Apparatus for Metasearching on the Internet and Purchasing At Least One Item From At Least One Third Party in a Rapidly Changing Price and Inventory Environment

摘要

Apparatus for metasearching on the Internet and purchasing at least one item from at least one third party in a rapidly changing price and inventory environment, comprising a computer server programmed to: upon receipt of at least one search query from a client device: (a) metasearch at substantially the same time a plurality of unique hosts, comprising at least one unstructured data host and at least one structured data host, and at least one data server, limit the maximum time for response; and return combined search results and database results, comprising at least one item that may be purchased by a user; and upon receipt of a purchase request from the client device (b) communicate the purchase request from the client device to the at least one third party, and send confirmation to the client device that the purchase request was placed with the at least one third party.

主权项

1. Apparatus for metasearching on the Internet and purchasing at least one item from at least one third party in a rapidly changing price and inventory environment, comprising a computer server programmed to:
(a) metasearch a plurality of unique hosts, comprising at least one unstructured data host and at least one structured data host, and at least one data server, comprising:
(i) receiving, at the computer server, a Hypertext Transfer Protocol request from a client device for the computer server to send at least one search query to the plurality of unique hosts that provide access to information to be searched, wherein:
the Hypertext Transfer Protocol request from the client device is associated with the at least one item that may be purchased from a plurality of items that may be purchased;(ii) transforming, by the computer server, the Hypertext Transfer Protocol request received from the client device into: at least one unstructured query, at least one structured query, and at least one database query;(iii) sending, by the computer server, at substantially the same time:
the at least one unstructured query to the at least one unstructured data host,the at least one structured query to the at least one structured data host, andthe at least one database query to the at least one data server, comprising at least one database,
the at least one database comprising stored information related to the plurality of items that may be purchased;(iv) limiting, by the computer server, maximum time to one second for receipt at the computer server of:
search results from the at least one unstructured data host and the at least one structured data host in response to the at least one unstructured query sent to the at least one unstructured data host and the at least one structured query sent to the at least one structured data host andat least one database result from the at least one data server in response to the at least one database query sent to the at least one data server;(v) receiving, at the computer server,
the search results from the at least one unstructured data host in response to the at least one unstructured query sent to the at least one unstructured data host and the at least one structured query sent to the at least one structured data host andthe at least one database result from the at least one data server in response to the at least one database query sent to the at least one data server,
the at least one database result comprising at least a portion of the stored information related to the plurality of items that may be purchased;(vi) combining, by the computer server, the received search results from the at least one unstructured data host and the at least one structured data host and the at least one database result into combined search results;(vii) transforming, by the computer server, the combined search results into a response to be sent to the client device;(viii) sending, by the computer server, the response comprising the combined search results to the client device and causing the combined search results to be displayed on the client device;(ix) causing at least one advertisement related to the at least one item that may be purchased to be displayed on the client device; (b) process a purchase request from the client device, comprising:
(i) receiving, by the computer server, a purchase request from the client device for the computer server to purchase the at least one item from the at least one third party on behalf of a user of the client device,
the purchase request comprising information about the at least one item to be purchased, payment, payment information, and instructions;(ii) purchasing, by the computer server, the at least one item from the at least one third party, comprising:
communicating, by the computer server, to the at least one third party the purchase request, comprising the information about the at least one item to be purchased, the payment, the payment information, and the instructions received from the client device;(iii) sending confirmation, by the computer server, to the client device confirming that the purchase of the least one item was placed with the at least one third party.