Patent ID: 7734629

Claim:
A computer-implemented method for clustering a data set, comprising: determining a snapshot cost of using hierarchical clustering to cluster at least one data set in a sequence of data sets independently of a series of clusterings of the data sets in the sequence, the at least one data set having a plurality of data elements and each of the sequence of data sets being acquired at different times, determining an overall cost of using hierarchical clustering to cluster the at least one data set in the sequence of data sets by minimizing a combination of the snapshot cost of using hierarchical clustering to cluster the at least one data set independently of the series of clusterings of the data sets in the sequence and a history cost of using hierarchical clustering to cluster the at least one data set as part of the series of clusterings of the data sets in the sequence; and using hierarchical clustering to cluster the at least one data set in the sequence of data sets according to the overall cost determined by minimizing the combination of both the snapshot cost of clustering the at least one data set independently of the series of clusterings of the data sets in the sequence and the history cost of clustering the at least one data set as part of the series of clusterings of the data sets in the sequence.