System, method, and software for inserting hyperlinks into documents

• US 8,001,457 B2
• Filed: 02/06/2006
• Issued: 08/16/2011
• Est. Priority Date: 01/25/1999
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Thomson Reuters Enterprise Centre GmbH (The Woodbridge Co. Ltd.)
• Original Assignee: West Services
• Inventors: Rosenoff, Douglas T., Runde, Craig, Medina, Anthony Mario
• Primary Examiner(s): Nguyen; Maikhanh
• Application Number:
  US11/275,946
• Publication Number:
  US 20070016848A1
• Time in Patent Office: 2,017 Days
• Field of Search: 715/200, 715/205, 715/207, 715/208, 715/209, 715/229, 715/234, 715/243, 715/246, 715/247, 715/251, 715/253, 715/254, 715/255, 715/256, 715/257, 715/273, 707 1- 4, 707/6, 707/100, 707/102, 707/200
• US Class Current: 715/205
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/94 Hypermedia Hyperlinking G06F40/134
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/9558 Details of hyperlinks; Management of linked annotations
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99933 Query processing, i.e. searching

Abstract

Software that automatically locates and marks specific portions of a document and defines hyperlinks including at least a portion of the marked text. An exemplary implementation, tailored for legal citations, processes the portion of the marked text as a search term, and allows completion of hyperlinks without the necessity of including complete file addresses. This implementation also defines a portion of the hyperlinks based on the cost or time of executing the hyperlink, to reduce the cost or time of executing the hyperlink.

Claims

1. A computer-implemented method for automatically inserting hyperlinks into an active document, the method comprising:

locating and marking automatically one or more legal citations, in the active document within a document-processing application;

automatically defining a hyperlink at each location in the active document where the one or more legal citations are found, wherein each hyperlink has a uniform resource locator (URL) including at least a portion of the marked legal citation as a search term and a domain name associated with an online legal research service; and

implementing a search based on the included portion of the marked legal citation, using the URL, in response to selection of the hyperlink;

wherein the hyperlink does not include a specific document address.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the document-processing application includes at least one of a word-processing application, a spread-sheet application, and a presentation-development application.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein the document-processing application includes a version of Microsoft Word or Corel WordPerfect.

4. The method of claim 1, wherein one or more of the hyperlinks further includes account information for a user.

5. The method of claim 1, wherein one or more of the hyperlinks further includes information identifying a third-party sponsor for facilitating access to documents in a database accessible by selecting the hyperlink.

6. The method of claim 1, wherein one or more of the hyperlinks include at least one query connector.

7. The method of claim 1, wherein one or more of the hyperlinks further includes at least one search instruction.

8. The method of claim 1, wherein the hyperlink identifies one of a natural-language search method and a boolean search method.