Using question answering (QA) systems to identify answers and evidence of different medium types

• US 9,613,093 B2
• Filed: 10/16/2014
• Issued: 04/04/2017
• Est. Priority Date: 10/16/2014
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Original Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Inventors: Clark, Adam T., Huebert, Jeffrey K., Payton, Aspen L., Petri, John E.
• Primary Examiner(s): Woo, Isaac M
• Application Number:
  US14/515,587
• Publication Number:
  US 20160110415A1
• Time in Patent Office: 901 Days
• Field of Search: 707600-899
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/24535 of sub-queries or views
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/332 Query formulation

Abstract

First, a computer may receive an input query of a first medium type. The input query may then be analyzed. Based on the analysis, the input query may be categorized as being associated with at least a second medium type. A first-medium-type search of a set of corpora may then be performed. Based on the results of the first-medium-type search, a candidate answer of the first medium type may be generated. In response to the categorizing, a second-medium-type search of the set of corpora may also be performed.

Claims

1. A computer program product comprising a non-transitory computer readable storage medium having program instructions embodied therewith, the program instructions executable by a computer to cause the computer to:

receive an input query of a first medium type;

analyze the input query;

categorize, based on the analyzing, the input query as being associated with at least a second medium type;

perform a first-medium-type search of a set of corpora;

generate, as a result of the first-medium-type search, a candidate answer of the first medium type;

calculate a confidence score for the candidate answer;

determine that the confidence score is below a threshold confidence score; and

perform, in response to both the determining and the categorizing, a second-medium-type search of the set of corpora.

2. A system comprising one or more circuits configured to perform a method comprising:

receiving an input query of a first medium type;

analyzing the input query;

categorizing, based on the analyzing, the input query as being associated with at least a second medium type;

performing a first-medium-type search of a set of corpora;

generating, as a result of the first-medium-type search, a candidate answer of the first medium type;

calculating a confidence score for the candidate answer;

determining that the confidence score is below a threshold confidence score; and

performing, in response to both the determining and the categorizing, a second-medium-type search of the set of corpora.

3. The system of claim 2, wherein the input query is created by a user, and wherein the one or more circuits are further configured to perform the method comprising:

generating, as a result of the second-medium-type search, a second candidate answer; and

presenting the second candidate answer to the user.

4. The system of claim 3, wherein the second candidate answer is of the first medium type.

5. The system of claim 3, wherein the second candidate answer is of the second medium type.

6. The system of claim 3, wherein the first medium type is a textual type, and wherein the second medium type is one of the group consisting of an image type, an audio type, and a video type.

7. The system of claim 6, wherein the set of corpora includes a set of source items of the second medium type, and wherein the performing the second-medium-type search comprises:

extracting data from the set of source items; and

processing the extracted data.

8. The system of claim 7, wherein the extracted data includes non-textual extracted data.

9. The system of claim 8, wherein the extracted data includes textual extracted data.

10. The system of claim 2, wherein the set of corpora includes a first corpus and a second corpus, wherein the performing the first-medium-type search is a search of the first corpus, and wherein the performing the second-medium-type search is a search of the second corpus.

11. The system of claim 2, wherein the at least the second medium type includes the second medium type and a third medium type, and wherein the one or more circuits are further configured to perform the method comprising:

performing a third-medium-type search of the set of corpora.

12. The system of claim 2, wherein the categorizing the input query as being associated with at least a second medium type occurs in response to determining that at least a portion of the input query represents a concept encompassed within an ontology of the second medium type.

13. The system of claim 2, wherein the first medium type is a textual type, and wherein the analyzing the input query includes:

parsing, by a natural language processing technique configured to analyze syntactic and semantic content, the input query.

14. A system comprising one or more circuits configured to perform a method comprising:

receiving an input query of a first medium type;

analyzing the input query;

categorizing, based on the analyzing, the input query as being associated with at least a second medium type;

performing a first-medium-type search of a set of corpora; and

performing, in response to the categorizing, a second-medium-type search of the set of corpora,

wherein the first medium type is a textual type, wherein the second medium type is an image type, wherein the set of corpora include a textual source item and further include an image-type source item, wherein the performing the first-medium-type search includes extracting a first textual data from the textual source item and further includes processing the extracted first textual data, wherein the performing the second-medium-type search includes extracting second textual data from the image-type source item and further includes processing the extracted second textual data, and wherein the one or more circuits are further configured to perform the method comprising;

generating, based on the processing the extracted first textual data, a textual candidate answer;

calculating a confidence score for the textual candidate answer;

determining that the confidence score is below a threshold confidence score, wherein the performing the second-medium-type search occurs in response to both the determining and the categorizing;

generating, based on the processing the extracted second textual data, an image-type candidate answer including the image-type source item; and

presenting the image-type candidate answer to the user.