Method and Apparatus for Approximate Matching of Image Data
A method and device are disclosed for an associative and approximate, analog or digital scanning of databases that allows for the asynchronous accessing of data from a mass storage medium. The invention includes providing dedicated analog and digital circuitry and decision logic at the mass storage medium level for determining a key identifying the data of interest, continuously comparing the key to a signal generated from a reading of the data from the mass storage medium with an approximate or exact matching circuit to determine a pattern match, determining a correlation value between the key and the data as it is read in a continuous fashion, and determining a match based upon a preselected threshold value for the correlation value. The pattern matching technique eliminates any need to compare data based on its intrinsic structure or value, and instead is based on an analog or digital pattern. The key and data may be either analog or digital. This device and method may be provided as part of a stand-alone computer system, embodied in a network attached storage device, or can otherwise be provided as part of a computer LAN or WAN.
This application is a continuation of U.S. application Ser. No. 11/621,001, filed Jan. 8, 2007, and entitled “Associative Database Scanning and Information Retrieval”, which is a continuation application of U.S. application Ser. No. 10/722,691, filed on Nov. 24, 2003, and entitled “Associative Database Scanning and Information Retrieval”, now U.S. Pat. No. 7,181,437, which is a continuation of U.S. application Ser. No. 09/545,472, filed Apr. 7, 2000, entitled “Associative Database Scanning and Information Retrieval”, now U.S. Pat. No. 6,711,558, the entire disclosures of each of which are incorporated herein by reference.
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTIONAssociative memory devices are known in the prior art. Generally, these associative memory devices comprise peripheral memories for computers, computer networks, and the like, which operate asynchronously to the computer, network, etc. and provide increased efficiency for specialized searches. Additionally, it is also known in the prior art that these memory devices can include certain limited decision-making logic as an aid to a main CPU in accessing the peripheral memory. An example of such an associative memory device particularly adapted for use with a rotating memory such as a high speed disk or drum can be found in U.S. Pat. No. 3,906,455, the disclosure of which is incorporated herein by reference. This particular device provides a scheme for use with a rotating memory and teaches that two passes over a memory sector is necessary to presort and then sort the memory prior to performing any logical operations thereon. Thus, this device is taught as not being suitable for use with any linear or serial memory such as magnetic tape or the like.
Other examples of prior art devices may also be found in U.S. Pat. Nos. 3,729,712; 4,464,718; 5,050,075; 5,140,692; and 5,721,898; the disclosures of which are incorporated herein by reference.
As an example, in U.S. Pat. No. 4,464,718, Dixon performs fixed comparisons on a fixed number of bytes. They don't have the ability to scan and correlate arbitrarily over the data. They search serially along the tracks in a given disk cylinder but there is no provision for parallel searching across disks. Dixon's comparisons are limited by a fixed rigid number of standard logical operation types. Additionally, the circuitry presented supports only these single logical operations. There is no support for approximate or fuzzy matching.
While these prior art associative memory devices represent an attempt to speed the input and output of information to and from a peripheral memory, which in many cases is a mass storage memory device, all rely on the classic accessing of data stored in digital form by reading and interpreting the digital either address or content of the memory location. In other words, most such devices access data by its address but there are some devices that take advantage of the power of content addressing as is well known in the art. Nevertheless, in all of the prior art known to the inventors, the digital value of the address or data contained in the addressed location must be read and interpreted in its digital form in order to identify the data and then select it for processing. Not only does it take processing time to read and interpret the digital data represented by the address or content, this necessarily requires that the accessing circuit process the memory according to the structure of the data stored. In other words, if the data is stored in octets, then the accessing circuitry must access the data in octets and process it in an incremental manner. This “start and stop” processing serves to increase the input/output time required to access data. As is also well known in the art, this input/output time typically represents the bottleneck and effective limitation of processing power in any computer or computer network.
In order to solve these and other problems in the prior art, the inventors herein have succeeded in designing and developing a method and apparatus for an associative memory in several embodiments which provide an elegantly simple solution to these prior art limitations as well as dramatically decreased access times for data stored in mass storage memories. As mentioned, the invention has several embodiments each of which has its own advantages.
