Patent ID: 7689536

Claim:
A method for extracting information from an electronic document using a computer server system having one or more processors, the method comprising: receiving, at the server system, a request for information that includes a definition of a concept list comprising an origin concept, a relationship between the origin concept and an evaluated concept, and a distance representing a strength of the relationship between the origin concept and the evaluated concept, and a target scope that characterizes a size of document regions to which the concept list is to be applied, wherein the request for information and the target scope are received from a user interacting with the server system through a client device connected to the server system via a network; receiving, at the server system a definition of an extraction rule, wherein the extraction rule definition comprises an extraction scope that characterizes document regions to be extracted; the server system determining a target score for document regions of the article, wherein the score represents how well document regions of the size to which the concept list is to be applied relate to the concept list; the server system applying the extraction rule to the article to extract document regions characterized by the extraction scope from the article, wherein the application of the extraction rule is based on the determined target score; and outputting the extract from the server system for the client device in response to the request for information.