Customizable filters for personalized search

• US 8,412,698 B1
• Filed: 04/07/2005
• Issued: 04/02/2013
• Est. Priority Date: 04/07/2005
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: R2 Solutions LLC (Acacia Research Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Yahoo! Inc. (Apollo Global Management, Inc.)
• Inventors: Sarukkai, Ramesh R.
• Primary Examiner(s): Le, Uyen T.
• Application Number:
  US11/102,185
• Time in Patent Office: 2,917 Days
• Field of Search: 707/4
• US Class Current: 707/713
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/332 Query formulation
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/9535 Search customisation based on user profiles and personalisation

Abstract

A computerized search filtering method includes receiving on a client system a query from a querier; receiving a selection for a filter record from the querier, the filter record including a set of filter elements; retrieving the filter record from a filter-record database; transferring the query and the filter record to a search filter; adding at least one of the filter elements to the query to generate an amended-query; performing a document-corpus search to identify a set of documents relevant to the amended-query; identifying a subset of the documents that include at least one of the filter elements; and displaying on a display of the client system a set of search results for the subset of the documents.

Claims

1. A computerized search method, the method comprising:

presenting, to a querier, a single interface that includes two mechanisms for specifying search terms for the same query in two different manners;

wherein the first mechanism includes first controls for receiving a query string from the querier;

wherein the second mechanism includes second controls for selecting one of a plurality of selectable items;

wherein each selectable item of the plurality of selectable items corresponds to a filter record of a plurality of filter records;

wherein said first controls allow the querier to enter one or more search terms that comprise the query string;

wherein said second controls allow the querier to specify which filter record, of the plurality of filter records, to use to generate an amended query string based on said query string;

receiving a request from the querier, wherein receiving said request includes receiving a first set of search terms from the querier through said first controls and receiving, through said second controls, a selection of a selectable item;

based on the request indicating the selection of the selectable item, determining that a selected filter record should be used to process the request, wherein the selected filter record corresponds to the selectable item that was selected through said second controls and includes a set of filter elements that correspond to a second set of search terms;

adding search terms that correspond to the filter elements associated with the selected filter record to the first set of search terms to generate said amended query string that includes both the first set of search terms and the second set of search terms; and

performing a document-corpus search of a document-corpus by treating the second set of search terms as if they were a part of said first set of search terms submitted through said first controls, to identify a set of documents relevant to the both the first set of search terms and the second set of search terms;

wherein performing the document-corpus search involves comparing both the first set of search terms and the second set of search terms to terms contained in documents that belong to the document-corpus;

wherein the method is performed by one or more computing devices.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the querier is a human.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein the querier is a computer.

4. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

generating one or more custom filter records based on information extracted from a user profile of the querier;

storing, in a filter-record database, the one or more custom filter records;

selecting, from the filter-record database, at least one custom filter record of the one or more custom filter records to present to the querier based on information associated with the querier;

wherein at least one of the plurality of selectable items corresponds to the at least one custom filter record.

5. The method of claim 1, wherein the text of at least one filter element associated with the selected filter record is not presented to the querier on the single interface.

6. The method of claim 1, wherein the step of adding search terms that correspond to the filter elements associated with the selected filter record to the first set of search terms to generate said amended query string that includes both the first set of search terms and the second set of search terms is performed by a client computing device that performed the presenting step.

7. A search system comprising:

a client system including one or more processors configured to present, to a querier, a single interface that includes two mechanisms for specifying search terms for the same query in two different manners;

wherein the first mechanism includes first controls for receiving a query string from the querier;

wherein the second mechanism includes second controls for selecting one of a plurality of selectable items;

wherein each selectable item of the plurality of selectable items corresponds to a filter record of a plurality of filter records;

wherein said first controls allow the querier to enter one or more search terms that comprise the query string;

wherein the second controls allow the querier to specify which filter record, of the plurality of filter records, to use to generate an amended query string based on said query string,

at least one server system configured to receive a request from the querier, wherein the request includes receiving a first set of search terms from the querier through said first controls and receiving, through said second controls, a selection of a selectable item;