Generally, the invention may be described as a technique for data retrieval through approximate matching of a data key with a continuous reading of data as stored on a mass storage medium. In its broadest, and perhaps most powerful, embodiment, this key may be an analog signal and it is matched with an analog signal generated by a typical read/write device as it slews across the mass storage medium. In other words, the steps taught to be required in the prior art of not only reading the analog representation of digital data stored on the mass storage medium but also the conversion of that signal to its digital format prior to being compared are eliminated. Furthermore, there is no requirement that the data be “framed” or compared utilizing the structure or format in which the data has been organized and stored. For an analog signal, all that need be specified is the elapsed time of that signal which is used for comparison with a corresponding and continuously changing selected time portion of the “read” signal. Using any one of many standard correlation techniques as known in the prior art, the data “key” may then be approximately matched to the sliding “window” of data signal to determine a match. Significantly, the same amount of data may be scanned much more quickly and data matching the search request may be determined much more quickly as well. For example, the inventors have found that CPU based approximate searches of 200 megabytes of DNA sequences can take up to 10 seconds on a typical present day “high end” system, assuming the offline processing to index the database has already been completed. In that same 10 seconds, the inventors have found that a 10-gigabyte disk could be magnetically searched for approximate matches using the present invention. This represents a 50:1 improvement in performance. Furthermore, in a typical hard disk drive there are four surfaces and corresponding read/write heads, which may be all searched in parallel should each head be equipped with the present invention. As these searches can proceed in parallel, the total increase in speed or improvement represents a 200:1 advantage. Furthermore, additional hard disk drives may be accessed in parallel and scaled to further increase the advantage provided by the present invention.
By choosing an appropriate correlation or matching technique, and by setting an appropriate threshold, the search may be conducted to exactly match the desired signal, or more importantly and perhaps more powerfully, the threshold may be lowered to provide for approximate matching searches. This is generally considered a more powerful search mode in that databases may be scanned to find “hits” which may be valid even though the data may be only approximately that which is being sought. This allows searching to find data that has been corrupted, incorrectly entered data, data which only generally corresponds to a category, as well as other kinds of data searches that are highly desired in many applications. For example, a library of DNA sequences may be desired to be searched and hits found which represent an approximate match to a desired sequence of residues. This ensures that sequences which are close to the desired sequence are found and not discarded but for the difference in a forgivable number of residue mismatches. Still another application involves Internet searches provided by Internet search engines. In such a search, approximate matching allows for misspelled words, differently spelled words, and other variations to be accommodated without defeating a search or requiring a combinatorial number of specialized searches. This technique permits a search engine to provide a greater number of hits for any given search and ensure that a greater number of relevant web pages are found and cataloged in the search.
Still another possible application for the present invention is for accessing databases which may be enormous in size or which may be stored as analog representations. For example, our society has seen the implementation of sound recording devices and their use in many forums including judicial proceedings. In recent history, tape recordings made in the President's oval office have risen in importance with respect to impeachment hearings. As can be appreciated, tape recordings made over the years of a presidency can accumulate into a huge database which might require a number of persons to actually listen to them in order to find instances where particular words are spoken that might be of interest. Utilizing the present invention, an analog representation of that spoken word can be used as a key and sought to be matched while the database is scanned in a continuous manner and at rapid speed. Thus, the present invention provides a powerful search tool for massive analog databases as well as massive digital databases.
While text-based searches are accommodated by the present invention as described above, storage media containing pictures, sound, and other representations have traditionally been more difficult to search than text. The present invention allows searching a large data space for the presence of such content or fragments thereof. For example, the key in this case could be a row or quadrant of pixels that represent the image being sought. Approximate matching of the key's signal can then allow identification of matches or near matches to the key.
While the principal advantages and features of the present invention have been briefly explained above, a more thorough understanding of the invention may be attained by referring to the drawings and description of the preferred embodiment which follow.
