Method and apparatus for establishing relationship between documents

• US 7,809,716 B2
• Filed: 04/26/2007
• Issued: 10/05/2010
• Est. Priority Date: 06/27/2006
• Status: Expired due to Fees

• Current Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Original Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Inventors: Fei, Ben, Su, Zhong, Wang, Qing Bo, Chen, Wei Zhu
• Primary Examiner(s): Jalil; Neveen Abel
• Assistant Examiner(s): Liang; Vei-Chung
• Application Number:
  US11/740,431
• Publication Number:
  US 20070299826A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,258 Days
• Field of Search: None
• US Class Current: 707/721
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/31 Indexing; Data structures therefor; Storage structures

Abstract

The present invention is directed to a method and apparatus for establishing documents relationship based on user'"'"'s operation upon search result. When a user uses search engine to search for documents with a query in repository, the search result may be a list of ranked documents, and these documents may contain a lot of relationship in term of the specific query. If the user clicks some search result further, and if the click and open operation meet certain conditions, for example exceed a period of time, the clicked document could be deemed as related to the search query. Furthermore it could be inferred that there is a strong relationship between different documents clicked by the user. The present invention records the relationship between documents and presents it to the user when necessary.

Claims

1. A method for establishing relationship between documents in term of a user'"'"'s operation upon a document search result, wherein the document search result is obtained from a search based on one or more search queries, the method comprising:

monitoring the user'"'"'s operation upon the document search result;

obtaining one or more documents selected by the user according to the operation and storing a related document list for the selected documents, the related document list being different from the document search result;

depicting a document relationship according to the related document list by using at least the one or more search queries, and

creating a document relationship table stored in a document relationship repository, the table containing a relevance degree of the document relationship between at least one pair of the documents in the search result,

wherein at least one of the selected documents is opened by the user for browsing, in the search result, and the relevance degree between said pair of documents is a query-based relevance degree averaged over at least two search queries; and

wherein said at least one of the selected documents meets a criteria for being a related document, the criteria comprises one or more following conditions;

whether the duration of the selected document being opened exceeds a predefined period;

the number of times of the selected document being opened exceeds a predefined value;

the selected document is opened within a predefined time frame; and

the selected document is opened in a predefined opening sequence.

2. The method of claim 1, further comprising determining whether the at least one of the selected documents meets the criteria for being a related document, and if the document meets the criteria, storing the document as a related document;

otherwise not storing the document as a related document.

3. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

detecting and storing extra information of the related document list, and

recording the document relationship according to the related document list and the extra information.

4. The method of claim 3, wherein the extra information comprises the duration of the document being opened, the number of times that the same document is opened by the user, the time when the selected document is opened, and/or the opening sequence in which the user selected document is opened.

5. The method of claim 3, wherein recording the documents relationship comprises computing the relevance degree between documents based on at least one of the search queries, according to at least the extra information, and depicting the document relationship by using at least the one or more search queries and the relevance degree between documents.

6. A method for checking related document according to the document relationship determined by the method in claim 1, comprising:

receiving an entry document selected by a user;

checking the related document which has relationship with the entry document; and

returning a checking result which contains the related document to the user.

7. The method of claim 6, wherein returning the checking result to the user further comprises returning the one or more search queries associated with the entry document, and the related document associated with the entry document to the user, wherein the related document is indexed by the one or more search queries.

8. The method of claim 6, wherein returning the checking result to the user further comprises returning the related document associated with the entry document, and the one or more search queries associated with the entry document to the user, wherein the one or more search queries are indexed by the related document.

9. An apparatus of establishing relationship between documents in term of a user'"'"'s operation upon a document search result, wherein the document search result is obtained from a search based on one or more search queries:

the apparatus comprising;

a log monitor for monitoring the user'"'"'s operation upon the search result, and obtaining one or more documents selected by the user according to the operation;

a log repository for storing a related document list for the selected document(s), the related document list being different from the search result;

a log analyzer for obtaining a document relationship according to the related document list and creating a document relationship table containing a relevance degree of the document relationship between at least one pair of the documents in the search result; and

a document relationship repository for storing said relevance degree of said document relationship,

wherein, the document relationship is depicted at least by using the one or more search queries;

at least one of the selected documents is opened by the user for browsing, in the search result, and the relevance degree between said pair of documents is a query-based relevance degree averaged over at least two search queries; and

said at least one of the documents selected meets a criteria for being a related document, the criteria comprises one or more following conditions;

whether the duration of the selected document being opened exceeds a predefined period;

the number of times of the selected document being opened exceeds a predefined value;

the selected document is opened within a predefined time frame; and

the selected document is opened in a predefined opening sequence.

10. The apparatus of claim 9, further comprising:

a means for determining whether the at least one of the documents selected by the user meets the criteria for being a related document, and if the document meets the criteria, storing the document as a related document, otherwise not storing the document as a related document.

11. The apparatus of claim 9, further comprising:

a means for detecting and storing extra information of the related document, and

a means for recording the document relationship according to the related document list and the extra information.

12. The apparatus of claim 11, wherein the extra information comprises the duration of the document being opening, the number of times that the same document is opened by the user, the time when the selected document is opened, and/or the opening sequence in which the user selected document is opened.

13. The apparatus of claim 11, wherein the means for recording the documents relationship further comprises a means for computing the relevance degree between documents according to at least one of the extra information, and depicting the documents relationship by using at least the one or more search queries and the relevance degree between documents.

14. An apparatus for checking the related document according to the document relationship determined by the apparatus in claim 9, comprising:

a means for receiving an entry document selected by a user;

a means for checking the related document which has relationship with the entry document; and

a means for returning a checking result which contains the related document to the user.

15. The apparatus of claim 14, wherein the means for returning the checking result to the user further comprises a means for returning the one or more search queries associated with the entry document, and the related document associated with the entry document to the user, wherein the related document is indexed by the one or more search queries.

16. The apparatus of claim 14, wherein the means for returning a checking result to the user further comprises a means for returning the related document associated with the entry document, and one of the search queries associated with the entry document to the user, wherein the one or more search queries are indexed by the related document.

17. A computer-readable storage medium having stored thereon a set of instructions that, when executed by a computer, results in establishing relationship between documents in term of a user'"'"'s operation upon a document search result, wherein the document search result is obtained from a search based on one or more search queries, by:

monitoring a user'"'"'s operation upon the search result;

obtaining one or more documents selected by the user according to the operation and storing a related document list for the selected documents, the related document list being different from the search result;

depicting a document relationship according to the related document list by using at least the one or more search queries, and

creating a document relationship table stored in a document relationship repository, the table containing a relevance degree of the document relationship between at least one pair of the documents in the search result,

wherein the relevance degree is a query-based relevance degree between said pair of documents, said relevance degree being averaged over at least two search queries;

wherein at least one of the selected documents is opened by the user for browsing, in the search result, and the relevance degree between said pair of documents is a query-based relevance degree averaged over at least two search queries; and

wherein said at least one of the selected documents meets a criteria for being a related document, the criteria comprises one or more following conditions;

whether the duration of the selected document being opened exceeds a predefined period;

the number of times of the selected document being opened exceeds a predefined value;

the selected document is opened within a predefined time frame; and

the selected document is opened in a predefined opening sequence.