JP2007080205A - Retrieval apparatus and retrieval method - Google Patents

Abstract

<P>PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To simply display a retrieval result regarding a retrieval apparatus and retrieval method. <P>SOLUTION: A file matching a retrieval condition is retrieved out of a plurality of files and when a number of suited files exist within the same directory, in place of the suited files included in the same directory, the directory is displayed as a retrieval result. Thus, the retrieval result is simply displayed, thereby easily discovering a target document out of documents matching the retrieval condition. <P>COPYRIGHT: (C)2007,JPO&INPIT

Description

  The present invention relates to a search device, a search method, a computer program, and a recording medium, and more particularly to a technique suitable for use in displaying search results.

  In recent years, there is an increasing tendency to store documents electronically. The reason may be that various conveniences can be obtained when performing maintenance management or the like. A technique that has become indispensable as a result of computerization is a search technique (see, for example, Patent Document 1). With the development of this document search technology, information searching has become much easier, and there are many expectations for the development of this field.

JP 2004-326293 A

  What is important in search technology is how quickly and accurately the intended document can be searched. The searcher gives a search condition to the search device, receives the search result, and accesses the target document. However, since it is difficult to completely reflect the document intended by the user in the search condition, an operation of selecting a target document from a search result including many extra documents must be performed. In order to proceed smoothly with this document selection work, it was an important issue to make the search result concise.

  The present invention has been made in view of the above-described problems, and an object of the present invention is to make it possible to display search results in a concise manner.

  The search apparatus according to the present invention includes a search unit that searches for a conforming file that matches a search condition from a plurality of files, and a determination that determines whether or not there are many conforming files retrieved by the search unit in the same directory. And a search result display means for displaying the directory as a search result instead of the matching file included in the same directory when there are a large number of the matching files in the same directory as a result of the determination by the determining means. It is characterized by having.

  The search method of the present invention includes a search step for searching for a conforming file that matches a search condition from a plurality of files, and a determination for determining whether a large number of conforming files retrieved by the search step exist in the same directory. And a search result display step of displaying the directory as a search result instead of the matching file included in the same directory when there are many matching files in the same directory as a result of the determination in the determination step. It is characterized by having.

  The computer program according to the present invention includes a search step for searching for a compatible file that matches a search condition from a plurality of files, and a determination for determining whether or not a large number of compatible files searched by the search step exist in the same directory. And a search result display step of displaying the directory as a search result instead of the matching file included in the same directory when there are many matching files in the same directory as a result of the determination in the determination step. The computer is caused to execute a search method having

  The recording medium of the present invention records the computer program described above.

  According to the present invention, a file that matches a search condition is searched from a plurality of files, and when there are many compatible files in the same directory, the directory is used as a search result instead of the compatible files included in the same directory. By displaying the search result, the search result can be displayed in a concise manner, so that the target document can be easily found from a plurality of documents that meet the search condition.

(First embodiment)
Hereinafter, a first embodiment of the present invention will be described.
FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing a functional configuration of the search device according to the present embodiment.
In FIG. 1, a communication unit 101 returns a search result in response to a search request from an external device. The search condition generation unit 102 generates a search condition used inside the search device from the search condition included in the search request.

  The database 103 stores document and directory information. The database search unit 104 searches the database 103 for documents and directories that match the search condition generated by the search condition generation unit 102. The search result generation unit 105 generates a search result to be returned to the searcher from the search result of the database search unit 104.

FIG. 2 is a diagram illustrating an example of a hardware configuration when the search apparatus according to the present embodiment is realized by information processing including a general-purpose computer.
In FIG. 2, the search device includes an HD (hard disk) device 201 as a secondary storage device, a memory 202, a network I / F 203, a CPU 204, and a removable device 205. Further, the search device includes a display device 206, a display board 207, a keyboard 208, a mouse 209, and a peripheral controller 210.

  Each function of the search device shown in FIG. 1 is executed based on a program stored in the secondary storage device. This program exists as an execution file in the HD device 201. When executing each function, the execution file is loaded into the memory 202. Each function is executed by the CPU 204 based on the loaded execution file. The search request is input using the keyboard 208 and the mouse 209, and the search result is presented on the screen of the display device 206. When implemented as a network application, both search requests and search results are input / output via the network I / F.

