Patent ID: 7890535

Claim:
A hardware apparatus for managing one or more processes, comprising: a processor; a reference relation information managing unit configured to manage and create information about reference relations between the one or more processes, one or more activities constituting the one or more processes, and one or more documents relating to at least one of the one or more processes and the one or more activities, and to manage and create information about reference relations between the one or more processes, the one or more activities, and one or more participants relating to at least one of the one or more processes and the one or more activities; a search unit configured to search for the one or more processes, the one or more activities, the one or more documents, and the one or more participants related to each other by the information about reference relations created by said reference relation information managing unit, in response to a search request inclusive of a search condition that is information about at least one of the one or more processes, the one or more activities, the one or more documents, and the one or more participants; a linking unit configured to link and associate a document with the one or more activities associated with the one or more processes, when a document is added to the one or more activities, and the linking unit is further configured to store links with respect to the one or more activities associated with the one or more processes and the one or more documents; and a merge unit configured to merge results of a search conducted by said search unit based on the information about reference relations managed by said reference relation information managing unit.