| 摘要 |
A method of forming a keyword based search query that uses a plurality of keywords, in which the keywords of the query are arranged into groups of purpose-related keywords, in which each keyword is associated with a designation of its relative importance. The keywords of a group may be identified manually by the searcher, or existing keywords in a group may be used to suggest or automatically add additional related keywords to the group. The keywords of a group need not be semantically related, but only related to a common purpose of the keyword group. Additional keywords can be suggested to the searcher, or automatically added to the groups. Suitable additional keywords may be identified by reference to previous searches in which the existing keywords were grouped with those additional keywords. Keywords may also be derived from text designated by the searcher, using all or portions of one or more documents or text blocks that the user identifies as describing a concept of interest to the searcher. The searcher may also select sources to search and may designate the importance of sections of those sources. |
| 主权项 |
1. A method of forming a keyword based search query, comprising:
receiving a plurality of search keywords that comprise the query from a searcher, each search keyword representing a keyword group; for each keyword group, visually presenting a user interface in response to a selection of the keyword group, the user interface including:
a list of a plurality of purpose-related keywords belonging to the keyword group,a plurality of suggested keywords derived from one or more of the purpose-related keywords in the keyword group, each of the suggested keywords selectable by the searcher to add to the list of purpose-related keywords in the keyword group,a field for receiving an entry of a keyword from the searcher to add to the purpose-related keywords in the keyword group, andfor each purpose-related keyword in the keyword group, a searcher weight control for assigning a weight to the purpose-related keyword, each weight representing a searcher-defined relative importance setting for the purpose-related keyword; for each keyword group, receiving from the searcher via the user interface an assignment of a weight to at least one purpose-related keyword in the keyword group from a searcher weight control associated with the at least one purpose-related keyword, the assigned weight identifying a relative importance of the at least one purpose-related keyword relative to at least one other purpose-related keyword in the keyword group; receiving from the searcher via the user interface a group importance weight for each keyword group of the plurality of the keyword groups; performing the keyword based search using the purpose-related keywords in the keyword groups of the query; removing a keyword from a keyword group in response to an indication received from the searcher;
generating a score for each of a plurality of results of the search, the score based on the weight of each purpose-related keyword in the plurality of keyword groups and the group importance weight for each of the keyword groups; and sorting the results using the score for each result. |
