Abstract: An information recording apparatus comprises an encryption section encrypting contents information and also a license condition referred to limit use of the contents information and a decoding key for decoding the encrypted contents information to generate license information, and a recording section recording the encrypted contents information and the generated license information on a recording medium. An information reproducing apparatus comprises a decoder unit decoding the license information recorded on the recording medium using a second decoding key for decoding the license information and deciding on the basis of the license condition contained in the decoded license information whether the contents information can be used. If it is decided that the contents information can be used, the encrypted contents information recorded on the recording medium is decoded using the first decoding key contained in the decoded license information.

Abstract: In a commodity data management apparatus, a communication unit receives purchase commodity data of each customer in time series from a commodity data input and output apparatus. A data analysis unit determines a tendency of purchase commodity of each customer according to the purchase commodity data received. The communication unit sends commodity presentation data based on the tendency of purchase commodity to the commodity data input and output apparatus of the customer. The commodity presentation data is usable for the customer's next purchase. In the commodity data input and output apparatus, a communication unit receives the commodity presentation data, and a display unit displays the commodity presentation data to the customer.

Abstract: An information recording apparatus comprises an encryption section encrypting contents information and also a license condition referred to to limit use of the contents information and a decoding key for decoding the encrypted contents information to generate license information, and a recording section recording the encrypted contents information and the generated license information on a recording medium. An information reproducing apparatus comprises a decoder unit decoding the license information recorded on the recording medium using a second decoding key for decoding the license information and deciding on the basis of the license condition contained in the decoded license information whether the contents information can be used. If it is decided that the contents information can be used, the encrypted contents information recorded on the recording medium is decoded using the first decoding key contained in the decoded license information.

Abstract: The present invention is a device and method for filtering information, the device comprising a document database storing document data to be filtered, a reproduced document information storing unit storing fundamental document data used for detection of documents, newly created or updated, a detecting unit for detecting a document, newly created or updated, among document data stored in the document database based on document data stored in the document database and the fundamental document data stored in the reproduced document information storing unit, a similarity computing unit for computing a similarity between the detected document detected by the detecting unit and a retrieval condition set in advance, and a presenting unit for presenting detected documents detected by the detecting unit according to the similarities computed by the similarity computing unit.

Abstract: A topic storage section organizes the addresses for an information providing sources entered from a topic managing section, the pointers to information acquisition drivers stored in an information acquisition driver storage section, and the pointers to search conditions stored in a search condition storage section into groups. The topic storage section then stores such groups by each of the topics classified hierarchically. Then, an information selecting section acquires information from the information providing source for the topic stored in the topic storage section by means of the information acquisition driver corresponding to the information providing source. Thereafter, the information selecting section compares each of the acquired pieces of information with the search condition for the topic stored in the topic storage section and chooses only the pieces of information that conform to the search condition.

Abstract: An information filtering apparatus for providing articles to a user includes an article extraction section that retrieves articles from articles stored in an article storage section using a user-profile. An excerpt generating section generates excerpts of the retrieved article by calculating similarities between the retrieved articles and the user-profile to generate the excerpt including the user's necessary information. An abstract generating section combines excerpts to form an abstract. The user-profile for each user in the user-profile storage section is modified in accordance with user feedback.

Abstract: An information filtering apparatus for receiving articles, such as texts or images, from information sources to select predetermined articles from the supplied articles to a user has a storage portion, an article retrieving portion, a determining portion and a presentation portion. The storage portion stores retrieving conditions previously specified for each user. The article retrieving portion retrieves the supplied articles to select articles which satisfy the retrieving conditions for each user. The determining portion calculates similarities among the articles selected by the article retrieving portion or the selected articles and other articles to determine relevant articles for each article in accordance with the similarities. The presentation portion adds information of the determined relevant articles to the selected articles to present the articles and information to the user.

Abstract: A document detection system capable of detecting a desired document from a large number of documents easily and accurately in which the user can make a judgement concerning the appropriateness of the detection result quickly. In the system, those documents which contain a semantic structure of a detection command containing natural language expressions entered by a user are detected. Also, the keywords of each document can be extracted from the summary of each document and those documents whose keywords match with detection keywords specified by a user can be detected. Also, the summary of each detected document can be automatically generated according to text structures of each detected document and displayed along with the detected document itself. Also, the detection processing can be carried out with respect to the summaries of the documents instead of the documents themselves.

Abstract: A language processing application system capable of operating a plurality of language processing functions on different computer systems while improving a performance level of each language processing function. In the system, mutually different language processing functions are provided by a plurality of language processing servers, and status data obtained in a course of a language processing by each language processing server is managed at a status data management unit, where the status data indicates at least a part of features of input data processed by each language processing server. Each language processing server acquires the status data obtained in a course of a language processing by another language processing server from the status data management unit and adjusts its language processing according to the status data acquired from the status data management unit.

Abstract: A document retrieval system is provided with an original sentence processing unit which sets a plurality of sentence types for identifying the contents of sentences, such as "OPINION" and "PROPOSAL," prepares sentence-unit excerpt sentence data classified according to the sentence types from an original sentence database storing original sentence data constituting documents, and stores the excerpt sentence data as excerpt sentence database. The original sentence processing unit comprises a type determination section for extracting excerpt sentence data corresponding to a designated sentence type, and a shaping section for shaping the excerpt sentence data in a predetermined format, e.g., in such a format that a conjunctive is deleted.

Abstract: A human interface system constructed by connecting systems containing a plurality of computers via a network includes site building means for building a plurality of sites that either retain or manage a plurality pieces of data and a plurality of programs, and access managing means for managing users' access to each site. The access managing means has a communication channel between the users established by accessing the sites via the data and programs.

Abstract: A document detection system using a detection result presentation that can facilitate a user's quick comprehension of the relevancy of each detected document. In this system, a user's input for commanding a document detection is analyzed to extract keywords and viewpoints relevant to each keyword contained in the user's input, and a detection command is constructed from the keywords and the viewpoints extracted from the user's input. Then, the detection operation is executed to detect those documents among a plurality of stored documents which match with the constructed detection command as detected documents for a detection result. The detection result can be presented in the multi-dimensional display formed by setting the viewpoints to axes with the detection command as an origin and using distances of the detected documents with respect to the origin for each viewpoint as coordinates of the detected documents with respect to each axis representing each viewpoint.

Abstract: A digital computing apparatus for preparing document text includes a sentence significance decision section for calculating a significance value of each sentence of document data according to a relation between each sentence and other sentences of the document data. The apparatus can also include a topic extraction section for extracting a topic for each sentence of the document data. A format structure extraction section extracts format structure from document data according to predetermined rules. The format structure, corresponding sentence significance values and topics are sent to an output section. The output section displays this information to the user. The sentence retrieval section retrieves sentences including a user inputted reference word from document data. Then the sentence retrieval section selects a sentence which is related to the reference word from retrieved sentences according to the sentence significance value or the topic. The output section displays only the selected sentence to user.