JP2007065745A - Document search method and document search device, and program - Google Patents

Abstract

<P>PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To provide a document search method capable of solving the problems associated with similar document search. <P>SOLUTION: A document suitable for a user's search intention with a simple operation can be acquired by a search using keywords in the document and information relevant to the document and the keywords. <P>COPYRIGHT: (C)2007,JPO&INPIT

Description

  The present invention relates to a document search method, and more particularly to a document search method for searching a document similar to a certain document with a simple operation.

  In recent years, search has come to be used in various scenes such as Web page search and document search due to the progress of search technology. As one method for providing a search condition at the time of search, a method called similar document search has been developed in which a certain document is given and a document similar in content is searched for (see, for example, Patent Document 1).

However, generally, in the similar document search, an algorithm for determining similarity is concealed from the user, and in some cases, it may be difficult to understand the basis for obtaining the search result.
Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 9-269952

  Therefore, the present invention provides a document search method that presents important words / phrases that appear in a document, and also presents information related to the words / phrases, and can specify a search condition from these. Objective.

  In order to solve the above problem, the document search method according to claim 1 according to the present invention includes a keyword extraction step of extracting a keyword from a document, a document display step of displaying the document, and the keyword in the document. A keyword display step for displaying inside, a keyword supplement information generation step for generating keyword supplement information for adding information to the keyword, a keyword supplement information display step for displaying the keyword supplement information outside the document, and a user A search condition selection step for selecting a condition to be used for a search from a part or all of the keyword and the keyword supplementary information, a search processing instruction step for a user to instruct a search process, and the selected search condition And a search step for performing a search using.

  In the present invention, the keywords in the document and the information related to the documents and keywords are displayed, and any of them can be selected by a simple operation and can be searched using this. Documents can be acquired with a simple operation.

<Embodiment 1>
Hereinafter, the search method of the present invention will be described in detail with reference to the drawings.

  FIG. 1 is a diagram showing a functional configuration of a document search apparatus according to the present invention. In FIG. 1, reference numeral 109 denotes a document reading unit that reads a document. A document holding unit 110 holds a read document. A document display unit 101 displays the read document. A document analysis unit 111 analyzes the read document. A keyword extraction unit 102 extracts a keyword from the read retained document. A keyword display unit 103 displays the extracted keywords inside the document. Reference numeral 104 denotes a development keyword generation unit that generates a development keyword for adding information to the keyword. Reference numeral 105 denotes an expanded keyword display unit that displays expanded keywords outside the document. Reference numeral 112 denotes an associative word dictionary used when deriving expansion keywords. Reference numeral 106 denotes a search condition selection unit that selects a condition to be used for a search from a part or all of the keyword and the expanded keyword. Reference numeral 107 denotes a search processing instruction unit for a user to instruct search processing. A search unit 108 performs a search using the selected search condition.

  FIG. 2 is a block diagram showing a hardware configuration of the document search apparatus according to the present invention. In FIG. 2, reference numeral 201 denotes a central processing unit that controls the entire computer apparatus 200. A main storage device 202 is used as a work area of the central processing unit. A display device 203 displays data on the document display unit 101, the keyword display unit 103, and the expanded keyword display unit 105. Reference numeral 204 denotes an input device such as a pointing device or a keyboard for inputting data in response to an operation instructed by the user in the search processing instruction unit 107. Reference numeral 205 denotes an external storage device that stores data such as a keyword dictionary that stores words as keywords and an associative word dictionary 112 that stores words associated with the keywords. Also, the external storage device 205 stores a program that executes the processing of the document search device of the present embodiment.

  FIG. 3 is a flowchart showing a specific processing flow by the document search apparatus of the present invention. The flow of FIG. 3 is described below. In the flowchart shown in FIG. 3, processing of each function is performed by the central processing unit 201 executing a program read from the external storage device 205.

  In response to the user's instruction, the document to be searched is scanned by the document reading unit 109 (S301). Then, the scanned data is recorded in the document holding unit 110 (S302). Note that scanned document data may be directly provided to the document holding unit 110 as an alternative to the processing of S301 and S302.

  Then, the scanned data is analyzed by the document analysis unit 111, and text data is extracted (S303). The correspondence between the text data extracted in S303 and the position in the scanned image is recognized (S304). Note that S303 and S304 can be achieved by using an existing document analysis technique.

  The keyword extraction unit 102 extracts keywords from the text data based on the result analyzed by the document analysis unit 111 (S305). Note that keyword extraction is achieved by extracting words registered in the keyword dictionary from text data.

  Further, by referring to the associative word dictionary 112 by the processing of the expansion keyword generating unit 104, expansion keywords such as related words and association words are obtained for each keyword (S306). Here, the related terms are synonyms, broader terms, narrower terms, and the like. For example, “PC” includes “personal computer”, “computer”, and the like. Associative words include words such as “cheap” and “convenient” in “fast food”.

