JPH08161345A - Information retrieving system - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE: To prevent erroneous input at the time of specifying an information retrieving condition by reading out the code of a relation table and displaying a name corresponding to the code in a menu so as to allow a retrieving person to directly specify a retrieving condition. CONSTITUTION: When a retrieving key specified by an user is registered as a code in a main table 51, a relation table reading means 1 reads the code and the name of the code from relation tables 52 and 53. Then, a menu preparing means 2 prepares a menu capable of listing up the name to the read code on a specified picture 6. Thus, a user can directly specify the retrieving value without remembering a code assigned mechanically or retrieving it in the relation table so that erroneous input can be prevented. When the user specifies the retrieving key from the name of the specified picture 6, a retrieving form preparation means 4 changes the name specified by the user to a code to prepare the retrieving form with the other retrieving keys.

Description

Detailed Description of the Invention

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to an information retrieval method in a database management system for accumulating a large amount of information on a computer and systematically organizing and managing it.
In particular, the present invention relates to an information search method having high operability in information search.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art A conventional technique will be described with reference to FIG. In the main table “Document” 51 in the database 5,
Generally, the creator of a document is managed by the employee code 512 instead of the creator's name, and a related table for the employee code is created separately. This is because if you manage by the name of the creator, for example, if there are 50 document records created by Hitachi Hanako and the name of Hitachi Hanako changes, you must change the creator name of all 50 records. Is. FIG.
If you register the employee code 512 of the creator in the main table "Document" 51 like this and manage the details such as employee name, affiliation, age etc. for the employee code in another related table "Employee" 53, Even if the name changes, it is enough to change one record of Hitachi Hanako in the related table "Employee" 53, and the main table "Document" 51
There is no need to change. For this reason, it is common to use codes consisting of numbers and symbols, and manage the names of the codes in a related table.

[0003]

However, in the information retrieval system using the database in the above conventional technique,
Since a code consisting of numerically assigned numbers and symbols is used mechanically, it is impossible to store all user codes when there are many users. Therefore, if you want to search for documents created by Hitachi Hanako, for example, in Step 201 of FIG.
The employee code 531 of the record whose name is Hitachiko is searched in advance, and the employee code 531 obtained in Step 201 on the designated screen 6 is entered through the search condition input means 3 (S
The input search value is passed to the search expression creating means 4 in Step 203. The search formula creating means 4 generates a search formula for searching the database based on the search value. After that, in Step 204, the actual search is performed on the database 5 by the search formula. In this way, it is necessary to search for what the code indicates in the related table in advance, and to perform the actual search by entering the searched code at the time of entering the search condition. there were.

The present invention has been made to eliminate the above-mentioned drawbacks of the prior art, and its purpose is to improve the operability at the time of information retrieval in the information retrieval system without changing the structure of the database. It will improve.

[0005]

In order to achieve the above-mentioned object, the present invention provides an information search method in a database management system for executing a search of information in a database, in which a user searches the database for information. When the designated search key is registered as a code in the main table, the code and the name corresponding to the code are read from the correlation table corresponding to the code in the main table in advance, and read by the correlation table reading means. , A menu creation means that creates a menu that can list the names of the codes on the screen, and a specified screen that displays the created menu and other search keys to prompt the user to enter search conditions, and specify the user In the search condition input means for obtaining the search condition and the search condition input means Based on the input search condition, if the name specified in the menu exists in the search condition, it is converted into a code for the name and the search formula for searching the desired record for the main table And a search formula creating means for generating.

[0006]

The present invention is configured as described above, and the user can directly specify the search condition by reading the record of the relation table and displaying the name corresponding to the code on the menu. It is possible to prevent input errors when specifying information search conditions. Then, by converting the code corresponding to the name selected by the user and creating the search condition, it is possible to improve the operability without changing the structure of the table.

[0007]

Embodiments of the present invention will be described below with reference to the drawings. FIG. 1 is a block diagram of the present invention. The present invention, when searching information from the database 5, when the search key specified by the user is registered in the main table as a code,
A relation table reading unit 1 that reads out the code and the name for the code from the relation table corresponding to the code in the main table in advance, and a menu creating unit 2 that creates a menu capable of listing the names corresponding to the read code on the screen, Designated screen 6 that displays the created menu and other search keys and prompts the user to enter search conditions
Is displayed, and the name specified in the menu exists in the search conditions based on the search condition input means 3 for acquiring the search condition specified by the user and the search condition input in the search condition input means. In this case, the search expression creating means 4 is configured to convert the code into a name and generate a search expression for searching a desired record in the main table.

In this embodiment, the case of searching a database for managing documents such as business trip reports and specifications is taken as an example. The record is searched for in the main table “document” 51. However, the names of the fields “classification code” 511 and “employee code” 512 in the table “document” 51 are managed in the related tables “classification” 52 and “employee” 53. When the search key designated by the user is registered as a code in the main table in this way, the association table reading means 1 reads the code and the name for the code from the association table. And the menu creating means 2
A menu is created in which the names of the read codes can be listed on the designation screen 6. Therefore, the user does not need to store the code assigned mechanically or search the related table in advance, and can directly specify the search value, and the input error can be prevented. When the user designates the business trip report as the search key on the designation screen 6, the search formula creating means 4 specifies the user from the code previously read by the search formula creating means 4 and the name corresponding to the code. Convert name to code and create search formula with other search keys. As described above, in the present invention, when the user specifies the search condition, the user can directly select the name instead of the code, and by converting the code to the code corresponding to the name selected by the user to create the search condition, the table It is possible to improve operability without changing the structure.

