Patent ID: 9697282
Date: 2017-07-04
CPC Classifications: G06F

Claim:
1. A search apparatus comprising: at least one memory operable to store program code; at least one processor operable to read the program code and operate as instructed by the program code, the program code including: first determination code configured to cause the at least one processor to, for each of a plurality of input words input by a user in one input area in which at least keywords can be input, determine whether or not the input word is a first attribute word representing a content of an attribute of a predetermined first division of a plurality of divisions of attributes had by a search object, said determination including at least one of comparison of said input word to attributes stored in a database storage unit and determination of whether said input word includes a word representing a predetermined unit; and search code configured to cause the at least one processor to search for a search object by using a content, as a search condition of attribute of the first division, represented by the input word which is determined to be the first attribute word by the first determination code, said search including comparison of said input word determined to be an attribute with a corresponding attribute field of potential search results; wherein, the database storage unit hierarchically stores the attributes as nodes in a tree structure; the program code further includes second determination code configured to cause the at least one processor to determine whether there are two or more sibling attribute words, among the plurality of input words, which are siblings to each other in the tree structure and each of the two or more sibling attribute words corresponds to any one of the attributes stored in the database storage unit, and generation code configured to cause the at least one processor to combine a search condition corresponding to each of the two or more sibling attribute words and at least one search condition corresponding to at least one input word, among the plurality of input words, other than the two or more sibling attribute words with logical AND to generate a search expression, when it is determined that there are the two or more sibling attribute words, the search code is further configured to cause the at least one processor to search for search objects meeting each of two or more search expression generated by the generation code to identify a set of search results, and the program code further includes providing code configured to cause the at least one processor to provide two or more sets of search results identified by the search code in a state where the two or more sets of search results are displayed separately.