Patent Document ID: 6061682
Application ID: 08910194

Base Claim:
1. A method using item constraints to discover association rules contained in a database, the method comprising: finding large itemsets in a database that satisfy defined constraints, the defined constraints involving one or more items of a mining input expression; determining subsets of large itemsets included in the itemsets, an itemset being large if its support is greater than a minimum support value, where support value for an itemset is based upon the number of times the itemset appears in the database; and finding association rules from the large itemsets that satisfy the defined constraints.

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Claim 2:
2. The method recited in claim 1, the method further comprising: determining a support value for subsets of large itemsets included in the database where the subsets do not satisfy the defined constraints; determining confidence values using large itemsets which satisfy the defined constraints and itemsets which do not satisfy the defined constraints, where a confidence value comprises a number of times an itemset appears in the database in relation to a number of times an associated itemset appears in the database; and outputting association rules that satisfy a minimum confidence value.