  FIG. 3 is a diagram illustrating an example of an execution screen configured by the search device illustrated in FIG.

  The screen is composed of three areas 301 to 303. An area 301 is a tree area that displays a tree structure of a directory, and an area 302 is a file list area that displays document files or directories below the directory specified in the tree area 301. An area 303 is a search area for giving a search request to the search apparatus. The character string written next to the folder icon in the tree area 301 is the name of the folder, and the character string written next to the document icon in the file list area 302 is the name of the document.

  The search area 303 is provided with an area for inputting a search word on the left side and a button for instructing to start executing a search using the input search word as a search request. In FIG. 3, the tree area 301 indicates a state where the “specifications” directory is selected, and the file list area 302 indicates a state where four documents in the “specifications” directory are displayed. . In addition, the search device according to the present embodiment has a function of searching for documents and directories that include search terms in their names.

FIG. 4 is a diagram showing a search result screen when searching with a conventional search device. FIG. 4 shows an example in which the search term is “specification”.
Data 401 is the number of search results, and indicates that the number of matches for the search word is 8 as a result of the search. An area 402 is a search result display area that displays relevant document files and directories. An icon is displayed on the left side, a document name or directory name is displayed in the middle, and a document location is displayed on the right side.

  Although the data 401 is displayed as eight search results, since only six items can be displayed in the search result display area 402, a button 403 for displaying the remaining two items is displayed in the lower right. ing.

  In the example shown in FIG. 4, the “specification” directory is matched as a search condition, and the document files “external specification.doc”, “data structure specification.doc”, “internal” under the “specification” directory. Spec.doc "conforms. In this way, when managing a document, if the directory name is “specification”, it is common to assign a document file containing the character string “specification” to the document in that directory. This is often the case. Therefore, the search result shown in FIG. 4 is often obtained, but it is not a preferable search result. In the example of FIG. 4, the “specifications” directory contains only three conforming documents. However, if more conforming documents are included, the search result has a poor prospect.

FIG. 5 is a diagram illustrating an example of a search result screen searched by the search device according to the present embodiment.
In FIG. 5, compared with the search result number 401 of FIG. 4, the search result number is reduced to five because the search result is simplified, and the upper four lines displayed in the search result display area 402 are shown in FIG. In the search result display area 502 of FIG.

  When the items in the upper first line displayed in the search result display area 402 and the items in the upper first line of the search result display area 502 in FIG. 5 are compared, the icons displayed in the search result display area 502 in FIG. The numbers and names on the right are different. The icon displayed in the search result display area 502 indicates that a directory including a plurality of compatible documents is compatible. The number to the right shows how many conforming document files are under the directory. As the name, “specification.doc”, which is the common part of the name of the directory and the name of the conforming document file below it, is displayed.

  FIG. 6 is a flowchart illustrating an example of a processing procedure for displaying the search result in a simplified manner in the search device according to the present embodiment. After the database search unit 104 searches for the matching item from the database 103, the search result generation unit 105 first performs simplification processing.

  In FIG. 6, the document files in the same directory are grouped among the document files that meet the search conditions (step S601). Next, the number of all document files existing in each directory where the group exists is acquired (step S602).

  Next, the content rate of the relevant document file (= the number of document files in the group / the number of all document files) is calculated from the total number of document files in the directory and the number of document files in the group (step S603). And it is determined whether the numerical value calculated by step S603 exceeds the threshold value 0.8 (step S604). Note that this threshold value is an example, and this value is not necessarily required.

  As a result of this determination, if the threshold value is not exceeded, it is not necessary to simplify and the process is terminated. On the other hand, if the result of determination in step S604 is that the threshold value is exceeded, most of the document files in that directory are document files that meet the search conditions, so each document file is not displayed as a search result. The directory is displayed as a search result as a representative of the group. Then, next, it is determined whether or not the directory used as a representative of the document group as the concise display is included in the search result that matches the search condition (step S605).

  If the result of this determination is that it is included in the search result, this directory is also represented by a new directory that is separately compiled, so this directory is removed from the search result (step S606), and then the process proceeds to step S608. move on.

  On the other hand, if the result of determination in step S605 is not included in the search result, it is determined whether there are two or more document files in the group (step S607). If there is only one as a result of this determination, it is not necessary to simplify the search result display, and the process ends.

