Location-Based Searching

• US 20110137881A1
• Filed: 11/24/2010
• Published: 06/09/2011
• Est. Priority Date: 12/04/2009
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Google LLC (Alphabet Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Google Inc. (Alphabet Inc.)
• Inventors: Cheng, Tak Keung, von Behren, James R.
• Granted Patent: US 8,396,888 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 707/706
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/951 Indexing; Web crawling techniques
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/9537 Spatial or temporal dependent retrieval, e.g. spatiotemporal queries
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/9538 Presentation of query results
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/021 Services related to particular areas, e.g. point of interest [POI] services, venue services or geofences
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/21 for social networking applications

Abstract

In general, the subject matter described in this specification can be embodied in methods, systems, and programs for providing location-based information. A geographical location of a mobile computing device is received at a server system. A request for content is received at the server system and from the mobile computing device. A search area that corresponds to the geographical location is selected by the sever system. The search area is selected from among a collection of search areas that correspond to the geographical location. At least one of the search areas in the collection is geographically nested within at least one other of the search areas. A search result that is most-relevantly ranked for the selected search area is determined by the server system. Content that represents the determined search result is provided by the server system and for receipt by the mobile computing device.

Claims

1. A computer-implemented method for providing location-based information, the method comprising:

receiving, at a server system, a geographical location of a mobile computing device;

receiving, at the server system and from the mobile computing device, a request for content;

selecting, by the server system, a search area that corresponds to the geographical location, the search area selected from among a collection of search areas that correspond to the geographical location, at least one of the search areas in the collection being geographically nested within at least one other of the search areas;

determining, by the server system, a search result that is most-relevantly ranked for the selected search area; and

providing, by the server system and for receipt by the mobile computing device, content that represents the determined search result.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein:

the request is an HTTP request for resources,

the request does not include a query that was generated by a user of the mobile computing device and that is for a search engine system, and

the server system selects the search area and determines the search area without using a query that was generated by a user of the mobile computing device and that is for a search engine system.

3. The method of claim 2, wherein:

each of the search areas in the collection of search areas is assigned a different descriptive phrase of one or more human-understandable language words, and

determining the search result includes submitting to a search engine system a query that includes the descriptive phrase that is assigned to the selected search area.

4. The method of claim 3, wherein the determined search result does not correspond to content that identifies a location using geographical coordinates.

5. The method of claim 1, wherein the at least one of the search areas in the collection is completely geographically nested within at least the one other of the search areas.

6. The method of claim 1, wherein the at least one of the search areas in the collection is partially geographically nested within at least the one other of the search areas.

7. A computer-implemented method for providing location-based information, the method comprising:

determining, by a mobile computing device, a geographical location of the mobile computing device;

providing, by the mobile computing device and for receipt by a server system that is remote from the mobile computing device, the geographical location;

transmitting, by the mobile computing device and for receipt by the server system, a request for content, so as to cause the server system to;

(i) select a search area that corresponds to the geographical location, the search area being selected from among a collection of search areas that correspond to the geographical location, at least one of the search areas in the collection being geographically nested within at least one other of the search areas, and

(ii) determine a search result that is most-relevantly ranked for the selected search area;

receiving, by the mobile computing device and from the server system, content that represents the determined search result; and

displaying, by the mobile computing device, the content that represents the determined search result.

8. The method of claim 7, wherein:

the content is displayed in a web page,

the displayed content identifies a physical venue, and

the web page does not include a display of content that represents another search result and that identifies another physical venue.

9. The method of claim 8, wherein the web page displays, in addition to the content that identifies a physical venue:

(i) a voice query input button for receiving user input to submit to a search engine system a voice query,

(ii) an indication of the selected search area, and

(iv) a user-selectable option for changing the selected search area.

10. The method of claim 8, wherein the web page displays, in addition to the content that identifies a physical venue:

(i) a search box for receiving textual user input that defines a search query,

(ii) a search button for receiving user input to submit to a search engine system the search query,

(iii) an indication of the selected search area, and

(iv) a user-selectable option for changing the selected search area.

11. The method of claim 10, further comprising:

receiving user input, using the user-selectable option, that changes the selected search area to another search area in the collection of search areas;

receiving, by the mobile computing device and in response to the user input changing the search area, content that represents a second search result that has been determined to be most-relevantly ranked for the other search area; and

replacing the displayed content for the determined search result with a display of content for the second search result.

12. The method of claim 11, further comprising:

in response to receiving the user input changing the search area, modifying a score for the other search area so that the other search area is more-relevantly scored with respect to the search area than before the modifying of the score of the other search area, the score for the other search area being used in selection of one of the search area and the other search area for display in the web page.

13. The method of claim 7, further comprising:

displaying, by the mobile computing device, a first webpage that includes;

(i) a search box for receiving textual user input defining a search query, and

(ii) a search button for receiving user input that submits the search query that was input in the search box to a search engine system; and

receiving user input selecting the search button when the search box has not received user input defining a search query;

wherein the transmitted request for content that represents a search result is transmitted by the mobile computing device in response to receiving the user input selecting the search button.

14. The method of claim 13, wherein:

the received content that represents the determined search result includes a Uniform Resource Identifier (URI) that the determined search result identifies, and

displaying the content that represents the determined search result includes displaying a second web page that is identified by the URI.

15. The method of claim 14, wherein the second web page is displayed by the mobile computing without receiving user input subsequent to receiving the user input selecting the search button.

16. The method of claim 15, wherein the determined search result that identifies the URI is selected from a collection of search results that identify URIs of web pages that are hosted by a variety of different information providers.

17. A system for providing location-based information, the system comprising:

a search area determiner that is configured to receive a geographical location of a requesting computing device and to select a search area that corresponds to the geographical location, the search area selected from among a collection of search areas that correspond to the geographical location, at least one of the search areas in the collection being geographically nested within at least one other of the search areas;

a search engine that is configured to determine a search result that is most-relevantly ranked for a query that includes the selected search area, and to provide content representing the determined search result to the requesting computing device; and

a plurality of mobile computing devices, wherein particular mobile devices in the plurality each include;

a geographical location determiner for determining a particular geographical location of the particular computing device and for providing the particular geographical location to the search area determiner; and

a search result display generator for receiving from the search engine content that represents a particular search result, and for displaying the content that represents the particular search result.

18. The system of claim 17, wherein:

the display of the content that represents the particular search result includes a selectable graphical interface element, and

user-selection of the graphical interface element causes the mobile computing device to navigate to a display of additional content that represents the particular search result.

19. The system of claim 18, further comprising:

a search area weighter to modify scores that are assigned to each of the search areas in the collection, wherein the scores for each of the search areas are used in the selection of the search area by the search area determiner.

20. The system of claim 19, wherein the search area weighter modifies the score for the determined search area in response to a user-selection of the selectable graphical interface element that is for the particular search result.

21. The system of claim 20, wherein:

the display of additional content for the particular search result includes a display of a selectable graphical interface element for at least another search area in the collection other than the selected search area, and

the search area weighter modifies the weight for the other search area in response to user selection of the graphical interface element for the other search area.

22. The system of claim 17, wherein the query does not include text that was input by a user of the mobile computing device.

23. The system of claim 17, wherein:

the search engine determines the particular search result in response to a selection of a particular interface element,

the particular interface element is used to submit from a computing device to the search engine a query that was defined by user content provided using a query input text box, and

the selection of the particular interface element is performed when the query input text box has not been provided user content.