Here, when the number of records (that is, the number of codes) registered in the related table is not so large, or when the registered records are not changed, the user purposely sets the search condition for the main table. It is not necessary to read the records from the related table when inputting, and it seems that it is sufficient to create a menu for displaying the records in the related table in advance. However, for example, in the case of a large number of employees in this embodiment, all the employees and the codes corresponding to them are always secured in the memory, which puts pressure on memory resources. Further, the record of the related table “employee” 53 has a property that the record is also changed as the employee is transferred. Therefore, if the menu is fixedly created, it becomes necessary to recreate the menu frequently.

On the other hand, in the present invention, when the search condition of the main table is input, the name corresponding to the code is read from the related table and a menu for listing the names is generated, so that the related table is managed. Even if the number of records (that is, the number of codes) is large or the records are updated frequently, there is an advantage that there is no need to squeeze the memory or rebuild the menu.

FIG. 2 shows a relation table reading means 1, a menu creating means 2, a search condition inputting means 3 and a search expression creating means 4.
Shows the function of. As described above, the association table reading means 1 is
If the search key specified by the user is registered as a code in the main table so that the user can select the search value directly from the name instead of the code assigned mechanically, the code from the related table And has the function of reading the name corresponding to the code. In this example, when you specify the author of the document, you can select St
Employee code 5 of all records from related table "Employee" 53 in ep101
31 and name 532 are read and written in the memory area.

Next, in Step 102, the menu creating means 2
Create a menu so that the names 532 read by ep101 can be listed. In Step 103, the designation screen 6 for displaying the menu created by the search condition input means 3 and other search keys is generated. The user inputs search conditions through this designation screen 6 in Step 104. The search condition input means 3 passes the value input by the user to the search expression creating means 4.

When the user selects a name using the menu, the retrieval formula creating means 4 operates as follows. When the user selects Hitachi Hanako in this embodiment, a search formula creating means
4 reads the employee code 532 corresponding to Hitachi Hanako from the employee code and name read in Step 101 above (Step 10
Five). Then, using the read employee code 532 “10005” as a search condition, a search expression is generated together with other search values.

As described above, the function of the relation table reading means 1, the menu creating means 2, the search condition input means 3 and the search expression creating means 4 allows the user to search from a name that can be directly used instead of a code attached for convenience. You can select the value. Since the code for the name selected by the user is acquired and the search expression is generated using the value, the table structure of the database and the search expression generation method can be used without any change.

FIG. 3 is a diagram for explaining another embodiment of the present invention. Here, the case where the number of records (that is, the number of codes) of the relation table read by the relation table reading means 1 is very large is given. For example, if there are hundreds of records in the table "Employees" 53, it is difficult for the user to select the desired name even if all of them are listed in the menu.
Input mistakes will increase. In such a case, in this embodiment, a menu is created so that the employee's affiliation can be used for hierarchical selection. First, the department code 551 and department name 552 from the table "Department" 55, the department code 54 from the table "Affiliation" 54
1, department code 542, department name 543 are read. Then, all signatures are created in the first layer 611 of the menu. When an arbitrary name of the first layer is selected, it is converted into a code corresponding to the first selected name. Here is the table "Department"
55 "Department code" 55 corresponding to department name "Sales" 5521
Get one. Next, from the data read from the table “affiliation” 54, the “department code” 542 is the “department code” 551 corresponding to the “sales” 5521, the “affiliation name” 543 is the second layer 612.
List in. Similarly, in the third layer, first, "affiliation name" 543 obtains "affiliation code" 541 corresponding to "second section" 5431. Then, the same name as the “affiliation code” 541 corresponding to the “division 2” 5431 obtained from the “employee” 53 in the table “employee” 53 is displayed in the third hierarchy. Even when the search value has to be selected from among such a large number of options, the user can easily select it. As in the case of the first embodiment, the search expression generation means converts the search expression into a code corresponding to "Hitachi Hanako" to generate the search expression.

[0016]

As described above, the present invention makes it easy for the user to specify the search condition by displaying the name of the code from the related table in advance in the menu when searching the information in the database. Further, by obtaining the code corresponding to the name selected by the user and creating the search expression by the code, the database table structure and the search expression creating method can be searched as usual.

[Brief description of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a configuration diagram of an information retrieval system showing an embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 2 is an explanatory diagram for explaining the function of the present invention.

FIG. 3 is a configuration diagram of an information retrieval system showing another embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 4 is a configuration diagram illustrating a conventional information search method.

[Explanation of symbols]

 1 Related Table Reading Means 2 Menu Creating Means 3 Search Condition Inputting Means 4 Search Formula Creating Means 5 Database 51 Main Table “Document” 511 Classification Code 512 Employee Code 52 Related Table “Classification” 521 Classification Code 53 Related Table “Employee” 531 Employees Code 532 Name 54 Related Table "Affiliation" 541 Affiliation Code 542 Department Code 543 Affiliation Name 5431 Second Section 55 Related Table "Department" 551 Department Code 552 Department Name 5521 Sales 532 Affiliation Code 6 Designation Screen 61 Command Menu 611 First Tier 612 Number 1 2nd layer 613 3rd layer

Claims (1)

[Claims] 1. In a database management system for executing a search for information in a database, when a search key specified by a user is registered as a code in the main table when searching for information from the database, the main table is previously set. Relationship table reading means for reading the code and the name for the code from the relationship table corresponding to the code in, and read by the relationship table reading means,
A menu creating means for creating a menu capable of listing the names of the codes on the screen, and a specified screen for displaying the created menu and other search keys to prompt the user to enter search conditions, and specify the user Based on the search condition input means for acquiring the search condition and the search condition input by the search condition input means, when the name specified in the menu exists in the search condition,
An information retrieval system comprising: a retrieval formula creating means (4) for converting a code for a name and generating a retrieval formula for retrieving a desired record for a main table.