Patents Examined by Thomas Meng
  • Patent number: 9740785
    Abstract: Discussion threads may be ranked based a factor other than a time since a most recent post of the discussion thread. Discussion threads may be ranked based on a likelihood of each discussion thread being helpful to a broad range of users and/or based on how likely each discussion thread is to draw users to participate in the respective discussion thread.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: March 25, 2011
    Date of Patent: August 22, 2017
    Assignee: Amazon Technologies, Inc.
    Inventors: James G. Robinson, Samuel S. Sonne, Jacob G. Kalberer
  • Patent number: 9740986
    Abstract: The present invention is directed to a method and system for determining user interaction patterns. The method and system comprises generating a plurality of atomic sessions by grouping search events related to a user and a query string using a search engine. The method and system includes using the atomic sessions, constructing a first query chain based on actions of the user to satisfy an information need. The method and system includes dividing the first query chain into at least one smaller chain by both a time factor and a query similarity factor. And the method and system includes determining user-interaction patterns relating to the search engine using the at least one smaller chain.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: September 30, 2008
    Date of Patent: August 22, 2017
    Assignee: Excalibur IP, LLC
    Inventors: Georges Dupret, Benjamin Piwowarski
  • Patent number: 9304898
    Abstract: Technologies are generally described herein for compressing an array using hardware-based compression and performing various instructions on the compressed array. Some example technologies may receive an instruction adapted to access an address in an array. The technologies may determine whether address is compressible. If the address is compressible, then the technologies may determine a compressed address of a compressed array based on the address. The compressed array may represent a compressed layout of the array where a reduced size of each compressed element in the compressed array is smaller than an original size of each element in the array. The technologies may access the compressed array at the compressed address in accordance with the instruction.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: August 30, 2011
    Date of Patent: April 5, 2016
    Assignee: Empire Technology Development LLC
    Inventor: Yan Solihin
  • Patent number: 9069841
    Abstract: An information retrieval system includes a query revision architecture that integrates multiple different query revisers, each implementing one or more query revision strategies. A revision server receives a user's query, and interfaces with the various query revisers, each of which generates one or more potential revised queries. The revision server evaluates the potential revised queries, and selects one or more of them to provide to the user. A session-based reviser suggests one or more revised queries, given a first query, by calculating an expected utility for the revised query. The expected utility is calculated as the product of a frequency of occurrence of the query pair and an increase in quality of the revised query over the first query.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: October 2, 2008
    Date of Patent: June 30, 2015
    Assignee: Google Inc.
    Inventors: David R. Bailey, Alexis J. Battle, Benedict A. Gomes, P. Pandurang Nayak
  • Patent number: 9020990
    Abstract: A system and method are provided for verifying data copies and reverifying the copies over the life span of media according to a verification policy. Characteristics of media and use of media are tracked to provide metrics which may be used to dynamically reevaluate and reassign verification policies to optimize media usage. Copies that fail verification operations may be repaired by repeating a storage operation for recent copies or by substituting a close temporal copy of the failed copy.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: September 13, 2012
    Date of Patent: April 28, 2015
    Assignee: CommVault Systems, Inc.