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In the prior art as shown in the upper portion of
The approximate matching unit 24 may itself comprise a set of digital logic or analog circuitry organized to perform scanning, correlation, general logic and approximate matching functions on the signals received from the storage medium in conjunction with digital or analog representations of query directed key information. The functions may be performed by dedicated logic and circuitry, programmable logic and circuitry or by use of programmable processors such as digital signal processors (DSPs). The inventors contemplate that many different variations of hardware or programmed software devices may be used to virtually equal advantage in implementing the present invention and therefore do not contemplate any particular implementation as a better mode than another, at present, except as otherwise expressed herein. Furthermore, the present invention should not be considered as being tied to any specific data structure or application, those having been used herein are instead to be viewed as illustrative only. Using the present disclosure as a template, it is contemplated that one of ordinary skill in the art could readily construct a device as would perform the functions and operation necessary to achieve the purposes of the invention.
As has been explained above, the present invention may be used to perform both exact matches and approximate matches. When performing an exact match in the analog domain, at Point A in
The microprocessor or programmable logic device 22 may itself comprise one or more microprocessors, programmable logic units, dedicated logic and associated circuitry. This unit interfaces with the system or input/output bus 34 and, in one configuration, also interfaces with any disk caches 30 which may be present. The unit receives and processes requests and queries from the CPU 32 or network interface 36 and presents these requests in the appropriate form to approximate matching unit 24. Additionally the unit may aid in passing the results of the requests to either or both the disk cache 30 and/or the CPU 32 (by way of the bus 34).
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The configurations as exemplified by those shown in
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The query will typically result in the execution of one or more operating system utilities. As an example of a higher level utility command, for the UNIX operating system, this could be modified versions of glimpse, find, grep, apropos. Other such functions causing the CPU to send commands 66 such as search, approximate search, etc., to the approximate matching and pre-fetch processor of the present invention (see
At this point, depending upon the particular methodology desired to be implemented in the particular embodiment of the invention, it would be necessary that an analog or digital key is determined. This key is data, exact or approximate, that corresponds to the data being searched for. For an analog key, this key may either be pre-stored such as in the mass storage medium, developed using dedicated circuitry, or required to be generated. Should the analog key be pre-stored, a send pre-stored key step 68 would be performed by the microprocessor or programmable logic device 22 (see
Decision logic 84 would next make an intelligent decision as to whether a portion of data approximately matches or does not approximately match the key. Should a match be found, then the data is processed as at step 86 and the data requested by the query is sent to a disk cache 30, directly onto system bus 34, or otherwise be buffered or made available to a CPU 32, network interface 36, or otherwise as shown in
The inventors herein have preliminarily tested the present invention and have generated preliminary data demonstrating its operability and effectiveness.
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At approximately the point labeled 325, a distinct peak is noted which approaches 1, indicating a very close match between the key and the pseudo-random binary sequence. Thus, the present invention has been demonstrated as capable of finding a key that is present in a pseudo-random digital sequence.
Various changes and modifications to the present invention would be apparent to those skilled in the art but yet which would not depart from the spirit of the invention. Several of these alternatives have been indicated above. For example, all of the operations exemplified by the analog processing shown in
Claims
1-37. (canceled)
38. A method for determining whether at least a portion of an image is an approximate match to a key, the method comprising:
- streaming data corresponding to an image through programmable logic that has been loaded with a key; and
- comparing the streaming image data with the key using the programmable logic to thereby identify any approximate matches that exist between the key and the image data.
39. The method of claim 38 wherein the image data comprises a plurality of pixels, and wherein the key corresponds to a group of pixels for which at least an approximate match is sought in the image data.
40. The method of claim 39 wherein the key comprises a row of pixels.
41. The method of claim 39 wherein the key comprises a quadrant of pixels.
42. The method of claim 39 further comprising:
- receiving a search command from a processor that is in communication with the programmable logic via a system bus; and
- providing information to the processor that is indicative of any approximate matches identified as a result of the comparing step.
43. The method of claim 40 further comprising:
- determining the key from the search command using the programmable logic.
44. The method of claim 39 wherein the comparing step comprises:
- continuously computing a correlation coefficient between the key and a sliding window of the streaming image data using the programmable logic; and
- judging each computed correlation coefficient against a threshold value to thereby identify whether an approximate match exists between the key and the streaming image data.