  The scanned document is displayed on the display by the document display unit 101 (S307). The keyword extracted by the keyword extraction unit 102 is highlighted in the keyword display unit 103 so as to indicate that it can be selected. Further, the expanded keywords generated by the expanded keyword generation unit 104 are displayed side by side in the expanded keyword display unit 105 in the same manner. Since there is no restriction on the display position of the expanded keyword, it may be arranged around the document instead of horizontally.

  The search condition selection unit 106 determines the search condition by specifying the keyword selected by the user using the pointing device (S308).

  The search processing instruction unit 107 instructs search processing based on the search condition selected by the search condition selection unit 106 (S309). The search process performed in the search unit 108 may be any process such as full-text search, keyword search, and concept search. In S308, if search conditions corresponding to each are generated, these search processes can be realized.

  FIG. 4 shows a user UI image in the processing shown in FIG. As shown in (a), the scan result of the document to be searched is displayed in the “text display area”, and the keywords included in the text are underlined. In addition, associative words for all underlined keywords are displayed in the “expanded keyword display area”.

  In FIG. 4A, the expansion keyword “document” is associated with the keyword “document” in the text display area, “character recognition” with respect to “OCR”, and “search” with respect to “search”. Are displayed in the expanded keyword display area (in this embodiment, one expanded keyword is displayed for each keyword, but a plurality of expanded keywords may be displayed).

  FIG. 4B shows a UI in the case where “OCR” and “character recognition” are selected and searched as keywords from the display state of FIG. 4A as keywords. As shown in FIG. 4B, it is possible to execute a search process by selecting a target keyword and selecting a search button.

<Embodiment 2>
The basic configuration of the second embodiment for implementing the present invention is the same as that of the first embodiment. However, the difference is that the search condition is derived not from the expansion keyword but from the related category.

  FIG. 8 is a diagram showing a functional configuration of an apparatus for carrying out the present invention. In FIG. 8, reference numeral 809 denotes a document reading unit that reads a document. A document holding unit 810 holds a read document. A document display unit 801 displays the read document. A document analysis unit 811 analyzes the read document. A keyword extraction unit 802 extracts a keyword from the read retained document. A keyword display unit 803 displays the extracted keywords inside the document. A document classification unit 804 performs document classification. A classification category display unit 805 displays the classified categories. Reference numeral 806 denotes a search condition selection unit that selects a condition used for a search from a part or all of a keyword and a developed keyword by a user. Reference numeral 807 denotes a search processing instruction unit for a user to instruct search processing. A search unit 808 performs a search using the selected search condition.

  FIG. 5 is a flowchart showing a specific processing flow by the document search apparatus of the present invention. The flow of FIG. 5 is described below. In the flowchart shown in FIG. 5, processing of each function is performed by the central processing unit 201 executing a program read from the external storage device 205.

  In response to a user instruction, the document reading unit 809 scans a document to be searched (S501). The scanned data is recorded in the document holding unit 810 (S502). Note that scanned document data may be directly provided to the document holding unit 810 instead of the processing of S501 and S502. The scanned data is analyzed by the document analysis unit 811 and text data is extracted (S503).

  The correspondence between the text data extracted in S503 and the position in the scanned image is recognized (S504). Note that S503 and S504 may be based on an existing document analysis technique.

  Further, the document classification unit 804 classifies the extracted text data into a plurality of categories (S505). This classification is achieved by an existing method such as referring to attribute information registered in the document in advance. Then, the keyword extraction unit 802 extracts keywords from the text, and further obtains associations between the classification categories and the keywords (S506). Keyword extraction is the same as in the first embodiment. The association between the classification category and the keyword is performed using, for example, a dictionary showing a correspondence relationship.

  The scanned document is displayed on the display by the document display unit 801. The classification category display unit 805 displays the classification category name so that it can be selected outside the document (S507). When it is detected that the name of the classification category displayed externally is selected by the user's instruction, only the corresponding keyword is highlighted in the document in the keyword display unit 803 (or all keywords are displayed in the initial state. It is also possible to highlight the keywords that are not related to the selected category and remove the highlighting).

  The search condition selection unit 806 determines the search condition from the keyword and classification category selected by the user using the pointing device (S508).

  The search processing instruction unit 807 instructs search processing based on the search condition selected by the search condition selection unit 806 (S509).