    Inventors: Brian Brockway, Parag Gokhale, Jun Lu
  • Patent number: 8676802
    Abstract: Methods and systems that enable searching with clustering in information access systems are described. The methods of clustering operate on a collection of materials wherein each item in the collection may be associated with one or more properties. An original subset of materials is selected from the collection and relevant properties associated with the subset of materials are clustered into property clusters. Each property cluster generally contains properties that are more similar to each other than to properties in a different property cluster. The property clusters can be used to respond to the query. A mapping function can be used to identify a set of materials that correspond to each property cluster based on the associations between individual items and properties. The property clusters can also be used for iterative query refinement.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: November 30, 2006
    Date of Patent: March 18, 2014
    Assignee: Oracle OTC Subsidiary LLC
    Inventors: Vladimir V. Zelevinsky, Daniel Tunkelang, Frederick C. Knabe, Michael Y. Saji, Velin Krassimirov Tzanov
  • Patent number: 8660991
    Abstract: Systems and methods system for managing data objects that support the personalization of mobile communications services are provided. The system includes one or more databases that contain subscriber data, such as usage, or state information related to the subscriber. For one or more of the databases within the system, a database federator and a distributed object repository having multiple nodes is provided. The nodes are used to store data objects and duplicate data objects. Data objects may be distributed to the nodes based on, a hashing algorithm. Additionally, graceful redundancy degradation of stored duplicate objects is provided. Further, time-based triggering of duplicate objects stored within separate nodes is provided.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: July 18, 2011
    Date of Patent: February 25, 2014
    Assignee: Bridgewater Systems Corp.
    Inventor: Normand Glaude
  • Patent number: 8190638
    Abstract: A search is performed based on a search query of at least metadata of a first plurality of files and a set of a permissions is determined for a first user, wherein the set of permissions defines at least a right to view information. Results of the search are displayed based upon the set of permissions. In the metadata database, there is metadata from a number of files of different types. The type of information in metadata for a first type of file differs from a type of information in metadata for a second type of file.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: December 27, 2006
    Date of Patent: May 29, 2012
    Assignee: Apple Inc.
    Inventors: Dominic Giampaolo, Yan Arrouye
  • Patent number: 8131779
    Abstract: A system and method of information retrieval and triage for Information analysis provides an for interactive multi-dimensional and linked visual representation of information content and properties. A query Interface plans and obtains result sets. A dimension interface specifies dimensions with which to categorize the result sets. Links among results of a result set or results of different sets are automatically generated for linked selection viewing. Entitles may be extracted and viewed and entity relations determined to establish further links and dimensions. Properties encoded in representations of the results in the multi-dimensional views maximizes display density. Multiple queries may be performed and compared. An integrated browser component responsive to the links is provided for viewing documents. Documents and other information from the result set may be used in an analysis component providing a space for visual thinking, to arrange the information in the space while maintaining links automatically.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: November 30, 2005
    Date of Patent: March 6, 2012
    Assignee: Oculus Info Inc.
    Inventors: David Jonker, William Wright, David Schroh, Pascale Proulx, Brian Cort, Alex Skaburskis
  • Patent number: 8131744
    Abstract: Methods, apparatus, and articles of manufacture for processing an abstract query and generating well organized user results are disclosed. Well organized user results preserve the cardinality of one-to-one and one-to-many between data elements retrieved using a database query. Embodiments of the present invention use an abstract database that separates a user from the physical representation of data stored in a data repository by providing a plurality of logical fields based on the substantive information stored in the underlying data repository. During query processing, query results generated from an abstract query are generated and organized according to the one-to-one and one-to-many relationships. Subsequently, query results are presented to users according to the intuitive relationships between data understood by users of an abstract database.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: December 17, 2004
    Date of Patent: March 6, 2012
    Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
    Inventors: Richard D. Dettinger, Daniel P. Kolz, Richard J. Stevens
  • Patent number: 8065262
    Abstract: A computer-implemented system and method are provided to handle operations dealing with a multidimensional database. Information about the hierarchical structure of a multidimensional database is used when performing the operations upon the database. Operations including update, select and others are performed using the hierarchical structural information. Keys and indexes are used in accessing the hierarchical structural information.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: October 19, 2010
    Date of Patent: November 22, 2011
    Assignee: SAS Institute Inc.