  On the other hand, if there are two or more as a result of the determination in step S607, the document file included in the group is removed from the search result (step S608). Then, a new directory to be represented is incorporated into the search result (step S609), and the process is terminated. When a new directory is incorporated, the character string portion duplicated in the name of the removed document file is used as the representative directory name.

(Second Embodiment)
In the first embodiment described above, an example in which the search result display is simplified in units of one hierarchy has been described. However, in the present embodiment, a plurality of hierarchies can be simplified by the following method.

  (1) If simplification processing is to be performed from a deep hierarchy and a representative directory is included in the lower layer, whether the number of document files represented by that directory is taken into account for the content ratio of the relevant document file and set as a representative directory. Judge whether or not. For example, the number of document files represented by the lower-level representative directory is regarded as 0.9 times the number of group document files, and the relevant document content rate is calculated. Note that the value of 0.9 is an example and does not necessarily have to be this value.

  (2) First, the ratio of document files that match the search conditions in all document file groups is checked, and if this exceeds the threshold, one root directory is set as a representative directory and the search result is returned as one matching number. If the threshold is not exceeded, the ratio of documents that match the search condition is examined toward the lower layer while gradually reducing the subtree so that the directory is simplified as much as possible. The conforming document content rate is calculated by (number of document files conforming to the search condition included in the subtree) / (number of document files included in the subtree).

(Third embodiment)
In the first embodiment described above, the conforming document file content rate is used as an index for determining whether or not to simplify the search result display in step S604. However, in this embodiment, only the number of document files in the group is used. Can be displayed in a simplified manner as an index. This is useful when you want to simplify if there is a certain number of document files.

(Fourth embodiment)
In the first embodiment described above, when the search result display is simplified, it is troublesome to directly access the document file that matches the search condition from the search result. Therefore, in this embodiment, simplification is performed only when the number of document files that meet the search conditions is large.

  As a processing procedure, a simplification execution determination is performed based on the number of document files matching the search condition before the processing in step S601. If the number of document files that match the search condition is greater than the threshold, the process proceeds to step S601 to perform the simplification process. If the number of document files that match the search condition is less than the threshold, the simplification process is performed. I do not do it.

(Fifth embodiment)
In the first embodiment described above, an apparatus that searches for a document file name and a directory name including a specific character string has been described. However, a search apparatus that performs a search under other conditions may be used.

  For example, even if it is a device that performs a full text search for a specific character string from all text data in a document file, if there are many document files that meet the search conditions in a certain directory, that directory may be used as the search result. In this case, instead of using the common part of the document file name as the name of the representative directory, a common wording around the search term in the text is presented as a character string indicating the characteristics of the representative directory in the search result. Also good.

  Also, for example, the search target can be extended to other files such as image files. For example, in the case of an image file, even if the device searches for an image whose color is close to the specified color, if there are many files that meet the search conditions in a certain directory, that directory may be used as the search result. In this case, instead of using the common part of the image file name as the name of the representative directory, a method of creating a reduced image by randomly selecting one of the matching images and showing it as a sample may be used.

(Another embodiment according to the present invention)
Each means constituting the search device and each step of the search method in the embodiment of the present invention described above can be realized by operating a program stored in a RAM or ROM of a computer. This program and a computer-readable recording medium recording the program are included in the present invention.

  Further, the present invention can be implemented as, for example, a system, apparatus, method, program, or recording medium, and can be applied to a system composed of a plurality of devices. Moreover, you may apply to the apparatus which consists of one apparatus.

  In the present invention, a software program (in the embodiment, a program corresponding to the flowchart shown in FIG. 6) for realizing the functions of the above-described embodiment is directly or remotely supplied to a system or apparatus, and the system Or the case where it is achieved also by the computer of the apparatus reading and executing the supplied program code is included.

  Accordingly, since the functions of the present invention are implemented by computer, the program code installed in the computer also implements the present invention. In other words, the present invention includes a computer program itself for realizing the functional processing of the present invention.

  In that case, as long as it has the function of a program, it may be in the form of object code, a program executed by an interpreter, script data supplied to the OS, and the like.

