Ontology-based network search engine

• US 8,140,535 B2
• Filed: 10/23/2007
• Issued: 03/20/2012
• Est. Priority Date: 10/23/2007
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Original Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Inventors: Eggebraaten, Thomas John, Tenner, Jeffrey Wayne, Wenzel, Shannon Everett, Will, Eric W.
• Primary Examiner(s): Mofiz, Apu
• Assistant Examiner(s): BIBBEE, JARED M
• Application Number:
  US11/876,989
• Publication Number:
  US 20090106217A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,610 Days
• Field of Search: 707/3, 707/5, 707/706, 707/715, 707/736, 707/741
• US Class Current: 707/741
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/313 Selection or weighting of terms for indexing
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/951 Indexing; Web crawling techniques

Abstract

A method and apparatus for searching for a documents residing on a network comprises receiving a search request from a user. The search request comprises one or more search terms of an ontology. The ontology includes a plurality of terms. One or more of the plurality of terms includes a plurality of sub-category terms. One or more documents residing on the network is identified based on the one or more search terms and an ontology index. The ontology index comprises a plurality of relationships between the plurality of terms and sub-category terms of the ontology and a plurality of documents residing on the network. One or more search results that describe the one or more documents is presented to the user. The one or more documents contain the one or more search terms, or one of the plurality of sub-category terms of the one or more search terms.

Claims

1. A computer-implemented method of registering an ontology with a search engine provider, comprising:

receiving an ontology definition comprising a plurality of terms from an ontology owner; and

creating an ontology index based on the ontology definition and a keyword index, wherein the keyword index includes a plurality of relationships between a plurality of keywords and a plurality of documents residing on a network, and wherein the ontology index includes a plurality of relationships between the plurality of terms and the plurality of documents residing on the network, comprising;

creating a plurality of ontology index entries, wherein each of the plurality of ontology index entries corresponds to a respective one of the plurality of terms in the ontology definition; and

for each of the plurality of ontology index entries;

searching the keyword index for the corresponding one of the plurality of terms to identify one or more related documents; and

inserting an identifier of the identified one or more related documents into the ontology index entry.

2. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

providing an interface to a search engine server of the search engine provider, wherein a user may specify search terms for searching the ontology index.

3. The method of claim 2, further comprising:

receiving a search request, comprising one or more search terms of the ontology;

identifying one or more documents residing on the network based on the one or more search terms, the ontology, and the ontology index; and

presenting one or more search results that describe the one or more documents to the user, wherein the one or more documents contain the one or more search terms, or a sub-category term of the one or more search terms.

4. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

generating an ontology handle, wherein an ontology handle enables a user to view the ontology definition and search the ontology index;

sending the ontology handle to the ontology owner.

5. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

providing an interface to a search engine server of the search engine provider, wherein a user may specify search terms for searching the ontology.

6. The method of claim 5, wherein the interface further comprises a drop-down selectable list of a plurality of publicly available ontologies.

18. The method of claim 1, wherein searching the keyword index for the corresponding one of the plurality of terms to identify one or more related documents further comprises:

determining that the corresponding one of the plurality of terms contains a plurality of words; and

searching the keyword index to determine that all of the plurality of words appear in each of the identified one or more related documents consecutively and in sequence.

7. A computer-readable storage medium containing a program which, when executed, performs an operation, comprising:

receiving an ontology definition comprising a plurality of terms from an ontology owner; and

creating an ontology index based on the ontology definition and a keyword index, wherein the keyword index includes a plurality of relationships between a plurality of keywords and a plurality of documents residing on a network, and wherein the ontology index includes a plurality of relationships between the plurality of terms and the plurality of documents residing on the network, comprising;

creating a plurality of ontology index entries, wherein each of the plurality of ontology index entries corresponds to a respective one of the plurality of terms in the ontology definition; and

for each of the plurality of ontology index entries;

searching the keyword index for the corresponding one of the plurality of terms to identify one or more related documents; and

inserting an identifier of the identified one or more related documents into the ontology index entry.

8. The computer-readable storage medium of claim 7, further comprising:

providing an interface to a search engine server of the search engine provider, wherein a user may specify search terms for searching the ontology index.

9. The computer-readable storage medium of claim 8, further comprising:

receiving a search request, comprising one or more search terms of the ontology;

identifying one or more documents residing on the network based on the one or more search terms, the ontology, and the ontology index; and

presenting one or more search results that describe the one or more documents to the user, wherein the one or more documents contain the one or more search terms, or a sub-category term of the one or more search terms.

10. The computer-readable storage medium of claim 7, further comprising:

generating an ontology handle, wherein an ontology handle enables a user to view the ontology definition and search the ontology index;

sending the ontology handle to the ontology owner.

11. The computer-readable storage medium of claim 7, further comprising:

providing an interface to a search engine server of the search engine provider, wherein a user may specify search terms for searching the ontology.

12. The computer-readable storage medium of claim 11, wherein the interface further comprises a drop-down selectable list of a plurality of publicly available ontologies.

19. The computer-readable storage medium of claim 7, wherein searching the keyword index for the corresponding one of the plurality of terms to identify one or more related documents further comprises:

determining that the corresponding one of the plurality of terms contains a plurality of words; and

searching the keyword index to determine that all of the plurality of words appear in each of the identified one or more related documents consecutively and in sequence.

13. A system, comprising:

a processor;

a memory containing a program configured to register an ontology with a search engine provider, the program, when executed on the processor, performs an operation, comprising;

receiving an ontology definition comprising a plurality of terms from an ontology owner; and

creating an ontology index based on the ontology definition and a keyword index, wherein the keyword index includes a plurality of relationships between a plurality of keywords and a plurality of documents residing on a network, and wherein the ontology index includes a plurality of relationships between the plurality of terms and the plurality of documents residing on the network, comprising;

creating a plurality of ontology index entries, wherein each of the plurality of ontology index entries corresponds to a respective one of the plurality of terms in the ontology definition; and

for each of the plurality of ontology index entries;

searching the keyword index for the corresponding one of the plurality of terms to identify one or more related documents; and

inserting an identifier of the identified one or more related documents into the ontology index entry.

14. The system of claim 13, further comprising:

providing an interface to a search engine server of the search engine provider, wherein a user may specify search terms for searching the ontology index.

15. The system of claim 13, further comprising:

generating an ontology handle, wherein an ontology handle enables a user to view the ontology definition and search the ontology index;

sending the ontology handle to the ontology owner.

16. The system of claim 13, further comprising:

providing an interface to a search engine server of the search engine provider, wherein a user may specify search terms for searching the ontology.

17. The system of claim 16, wherein the interface further comprises a drop-down selectable list of a plurality of publicly available ontologies.

20. The system of claim 13, wherein searching the keyword index for the corresponding one of the plurality of terms to identify one or more related documents further comprises:

determining that the corresponding one of the plurality of terms contains a plurality of words; and

searching the keyword index to determine that all of the plurality of words appear in each of the identified one or more related documents consecutively and in sequence.