Techniques for utilizing information associated with an action command to select an appropriate form

• US 9,928,227 B2
• Filed: 08/20/2015
• Issued: 03/27/2018
• Est. Priority Date: 08/20/2015
• Status: Expired due to Fees

• Current Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Original Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Inventors: Allen, Corville O., Freed, Andrew R.
• Primary Examiner(s): Cortes, Howard
• Application Number:
  US14/831,536
• Publication Number:
  US 20170052938A1
• Time in Patent Office: 950 Days
• Field of Search: None
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 40/174 Form filling; Merging
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 40/30 Semantic analysis

Abstract

A technique for pre-filling a computing device form with information associated with an action command found in a message includes receiving a message. Content of the message is analyzed utilizing natural language processing (NLP) to locate an action command within the message. NLP is applied to text in the message that is associated with the action command to determine a context of the action command. A similarity algorithm is applied to the text and one or more input fields of the form to identify one or more matching elements between the text and the input fields of the form. Finally, the input fields of the form are automatically pre-filled with information associated with the matching elements in the message whose similarity exceeds a predetermined threshold.

Claims

1. A computer program product configured to pre-fill a computing device form, the computer program product comprising:

a computer-readable storage medium; and

computer-readable program code embodied on the computer-readable storage medium, wherein the computer-readable program code, when executed by a form filling system that includes a processor and a memory coupled to the processor, causes the form filling system to;

receive a message;

analyze content of the message utilizing natural language processing (NLP) to locate an action command within the message;

apply NLP to text associated with the action command to determine a context of the action command;

select multiple candidate forms based on the multiple candidate forms being preconfigured to allow completion of the action command;

apply a similarity algorithm to the text associated with the action command and one or more input fields of the multiple candidate forms to identify one or more matching elements between the text and the input fields of the forms;

select a form, from among the multiple candidate forms, based on which of the multiple candidate forms has a greatest number of the matching elements between the text and the input fields of the form; and

automatically pre-fill the input fields of the form with information associated with the matching elements in the message whose similarity exceeds a predetermined threshold without user interaction to minimize copy errors and reduce task execution time associated with filling in the form.

2. The computer program product of claim 1, wherein the computer-readable program code, when executed by the form filling system, further configures the form filling system to:

select the form, from among multiple candidate forms, based on which of the multiple candidate forms also has a greatest number of types of the information matching types utilized in the input fields of the form.

3. The computer program product of claim 1, wherein the form is constructed in a programming language.

4. The computer program product of claim 3, wherein the programming language is hyper text markup language (HTML).

5. The computer program product of claim 3, wherein the computer-readable program code, when executed by the form filling system, further configures the form filling system to:

parse the programming language to identify the input fields of the form;

map the matching elements to the input fields of the form; and

pre-fill the input fields of the form with the information associated with the matching elements in the message.

6. The computer program product of claim 1, wherein the message is one of a text message, an email message, a message included in a word processing document, and a message generated by a web page.

7. A form filling system, comprising:

a cache memory; and

a processor coupled to the cache memory, wherein the processor is configured to;

receive a message;

analyze content of the message utilizing natural language processing (NLP) to locate an action command within the message;

apply NLP to text associated with the action command to determine a context of the action command;

select multiple candidate forms based on the multiple candidate forms being preconfigured to allow completion of the action command;

apply a similarity algorithm to the text associated with the action command and one or more input fields of the multiple candidate forms to identify one or more matching elements between the text and the input fields of the forms;

select a form, from among the multiple candidate forms, based on which of the multiple candidate forms has a greatest number of the matching elements between the text and the input fields of the form; and

automatically pre-fill the input fields of the form with information associated with the matching elements in the message whose similarity exceeds a predetermined threshold without user interaction to minimize copy errors and reduce task execution time associated with filling in the form.

8. The form filling system of claim 7, wherein the processor is further configured to:

select the form, from among multiple candidate forms, based on which of the multiple candidate forms also has a greatest number of types of the information matching types utilized in the input fields of the form.

9. The form filling system of claim 7, wherein the form is constructed in a programming language, and wherein the programming language is hyper text markup language (HTML).

10. The form filling system of claim 9, wherein the processor is further configured to:

parse the programming language to identify the input fields of the form;

map the matching elements to the input fields of the form; and

pre-fill the input fields of the form with the information associated with the matching elements in the message.

11. The form filling system of claim 7, wherein the message is one of a text message, an email message, a message included in a word processing document, and a message generated by a web page.