Patent ID: 7954063

Claim:
A method for assigning values to attributes of documents in a computer system, comprising: displaying, to a user on a display device, one or more document identifiers, wherein each document identifier includes a hyperlink associated with a corresponding document stored in a database; receiving, from the user, a selection of a document stored in the database, wherein the user selection comprises a selection of the hyperlink associated with the document; retrieving, from the database, an attribute list associated with the selected document and a list of values corresponding to the attribute list, the attribute list comprising one or more attributes assigned to the selected document; displaying, in a first interface of the display device, the attributes assigned to the selected document and a set of attribute values currently assigned to each of the displayed attributes; receiving, from the user, a selection of at least one of the displayed attributes; displaying the selected attribute in a highlighted portion of the first interface, in response to the received selection; processing the list of values of identify values associated with the selected attribute, the identified values comprising (i) values currently assigned to the selected attribute and (ii) possible values that can be assigned to the selected attribute, wherein the processing step comprises: filtering the possible values according to at least one of a property of the selected attribute or a property of the selected document; displaying, in a second interface of the display device, the filtered possible values and the values currently assigned to the selected attribute, wherein: the selected attribute is displayed in a highlighted portion of the second interface; and the values currently assigned to the selected attribute and the filtered possible values that can be assigned to the selected attribute are displayed simultaneously in the second interface; receiving, from the user, a selection of at least one of the filtered possible values displayed in the second interface; modifying the set of values currently assigned to the selected attribute in response to the received selection, the modifying comprising: assigning the at least one selected value to the selected attribute, when the at least one selected value is one of the filtered possible values; and storing the at least one selected value in the document in the database; and displaying the modified set of values associated with the selected attribute in the first interface of the display device.