Arranging records in a search result to be provided in response to a data inquiry of a database

• US RE41,071 E1
• Filed: 06/30/2004
• Issued: 01/05/2010
• Est. Priority Date: 09/03/1997
• Status: Expired due to Term

• Current Assignee: RPX Corporation
• Original Assignee: AT&T Intellectual Property I LP (AT&T, Inc.)
• Inventors: Anderson, Dewey Charles
• Primary Examiner(s): Alam, Hosain
• Assistant Examiner(s): Saeed, Usmaan
• Application Number:
  US10/882,125
• Time in Patent Office: 2,015 Days
• Field of Search: 707 1- 10, 707100-1041, 707200-205, 707/217, 701/201, 709/219, 710/33
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/248 Presentation of query results
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/951 Indexing; Web crawling techniques
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99931 Database or file accessing
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99932 Access augmentation or optimizing
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99933 Query processing, i.e. searching
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99935 Query augmenting and refining, e.g. inexact access
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99937 Sorting
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99945 Object-oriented database structure processing

Abstract

Systems and methods for arranging records in search results to be provided in response to a data inquiry of a database. After search results including records are received, a determination is made with respect to the order of the records in the search results. This determination may be based on various factors such as the destination of the search results, the preferred status of certain records over other records, a marketing determination with respect to the records, a frequency determination with respect to the number of times that a record or records may have already been provided in response to data inquiries, a weighting factor determination or a combination of one or more of these factors. In response to the determination of the order of the records in the search results, the records then are arranged into ordered records based on the determination. This order may be an alphabetical order, a preferred order based on the preferred status of certain records over other records, a least frequent first order, a highest weighting factor first order, or a combination of these orders. The search results with the records arranged into ordered records are then provided in response to the data inquiry.

Claims

1. A computer implemented method for arranging results of a search of a database, comprising the steps of:

receiving a data inquiry for a database that is stored on a computer system;

in response to the data inquiry, obtaining performing a search of the database on the computer system to obtain search results comprising a plurality of records;

determining an ordering characteristic for the search results based on a destination for the search results by identifying a preferred status characteristic associated with the destination and identifying the records of the search results corresponding to the preferred status characteristic;

the ordering characteristic independent from a user input;

arranging the records of the search results into ordered records based on the ordering characteristic; and

providing the ordered records to the destination for the search results.

3. The method of claim 1, whrein the destination comprises a delivery module.

2. A computer implemented method for arranging results of a search of a database that is stored on a computer system, comprising the steps of:

receiving a data inquiry for the database;

in response to the data inquiry, obtaining performing a search of the database on the computer system to obtain search results comprising a plurality of records;

determining an ordering characteristic for the search results based on a destination for the search results by determining a marketing characteristic associated with the destination and applying the marketing characteristic to the search results, the step of applying the marketing characteristic to at least one if the records of the search results further comprising determining whether at least one of the records is associated with a predefined entity;

the ordering characteristic independent of a user input;

arranging the records of the search results into ordered records based on the ordering characteristic; and

providing the ordered records to the destination for the search results.

4. A computer program product configured to arrange results of a search of a database, the computer program product comprising:

a computer-readable storage medium having computer-readable program code embodied in said medium, said computer-readable program code comprising;

computer program code configured to receive data inquiry for a database;

computer program code configured to obtain search results comprising a plurality of records in response to the data inquiry;

computer program code configured to determine an ordering characteristic for the search results based on a destination for the search results by identifying a preferred status characteristic associated with the destination and identifying the records of the search results corresponding to the preferred status characteristic, wherein the ordering characteristic is independent from a user input;

computer program code configured to arrange the records of the search results into ordered records based on the ordering characteristic; and

computer program code configured to provide the ordered records to the destination for the search results.

5. A system for arranging results of a search of a database, comprising:

a computer system on which the database is stored;

means for receiving at the computer system a data inquiry for the database;

means for obtaining search results comprising a plurality of records in response to the data inquiry;

means for determining an ordering characteristic for the search results based on a destination for the search results by identifying a preferred status characteristic associated with the destination and identifying the records of the search results corresponding to the preferred status characteristic, wherein the ordering characteristic is independent from a user input;

means for arranging the records of the search results into ordered records based on the ordering characteristic; and

means for providing the ordered records to the destination for the search results.