    Inventor: Christopher D. Bailey
  • Patent number: 8055646
    Abstract: A method and system for preventing redundant indexes in a database management system (DBMS). A received create-index command specifies a new index to be created for retrieving data from a table created by the DBMS and a redundancy check to be performed for the new index in conjunction with an action parameter in the create-index command. If the action parameter includes a REPORT value, each redundant index is stored and/or displayed and the new index is created. If the action parameter includes a PREVENT value and an existing index is redundant in view of the new index and the new index is not redundant in view of the existing index, the existing index is deleted and the new index is created. If the action parameter includes a PREVENT value and the new index is redundant in view of an existing index, the new index is not created.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: August 5, 2008
    Date of Patent: November 8, 2011
    Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
    Inventors: Oliver Augenstein, Namik Hrle, Thomas Ritter, Andreas Uhl
  • Patent number: 8027976
    Abstract: A solution is provided that allows end users to search documents in multiple remote content repositories in an enterprise environment, while maintaining security of those documents. Additionally, end users are able to search for a document without knowing which server or directory it is stored under. This is accomplished by installing a search agent on the end user's machine. The search engine collects the metadata of authorized documents located in different repositories via a web protocol (such as Hypertext Transfer Protocol, or HTTP) and stores them in the user's local memory as “searchable links”. This solves the enterprise content search problem through the creation of searchable links of remote content objects in an end user's local machine while allowing emerging desktop-search technology to index them.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: August 23, 2005
    Date of Patent: September 27, 2011
    Assignee: Oracle International Corporation
    Inventors: Dongling Ding, Kash Mohammadi
  • Patent number: 8019735
    Abstract: A query caching system and method for enabling the caching of software object instances at the granularity of query level. A query component in a container can issue a query to retrieve a query result from a database within a scope of a transaction. The query result includes one or more instances of a class that represents one or more persisted data entries retrieved from the database. A cache management component retrieves the query result for the query in the cache when a query registration component finds out that another query matches the query in the query registry. If the class is expected to remain unchanged within the transaction, the class can be configured to be used concurrently by multiple users, using an optimistic concurrency strategy. The cached query result can be invalidated during the transaction, when any row in any table in the database associated with the cached query result, or a range of any data entry of the one or more persisted data entries in the query is updated or invalidated.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: October 14, 2004
    Date of Patent: September 13, 2011
    Assignee: Oracle International Corporation
    Inventor: Seth White
  • Patent number: 7930327
    Abstract: A computer implemented method, apparatus, and computer program product for obtaining an absolute path name for an open file system object. A file descriptor for the open file system object is identified in response to a process in a first software partition opening a file system object to form the open file system object. The absolute path name for the open file system object is cached in a path name field in a file structure associated with the file descriptor for the open file system object. The absolute path name for the open file system object in the path name field is used during migration of the first software partition to restore the open file system object in a second software partition.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: May 21, 2007
    Date of Patent: April 19, 2011
    Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
    Inventors: David Jones Craft, Srikanth Vishwanathan
  • Patent number: 7930311
    Abstract: A data classification system is provided. The data classification system includes a fetch unit, a classification tree module, and a data repository. The fetch unit is adapted for receiving data including at least one datum, and fetching a data information contained in the data. The classification tree module is adapted for classifying the data in a manner of a tree structure according to the data info illation, and building a classification tree thereby. The data repository is adapted for storing the classification tree and the data.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: March 12, 2008
    Date of Patent: April 19, 2011
    Assignee: Industrial Technology Research Institute
    Inventors: Shih-An Feng, Tsung-Jen Huang, Yi-Ching Liaw, Chih-Tang Chang
  • Patent number: 7925648
    Abstract: A query access plan for executing a database query is dynamically selected from among multiple alternative query access plans based on the availability of computer resources allocated for running the query. Preferably, a first query access plan is generated based on resources then available, and if it is possible to provide additional resources, one or more alternative plans are generated based on the additional resources. If an alternative plan is significantly better than the original plan based on a comparison of query related parameters, the alternative is chosen for executing the query. Additional resources for running the query may be provided from logically partitioned and/or grid environments.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: August 16, 2007
    Date of Patent: April 12, 2011
    Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
    Inventors: Eric Lawrence Barsness, Mahdad Majd, Randy William Ruhlow, John Matthew Santosuosso