(12) United States Patent

US006711565B1

(10) Patent N0.: US 6,711,565 B1 Subramaniam et al. (45) Date of Patent: Mar. 23, 2004

(54) METHOD, APPARATUS, AND SYSTEM FOR 5,913,215 A * 6/1999 Rubinstein et al. ......... .. 707/10 PREVIEWING SEARCH RESULTS 6,014,662 A * 1/2000 Moran et al. ................ .. 707/3

6,292,796 B1 * 9/2001 Drucker et al. .............. .. 707/5

(75) Inventors; Pavitra Subramaniam, Alameda, CA 6,360,215 B1 * 3/2002 Judd et a1. ................... .. 707/3

(US); Jason Zoss, Foster City, CA Jian-Jung Ying, Foster * Cited examiner

(US); Marc Caltabiano, San Francisco, CA (US)

Primary Examiner—Safet Metj ahic (73) ASSigIlGGZ Siebel Systems, IIlC., San M21160, CA Assistant Examiner—Haythim J, Alaubaidi

(Us) (74) Attorney, Agent, or Firm—Jarnes W. Soong; Siebel _ _ _ _ _ Systems, Inc.

( * ) Notice: SubJect to any disclaimer, the term of this patent is extended or adjusted under 35 U.S.C. 154(b) by 308 days. (57) ABSTRACT

(21) AppL NO‘: 09/883,614 ‘According to‘ one aspect of the present invention, a method is prov1 e in W 1c a searc reques con aining searc d d h h h t t h

(22) Filed? