Patent ID: 8103710

Claim:
A computer-implemented system for searching for a document, comprising: providing, in a computer system, a first data storage having a plurality of documents including at least one document, and a second data storage storing respective references to the documents, including a reference to the at least one document, an attribute assigned to the document, and all ancestors of the assigned attribute but not descendants or siblings according to a hierarchy of attributes, the respective references uniquely indicating respective individual documents in the first data storage; the at least one document being a data record including a plurality of fields, the attribute being different from the fields and contents of the fields in the at least one document; and a computer processor device, the computer processor device being configured to accept, from an input device, a user's selection of search criteria including an attribute type and one of predetermined attributes associated with the attribute type; search the ancestors stored in the second data storage for the one of the predetermined attributes; and locate the at least one document from the respective reference in the first data storage when the one of the predetermined attributes is associated as one of the ancestors of the attribute assigned to the document.