Patent ID: 7603342

Claim:
A method of presenting search results in a response to an end-user query, said search results being combined from results from a plurality of indexes stored at least one computing device, each of said search results having an associated key field, said method comprising: (i) querying index entries of each of said plurality of indexes using an index-specific search algorithm to obtain a set of matching search results for each index, each matching search result having a quality of match specific to its index; (ii) for each of said plurality of indexes, retrieving a stored relative priority value assigned by an administrator to each of said plurality of indexes, wherein each said stored relative priority value is applicable to all search results obtained from a particular one of said plurality of indexes; (iii) combining said matching search results from said plurality of indexes into a merged list of ordered search results including search results from each of said plurality of indexes based on said quality of match of each matching search result, and based on said stored relative priority value of each of said plurality of indexes as assigned by said administrator, in which any search result from an index having a lower stored relative priority value for which an associated key field is identical to the associated key field of a matching search result in an index having a higher stored relative priority value is discarded, in favor of said matching search result from said index having a higher stored relative priority value.