Patent ID: 7007228

Claim:
A method in a client system for searching documents in a network comprising one or a plurality of server systems, wherein a document can be accessed on the server system from the client system, comprising information related to a geographic location, said document characterized in that it comprises a tag including a tag identifier and a geographic address, said geographic address comprising encoded geographic coordinates of the geographic location described or referenced in the document and said tag identifies the tag as being a geographical tag to enable geographic search capability of the tag, said method comprising the steps of: specifying a reference point; determining geographic coordinates of said reference point; encoding said geographic coordinates in a geographic address; searching on the plurality of server systems for documents tagged with said geographic address; specifying a geographic area around the reference point; determining geographic coordinates of said geographic area; encoding said geographic coordinates in a fuzzy geographic address; searching on the plurality of server systems, for documents tagged with a geographic address corresponding to a geographic location within the geographic area; wherein said step of encoding geographic coordinates of a geographic area in a fuzzy geographic address comprises the further steps of computing fuzzy geographic coordinates by replacing a wild card character for one or several less significant digits of absolute geographic coordinates (X r , Y r ) of the reference point depending on a specified geographic area, said wild card character being interpreted as “any trailing string”, and including said fuzzy geographic coordinates in said fuzzy geographic address.