Patent ID: 7917516

Claim:
A machine implemented method of updating an inverted index, the method comprising: receiving a notification of a changed item and in response to receiving the notification, updating a list of postings to reflect the changed item, wherein a posting of a change to the item is generated in the list of postings; in response to receiving a query for an item indexed in the inverted index, generating a query result of the query from the inverted index, wherein an existing content for the item in the inverted index does not accurately represent the item; interrogating the list of postings separate from the inverted index to determine if the change to the item indexed in the inverted index has occurred, the list of postings to represent changes having occurred to items indexed in the inverted index without having to immediately update the inverted index after the changes; if the change has occurred, applying the list of postings to the query result to reflect the change to the item, the list of postings supplementing the inverted index for the query result; and retrieving the item in accordance with the existing content of the inverted index supplemented with the posting of the change to the item, wherein the change to the item is applied prior to the retrieval and wherein the retrieved item is presented on a display device or the machine.