the at least one server system configured to determine, based on the request indicating the selection of the selectable item, that a selected filter record should be used to process the request, wherein the selected filter record corresponds to the selectable item that was selected through said second controls and includes a set of filter elements that correspond to a second set of search terms;

a search filter configured to add, to the first set of search terms, search terms that correspond to the filter elements associated with the selected filter record to generate said amended query string that includes both the first set of search terms and the second set of search terms; and

a search engine including one or more processors configured to perform a document-corpus search of a document-corpus by treating the second set of search terms as if they were a part of said first set of search terms submitted through said first controls, to identify documents relevant to both the first set of search terms and the second set of search terms;

wherein the search engine is configured to perform the document-corpus search by comparing both the first set of search terms and the second set of search terms to terms contained in documents that belong to the document-corpus.

8. The search system of claim 7, wherein the text of at least one filter element associated with the selected filter record is not presented to the querier on the single interface.

9. The search system of claim 7, wherein the search filter is a module of the client system.

10. The search system of claim 7, wherein the search filter is a module of the search engine.

11. The search system of claim 7, further comprising:

one or more custom filter records generated for the querier based on information extracted from a user profile of the querier, and stored in a filter-record database;

the server system configured to select, from the filter-record database, at least one custom filter record of the one or more custom filter records to present to the querier based on information associated with the querier;

wherein at least one of the plurality of selectable items corresponds to the at least one custom filter record.

12. The search system of claim 7, wherein the querier is a computer.

13. The search system of claim 7, wherein the querier is a human.

14. A volatile or non-volatile computer-readable non-transitory storage medium storing one or more sequences of instructions which, when executed by one or more processors, causes the one or more processors to perform:

presenting, to a querier, a single interface that includes two mechanisms for specifying search terms for the same query in two different manners;

wherein the first mechanism includes first controls for receiving a query string from the querier;

wherein the second mechanism includes second controls for selecting one of a plurality of selectable items;

wherein each selectable item of the plurality of selectable items corresponds to a filter record of a plurality of filter records;

wherein said first controls allow the querier to enter one or more search terms that comprise the query string;

wherein said second controls allow the querier to specify which filter record, of the plurality of filter records, to use to generate an amended query string based on said query string;

receiving a request from the querier, wherein receiving said request includes receiving a first set of search terms from the querier through said first controls and receiving, through said second controls, a selection of a selectable item;

based on the request indicating the selection of the selectable item, determining that a selected filter record should be used to process the request, wherein the selected filter record corresponds to the selectable item that was selected through said second controls and includes a set of filter elements that correspond to a second set of search terms;

adding search terms that correspond to the filter elements associated with the selected filter record to the first set of search terms to generate said amended query string that includes both the first set of search terms and the second set of search terms; and

performing a document-corpus search of a document-corpus by treating the second set of search terms as if they were a part of said first set of search terms submitted through said first controls, to identify a set of documents relevant to the both the first set of search terms and the second set of search terms;

wherein performing the document-corpus search involves comparing both the first set of search terms and the second set of search terms to terms contained in documents that belong to the document-corpus.

15. The volatile or non-volatile computer-readable non-transitory storage medium claim 14, wherein the querier is a human.

16. The volatile or non-volatile computer-readable non-transitory storage medium of claim 14, wherein the querier is a computer.

17. A volatile or non-volatile computer-readable non-transitory storage medium of claim 14, further comprising:

generating one or more custom filter records based on information extracted from a user profile of the querier;

storing, in a filter-record database, the one or more custom filter records;

selecting, from the filter-record database, at least one custom filter record of the one or more custom filter records to present to the querier based on information associated with the querier;

wherein at least one of the plurality of selectable items corresponds to the at least one custom filter record.

18. The volatile or non-volatile computer-readable non-transitory storage medium of claim 14, wherein the text of at least one filter element associated with the selected filter record is not presented to the querier on the single interface.

19. The volatile or non-volatile computer-readable non-transitory storage medium of claim 14, wherein adding search terms that correspond to the filter elements associated with the selected filter record to the first set of search terms to generate said amended query string that includes both the first set of search terms and the second set of search terms is performed by a client computing device that performed the presenting.