Patent ID: 7240003

Claim:
An apparatus for searching a database, comprising data defining a phoneme and/or word lattice for use in the database, said data comprising data for defining a plurality of time-ordered nodes within the lattice, data for defining a plurality of links within the lattice, each link extending from a first node to a second node, data for associating a phoneme or a word with at least one node or link, and data for arranging the nodes in a sequence of time-ordered blocks so that links from nodes in any given block do not extend beyond the nodes in a block that is a predetermined number of blocks later in the sequence, in response to an input query, by a user, the apparatus comprising: means for generating phoneme data corresponding to the user's input query; means for searching the phoneme and word lattice using the phoneme data generated for the input query; and means for outputting search results in dependence upon the output from said searching means.