  FIG. 6 shows a user UI image in the processing shown in FIG. As shown in FIG. 6A, the scan result of the document to be searched is displayed in the “text display area”. Further, the text is classified into categories, and the classification results are displayed in the “category category display area”. Then, a plurality of classified categories and keywords related to each category are extracted, and the keywords included in the text are displayed underlined. In FIG. 6, three keywords “Czech Republic”, “Hotel”, and “Overseas Travel” are displayed in the category display area as categories related to the text.

  FIG. 6B shows a case where “Czech Republic” is selected from the classification categories, and only the corresponding keywords are highlighted in the document (first, all keywords are highlighted and selected). Or unhighlighted keywords that are not related to the category you ’ve chosen).

<Embodiment 3>
The basic configuration of the third embodiment for carrying out the present invention is a combination of the first and second embodiments, and displays both the classification category and the expansion keyword outside the document. FIG. 7 shows a user UI image in this embodiment. The expanded keywords related to the classified categories shown in the classified category display area are displayed in the expanded keyword display area.

<Embodiment 4>
The basic configuration of the fourth mode for carrying out the present invention is the same as that of the first embodiment. However, it is different in that a word that is not extracted as a keyword in a document is specified by a user and added to a search word, and a development keyword corresponding to this keyword is added and displayed in a development keyword display area.

<Embodiment 5>
The basic configuration of the fifth embodiment for carrying out the present invention is the same as that of the first embodiment. However, not only the keyword but also the key image (main image in the document) can be extracted and selected.

<Embodiment 6>
The basic configuration of the sixth embodiment for carrying out the present invention is the same as that of the first embodiment. However, it is different in that it can be implemented even with a normal application document instead of a scanned document.

<Hardware configuration>
The functions of the above-described embodiment are not only realized by executing the program read from the above-described external storage device. Based on the program, an operating system (OS) or the like running on the computer performs part or all of the actual processing, and the above-described implementation function is also realized by the processing.

It is a figure which shows the functional structure of the apparatus in Embodiment 1. FIG. It is a block diagram which shows the hardware constitutions of the apparatus which implements this invention. FIG. 3 is a diagram illustrating a specific processing flow in the first embodiment. It is a figure which shows UI of the user in Embodiment 1. FIG. FIG. 10 is a diagram illustrating a specific processing flow in the second embodiment. It is a figure which shows UI of the user in Embodiment 2. FIG. It is a figure which shows UI of the user in Embodiment 3. It is a figure which shows the functional structure of the apparatus in Embodiment 2. FIG.

Explanation of symbols

DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 101 Document display part 102 Keyword extraction part 103 Keyword display part 104 Expansion keyword generation part 105 Expansion keyword display part 106 Search condition selection part 107 Search process instruction part 108 Search part 109 Document reading part 110 Document holding part 111 Document analysis part 112 Associative word Dictionary 200 Overall computer device 201 Central processing unit 202 Main storage device 203 Display device 204 Input device 205 External storage device 801 Document display unit 802 Keyword extraction unit 803 Keyword display unit 804 Document classification unit 805 Classification category display unit 806 Search condition selection unit 807 Search processing instruction unit 808 Search unit 809 Document reading unit 810 Document holding unit 811 Document analysis unit

Claims (7)

A keyword extraction step for extracting a keyword from a document; a document display step for displaying the document; a keyword display step for displaying the keyword in the document; and keyword supplement information generation for generating keyword supplement information for adding information to the keyword A keyword supplement information display step for displaying the keyword supplement information outside the document; and a search condition selection step for a user to select a condition used for the search from a part or all of the keyword and the keyword supplement information. A document search method comprising: a search process instruction process in which a user instructs a search process; and a search process for performing a search using a selected search condition.   2. The document retrieval method according to claim 1, wherein the keyword supplement information is a keyword related word or associative word, and the keyword supplement information generating step is a step of obtaining a keyword related word or associative word. .   2. The document retrieval method according to claim 1, wherein the keyword supplement information is a classification category of the document, and the keyword supplement information generation step is a step of performing document classification processing.   4. The document search method according to claim 1, further comprising a keyword addition specifying step of newly specifying a word / phrase existing in the document as a keyword.   The key image extraction step of extracting a key image, which is an important image, from images existing in a document according to claim 1, wherein the search condition selection step also selects a key image, The document search method according to claim 1, wherein the document search method can be used as a search condition. Keyword extraction means for extracting a keyword from a document, document display means for displaying the document, keyword display means for displaying the keyword inside the document, and keyword supplement information generation for generating keyword supplement information for adding information to the keyword Means, Keyword supplement information display means for displaying the keyword supplement information outside the document, and Search condition selection means for the user to select a condition to be used for a search from a part or all of the keyword and the keyword supplement information A document search apparatus comprising: search processing instruction means for a user to instruct search processing; and search means for performing a search using a selected search condition. A program for causing a computer to execute each step included in the document search method according to any one of claims 1 to 5.

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