METHOD AND APPARATUS FOR BUILDING A USER-DEFINED TECHNICAL THESAURUS USING ON-LINE DATABASES

摘要

An on-line data collection system is provided that uses a network to access multiple databases over the Internet (Figure 5). The user designates an initial search term and performs a preliminary search (or 'initial query') to obtain preliminary results that rank documents containing the initial search term (402). Using this information, the system can show words or phrases equivalent to the initial search term, and each of the search terms also can be associated with an image that is chosen by the user. The system iteratively searches databases containing 'electronic' documents using all desired terms completely under the control of the user, and as equivalent terms or new terms are discovered within certain documents, the user can refine the search query (404) to finally arrive at a 'crafted query'. This crafted query will produce a set of documents that are grouped by certain criteria, and these various criteria can then be linked so that more meaningful relationships between certain documents can be easily discerned by the user. The end result is a very useful interactive database searching tool that allows the user to quickly find the documents that are most relevant to that user.