Systems, methods, and computer program products for searching and displaying low cost product availability information for a given departure-return date combination or range of departure-return date combinations

摘要

The present invention generates a grid of low-priced fare combinations for either a selected departure and return date or a range of departure and return dates. The present invention uses various techniques to reduce processing and delay in generating the grids. The present invention first converts flight itineraries for the selected departure and return dates or the range of dates into the fare domain. The invention discards fare combinations that are not valid for the given travel request. The valid fare combinations are processed to determine which has the lowest fare price. The fare combinations are processed one at a time starting with the cheapest fare combination to determine which of the possible flight itineraries may be covered by the fare combination. The invention may use additional prunning steps to validate the fare combinations prior to application to individual flight itineraries. As each fare combination is matched to a flight itinerary, the grid is populated with this fare combination.