  As a recording medium for supplying the program, for example, floppy (registered trademark) disk, hard disk, optical disk, magneto-optical disk, MO, CD-ROM, CD-R, CD-RW, magnetic tape, nonvolatile memory card ROM, DVD (DVD-ROM, DVD-R) and the like.

  As another program supply method, a client computer browser is used to connect to an Internet homepage, and the computer program itself of the present invention or a compressed file including an automatic installation function is downloaded from the homepage to a recording medium such as a hard disk. Can also be supplied.

  It can also be realized by dividing the program code constituting the program of the present invention into a plurality of files and downloading each file from a different homepage. That is, a WWW server that allows a plurality of users to download a program file for realizing the functional processing of the present invention on a computer is also included in the present invention.

  In addition, the program of the present invention is encrypted, stored on a recording medium such as a CD-ROM, distributed to users, and key information for decryption is downloaded from a homepage via the Internet to users who have cleared predetermined conditions. It is also possible to execute the encrypted program by using the key information and install the program on a computer.

  In addition to the functions of the above-described embodiments being realized by the computer executing the read program, the OS running on the computer based on the instructions of the program is used for the actual processing. The functions of the above-described embodiment can be realized by performing some or all of the processes.

  Furthermore, after the program read from the recording medium is written in a memory provided in a function expansion board inserted into the computer or a function expansion unit connected to the computer, the function expansion board or The CPU or the like provided in the function expansion unit performs part or all of the actual processing, and the functions of the above-described embodiments are realized by the processing.

It is a block diagram which shows the structural example of the search device in the 1st Embodiment of this invention. It is a figure which shows the structural example of the hardware of the search device in the 1st Embodiment of this invention. It is a figure which shows an example of the execution screen of the search device in the 1st Embodiment of this invention. It is a figure which shows an example of the search result screen of the conventional search device. It is a figure which shows an example of the search result screen of the search device in the 1st Embodiment of this invention. It is a flowchart which shows an example of the process sequence for simplifying the display of the search result in the 1st Embodiment of this invention.

Explanation of symbols

DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 101 Communication part 102 Search condition production | generation part 103 Database 104 Database search part 105 Search result production | generation part

Claims (10)

A search means for searching for a conforming file that satisfies the search condition from a plurality of files;
Determining means for determining whether or not there are many conforming files searched by the searching means in the same directory;
As a result of the determination by the determining means, when there are many conforming files in the same directory, search result display means for displaying the directory as a search result instead of the conforming files included in the same directory. A search device characterized. Content rate calculating means for calculating the ratio of the conforming files included in the same directory to all the files included in the same directory;
The search device according to claim 1, wherein the determination unit determines whether a large number of the matching files exist in the same directory based on the ratio calculated by the content rate calculation unit.   The search device according to claim 1, wherein the determination unit determines whether or not a large number of the matching files exist in the same directory based on the number of matching files included in the same directory.   The search result display means displays a large number of compatible files included in the same directory as search results when the number of all the compatible files searched by the search means is less than a certain number. The search device according to claim 1. A search process for searching for a conforming file that satisfies a search condition from a plurality of files,
A determination step of determining whether there are a large number of matching files searched in the search step in the same directory;
A search result display step of displaying the directory as a search result instead of the compatible file included in the same directory when there are a large number of the compatible files in the same directory as a result of the determination in the determination step. A featured search method. A content ratio calculating step of calculating a ratio of the conforming files included in the same directory to all the files included in the same directory;
6. The search method according to claim 5, wherein the determination step determines whether or not a large number of the matching files exist in the same directory from the ratio calculated by the content rate calculation step.   6. The search method according to claim 5, wherein in the determination step, it is determined whether a large number of the matching files exist in the same directory based on the number of matching files included in the same directory.   The search result display step displays a large number of matching files included in the same directory as search results when the number of all matching files searched by the searching step is less than a certain number. The search method according to claim 5. A search process for searching for a conforming file that satisfies a search condition from a plurality of files,
A determination step of determining whether there are a large number of matching files searched in the search step in the same directory;
And a search result display step of displaying the directory as a search result instead of the compatible file included in the same directory when a large number of the compatible files exist in the same directory as a result of the determination in the determination step. A computer program for causing a computer to execute.   10. A computer-readable recording medium on which the computer program according to claim 9 is recorded.

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