USER CONTRIBUTED KNOWLEDGE DATABASE

• US 20090024590A1
• Filed: 04/22/2008
• Published: 01/22/2009
• Est. Priority Date: 03/15/2007
• Status: Abandoned Application

• Current Assignee: Google LLC (Alphabet Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Google LLC (Alphabet Inc.)
• Inventors: Cook, Robert, Bollacker, Kurt, STURGE, Timothy, Thompson, Nicholas, Taylor, Edwin, Giannandrea, John
• Application Number:
  US12/049,145
• Publication Number:
  US 20090024590A1
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/972 Access to data in other repository systems, e.g. legacy data or dynamic Web page generation

Abstract

A large open database of information has entries for commonly understood data, such as people, places and objects, which are referred to as topics. The database has a type system and contains attributes and relationships between topics. The invention also comprises a powerful query language and an open API to access the data and a website where contributors can update the data or add new topics and relationships. The elements of the invention comprise a scalable graph database, a dynamic user contributed schema representation, a tree-based object/property query language, a series of new Web service APIs, and set of AJAX dynamic HTML technologies.

Claims

1-19. -19. (canceled)

20. A scalable graph database, comprising:

a type system created by interaction of users with the graph database and stored in the graph database itself;

a namespace model built on said type system, wherein names are resolved against a dataset rather than being pre-declared;

a dynamically generated, user contributed, accretive database schema;

wherein data entry via means operable by a community of users creates types in said type system that are then instantly available via a query API, said query API further comprising a tree-based object/property query language;

wherein graph database queries are informed by said dynamically generated schema;

wherein schema building is collaborative and not a separate activity from data entry; and

wherein existing relationships in said graph database continue to function as said schema is expanded; and

a database store, wherein objects in said database store comprise versioned primitives that are attributed to a graph database contributor;

wherein relationships between said primitives are implicitly bi-directional

wherein said graph database contains attributes and relationships between topics; and

wherein topics can be multiply typed and properties are optional.

21. The database of claim 20, further comprising:

an access control and permissions model built on said graph database via data structures in the graph database related to properties, user groups, and groups of users;

wherein permissions are readily devolved to groups of database contributors.

22. The database of claim 20, said query API further comprising:

a plurality of query trees which are expanded to yield query results;

wherein a hierarchical query representing a graph constraint sent to the graph database receives a reply having a similarly shaped tree containing query results.

23. The database of claim 20, said query API further comprising:

an API for writing to said graph database comprising a tree based model.

24. The database of claim 20, said query API further comprising:

a query language that supports explicitly ordering items, sorting result sets, optional constraint clauses, and highly nested queries.

25. The database of claim 20, wherein said query API is based on the JSON open standard data interchange syntax.

26. A database, comprising:

a graph comprising a plurality of objects comprising arbitrary collections of properties, said objects further comprising a set of nodes and a set of reversible links expressing relationships between said nodes; and

a schema comprising a collection of properties of said objects, said properties comprising an expected type, wherein every type comprises a plurality of properties, wherein each property has an expected type, and wherein each type has one schema.

27. The database of claim 26, wherein said expected type further comprises a type enforcement scheme in a user interface wherein user input invokes an auto completion module that constrains said user input to a particular type.

28. The database of claim 27, said auto completion module comprising:

means for relevance ranking a list of candidate terms for presentation to a user during auto completion of a user query.

29. The database of claim 27, said auto completion module comprising:

means for enumerating user input to constrain a user query to a fixed list of predetermined terms.

30. The database of claim 27, said auto completion module comprising:

means for annotating an included type.

31. The database of claim 26, wherein all objects, regardless of their type or types, define at least one of the following properties:

a name property comprising a set of human-readable names for an object, suitable for display to end users of database;

wherein said name property comprises a value that holds a string and that defines a human language in which it is written;

wherein an object may have more than one name, but may only have one name per language; and

wherein if when querying the database, a user treats the name property as if it was a single value rather than a set of values, the database automatically returns the object'"'"'s name, if it has one, in a language of choice;

a key property comprising a set of fully-qualified names for an object;

wherein each member of the set is a value that specifies a namespace object and a name within the namespace; and

wherein no two objects ever have the same fully-qualified name;

a guid property for every object in the database comprising a globally unique identifier that specifies a unique identifier for an object;

wherein no two objects ever have the same value of the guid property;

an id property comprising a unique name for an object;

wherein no two objects ever have the same value of the id property.

This property is read-only;

a type property comprising a set of types associated with an object;

wherein an object can be viewed as an instance of any of said types; and

wherein each type is itself an object type;

a timestamp property comprising a single value that specifies when an object was created;

a creator property comprising a single link to an object that specifies which user created the object; and

a permission property comprising a single link to a permission object which specifies which user groups are allowed to alter an object.

32. The database of claim 26, further comprising:

a plurality of topics comprising objects that are displayed to users.

33. The database of claim 26, further comprising:

a plurality of values comprising single primitives or simple objects, said values comprising;

a value property that holds the primitive value; and

a type property comprising a type object that specifies a type of the value.

34. The database of claim 26, further comprising:

a plurality of namespaces that provide a user with the ability to build a name using nodes and links in the graph.

35. The database of claim 26, further comprising:

an access control system for controlling user ability to modify an object;

wherein every object has a permission property that refers to a permission object which specifies a set of user groups whose members have permission to modify the object.

36. A method for creating a scalable graph database, comprising the steps of:

providing a type system created by interaction of users with the graph database and stored in the graph database itself;

providing a namespace model built on said type system, wherein names are resolved against a dataset rather than being pre-declared;

providing a dynamically generated, user contributed, accretive database schema;

wherein data entry via means operable by a community of users creates types in said type system that are then instantly available via a query API, said query API further comprising a tree-based object/property query language;

wherein graph database queries are informed by said dynamically generated schema;

wherein schema building is collaborative and not a separate activity from data entry; and

wherein existing relationships in said graph database continue to function as said schema is expanded; and

providing a database store, wherein objects in said database store comprise versioned primitives that are attributed to a graph database contributor;

wherein relationships between said primitives are implicitly bi-directional;

wherein said graph database contains attributes and relationships between topics; and

wherein topics can be multiply typed and properties are optional.

37. The method of claim 36, further comprising the step of:

providing an access control and permissions model built on said graph database via data structures in the graph database related to properties, user groups, and groups of users;

wherein permissions are readily devolved to groups of database contributors.

38. A method for creating a database, comprising the steps of:

providing a graph comprising a plurality of objects comprising arbitrary collections of properties, said objects further comprising a set of nodes and a set of reversible links expressing relationships between said nodes; and

providing a schema comprising a collection of properties of said objects, said properties comprising an expected type, wherein every type comprises a plurality of properties, wherein each property has an expected type, and wherein each type has one schema.