EP0860786A2
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EP
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System and method for hierarchically grouping and ranking a set of objects in a query context
Assignee: International Business Machines Corp
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Filing: 1998-02-13
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Granted: —
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Expires: 2018-02-13
Abstract
Abstract Topically relevant objects in an object database are first identified using any generally known methods to obtain a set of topically relevant objects (topically relevant set). Parents, and in alternative embodiments other ancestors, of one or more of the topically relevant objects are identified according to directional structural relationships that the parents have with respect to the topically relevant objects. These objects form a set of structurally relevant objects (structurally relevant set). In some embodiments, the user query identifies one or more of these structural relationships. The topically relevant objects are then organized under one or more of their respective parents to form a hierarchy level of both (topically relevant and structurally relevant) sets of objects. In some preferred embodiments, the process can iterate to create more than one hierarchy level.
Inventors
- 👤 Eric William Brown
- 👤 Rong Nickle Chang
- 👤 Hamed Abdelfattah Ellozy
- 👤 John Martin Prager
- 👤 Edward Cholchin So
Bibliographic Details
Application Number
—
Jurisdiction
EP
Data Source
google_patents
Last Synchronized
2026-10-29 05:57
CPC Classifications
G; G06; G06F; G06F16/00; G06F16/90; G06F16/95; G06F16/951; G06F16/953; G06F16/9538; Y; Y10; Y10S; Y10S707/00; Y10S707/99931; Y10S707/99933; Y10S707/99934
Claims Analysis
Total Claims: 16
Claim 1
Independent Claim
227 words
A computer system having one or more memories and one or more
central processing units, the computer capable of accessing one or more
database memories, a plurality of objects stored in one or more of the
database memories and each object identified by an index, the computer
system further comprising: a user interface for entering a query; a hit list, stored in one or more of the memories, the hit list
being a topically relevant set of a plurality of topically relevant
objects, the topically relevant set being selected from one or more of
the database memories and ranked by a topical search engine using the
index, the rank indicating a topical relevance to the query; a relationship data structure containing information about how two
or more of the objects are related to one another by one or more
structural relationships, the structural relationships being directed;
and a hierarchical view generator that selects a structurally relevant
set of the objects, each object in the structurally relevant set being a
parent of one or more of the topically relevant objects according to one
or more of the structural relationships, each of the topically relevant
objects being a child of one or more of the parents, the hierarchical
view generator organizing each of the child objects under one or more of
its respective parents to create a directional hierarchy.
Claim 2
Dependent Claim
31 words
A computer system, as in claim 1, further comprising a
display that renders a presentation of one or more of the parents and the
child objects associated with the respective parent.
Claim 3
Dependent Claim
30 words
A computer system, as in claim 1 or 2, where the database
memory resides on one or more connected computers that are connected to
the computer system by a network.
Claim 4
Dependent Claim
17 words
A computer system, as in claim 3, where the query accesses
the computer system from the network.
Claim 5
Dependent Claim
31 words
A computer system, as in any preceding claim, where the
hierarchical view generator subselects a subset of the most relevant
topically relevant objects according to rank as the topically relevant
set.
Claim 6
Dependent Claim
46 words
A computer system, as in any preceding claim, where the
information in the relationship data structure includes weights for the
structural relationships and the hierarchical view generator subselects
a subset of the structurally relevant objects as the structurally
relevant set as a function of the weights.
Claim 7
Dependent Claim
28 words
A computer system, as in any preceding claim, where one or
more relationship data structures defining one or more structural
relationships are selected using information in the query.
Claim 8
Dependent Claim
46 words
A computer system, as in any preceding claim, where the
structural relationships include any one or more of the following: the
hyperlink relationship, the subclass or categorization relationship, the
geographic location relationship, the location within a file system
relationship, the conceptual relationship, and the is-a-part-of
relationship.
Claim 9
Dependent Claim
45 words
A computer system as in claim 1 further comprising: an iterator in the a hierarchical view generator that treats the
parents as topically relevant objects and runs the hierarchical view
generator zero or more times, each time creating a parent level in the
directional hierarchy.
Claim 10
Dependent Claim
26 words
A system, as in claim 9, where a different set of one or more
structural relationships is selected in one or more iterations of the
iterator.
Claim 11
Dependent Claim
58 words
A computer system, as in claim 9, further comprising: a display that renders a presentation of one or more selected
parents in one of the parent levels and one or more of the objects,
being displayed objects, structurally related to one of the selected
parents and at a lower level than the parent level in the directional
hierarchy.
Claim 12
Dependent Claim
19 words
A system, as in claim 11, where one or more of the displayed
objects is suppressed in the display.
Claim 13
Dependent Claim
21 words
A system, as in claim 12, where the displayed object is
suppressed due to its structural relationship with the respective parent.
Claim 14
Dependent Claim
144 words
A computer system having one or more memories and one or more
central processing units, the computer capable of accessing one or more
database memories, a plurality of objects stored in one or more of the
database memories and each object identified by an index, the computer
system further comprising: a) means for selecting a topically relevant set of two or more of
the objects; b) means for ranking the objects in the topically relevant set; c) means for identifying one or more structural relationships
between one or more of the objects in the topically relevant set, being
children, and one or more of the objects in the database memories, being
parents, the structural relationships being directional from the
parent to the child; and d) means for organizing one or more of the children under each of
the respective parents in a structural hierarchy.
Claim 15
Independent Claim
106 words
A method for hierarchically grouping a plurality of objects
stored in one or more database memories of a computer system,
comprising the steps of: a) selecting a topically relevant set of two or more of the
objects; b) ranking the objects in the topically relevant set; c) identifying one or more structural relationships between one or
more of the objects in the topically relevant set, being children, and
one or more of the objects in the database memories, being parents, the
structural relationships being directional from the parent to the child;
and d) organizing one or more of the children under each of the
respective parents.
Claim 16
Dependent Claim
39 words
A method, as in claim 15, further comprising the steps of: e) deselecting the children and identifying the parents as
children; and f) repeating steps c and d zero or more times, each time creating
a next hierarchical level.
References Cited (Backward Citations)
No citation records indexed.
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