Patent ID: 8140560

Claim:
A method of selecting an item from a database containing a plurality of items, the method comprising: associating each of the plurality of items with a corresponding item identifier; generating a first display, the first display comprising: a part of an item identifier for at least a first set of items and a second set of items in the database; and an option to display more parts of item identifiers; enabling selection of one of the at least two parts of the item identifiers by a user; generating, in response to the selection of the one of the at least two parts, a further display; the further display comprising: an additional part of an item identifier for at least a third set of items and a fourth set of items; the selected part of the item identifier; and an option to display more additional parts of item identifiers; enabling selection of one of the at least two additional parts of the item identifiers by a user; combining the selected part of the item identifier with the selected additional part of the item identifier to create a larger part of the item identifier; and displaying the larger part of the item identifier; wherein the parts of item identifiers and the additional parts of the item identifiers are alphanumeric symbols and the additional parts of the item identifiers are longer than a single alphanumeric symbol but shorter than the complete item identifier; and wherein the first set of items and the second set of items are mutually exclusive and the third set of items and the fourth set of items are mutually exclusive subsets of the first set of items or the second set of items.