Patent ID: 7752199
Filing Date: 2010-07-06
Classification: G06F,Y10S

Abstract:
1. A method for data retrieval, said method comprising creating a set of related objects from a collection of objects, each object in the set being an item returned from a search query, said items being in a plurality of categories, categories selected are determined by the connections between said categories in a category graph, said related objects being search results that match the query and are mapped to multiple categories wherein the multiple categories are connected in a graph, the step of creating, including the steps of: searching for a list of relevant objects, each relevant object being a ranked search result wherein a rank indicates relevance to the query, and obtaining a rank-ordered list of said relevant objects; selecting any target objects from the rank-ordered list, each target object being a member of a selected subset of the search results; mapping the relevant objects in the rank-ordered list into categories; connecting the categories into paths in a graph, said graph having a node for each category and edges based upon category relationships; terminating a graph traversal of said categories based upon reaching category nodes having at least one target object if there is a target object, and if there is no target object then terminating said graph traversal within a proximity in the graph near the most relevant category, the most relevant category being the category most relevant to the query based upon the relevance of the relevant objects mapped to said category; choosing a best path in the graph based upon a path evaluation criterion, said path evaluation criterion based on the relevance of objects mapped to the categories; and selecting particular objects in categories on the best path based upon an object selection criterion, each particular object being an object included in search results that meet the object selection criterion; wherein metadata is associated with at least one object being in a format of time varying media.