45. The method of claim 44 wherein the key comprises an analog key as represented by a plurality of samples, and wherein the streaming step comprises sampling an analog read signal of image data streaming from a database at a high rate, and wherein the comparing step comprises performing the comparing step on the respective samples of the analog key and the image data.
46. The method of claim 39 wherein the comparing step comprises determining whether an approximate match exists based on an adjustable threshold using the programmable logic.
47. The method of claim 46 further comprising:
- adjusting the threshold to control a degree of approximate matches which is identified as a result of the comparing step.
48. The method of claim 39 wherein the comparing step comprises pattern comparing the streaming image data with the key using the programmable logic to thereby identify any approximate matches that exist between the key and the streaming image data.
49. The method of claim 48 wherein the pattern comparing step comprises pattern comparing the streaming image data with the key using the programmable logic without framing the streaming image data.
50. An apparatus for determining whether a portion of an image stored by a mass storage medium is an approximate match to a key, the apparatus comprising:
- an approximate matching unit in communication with a mass storage medium, the approximate matching unit comprising programmable logic, the programmable logic being configured to (1) store a key, (2) receive a stream of image data from the mass storage medium, and (3) compare the received stream of image data with the key to thereby identify an approximate match between the key and the received image data.
51. The method of claim 50 wherein the image data comprises a plurality of pixels, and wherein the key corresponds to a group of pixels for which at least an approximate match is sought in the image data.
52. The apparatus of claim 51 wherein the apparatus further comprises a processor and a system bus, the system bus interconnecting the processor with the approximate matching unit, wherein the approximate matching unit is further configured to (1) receive a search command from the processor via the system bus, and (2) provide information to the processor that is indicative of any approximate matches identified as a result of the comparison.
53. The apparatus of claim 52 wherein the programmable logic is further configured to determine the key from the search command.
54. The apparatus of claim 51 wherein the apparatus further comprises a network interface and a system bus, the system bus interconnecting the network interface with the approximate matching unit, wherein the approximate matching unit is further configured to (1) receive a search command from the network interface via the system bus, and (2) provide information to the network interface that is indicative of any approximate matches identified as a result of the comparison.
55. The apparatus of claim 51 wherein the programmable logic is further configured to (1) continuously compute a correlation coefficient between the key and a sliding window of the received image data, and (2) judge the computed correlation coefficients against a threshold value to thereby identify whether any approximate matches exist between the key and the received image data.
56. The apparatus of claim 55 wherein the key comprises an analog key as represented by a plurality of samples, wherein the approximate matching unit is further configured to sample an analog read signal of image data streaming from the mass storage medium at a high rate, and wherein the programmable logic is further configured to perform its comparison on the respective samples of the analog key and the image data.
57. The apparatus of claim 51 wherein the programmable logic is further configured to determine whether any of the approximate matches exist based on an adjustable threshold.
58. The apparatus of claim 57 wherein the approximate matching unit is configured to adjust the threshold to control a degree of approximate matches which is identified as a result of the comparison.
59. The apparatus of claim 57 further comprising the mass storage medium directly coupled to the approximate matching unit.
60. The apparatus of claim 59 wherein the mass storage medium comprises at least one hard disk drive.
61. A method for determining whether a portion of an image is an approximate match to a key, the method comprising:
- reading image data from a mass storage medium as a stream of pixels;
- correlating a sliding window of the pixel stream with a key using programmable logic, wherein the key corresponds to a group of pixels; and
- determining whether an approximate match exists between the key and the pixel stream in response to the correlating step and based on an adjustable threshold.
62. The method of claim 61 wherein the correlating step comprises continuously computing a correlation coefficient between the key and the sliding window, and wherein the determining step comprises comparing the computed correlation coefficients with a threshold value to thereby identify whether any approximate matches exist between the key and the pixel stream.
Type: Application
Filed: Oct 31, 2007
Publication Date: May 15, 2008
Inventors: Ronald S. Indeck (St. Louis, MO), Ron Kaplan Cytron (St. Louis, MO), Mark Allen Franklin (St. Louis, MO)
Application Number: 11/932,434
International Classification: G06F 17/30 (20060101);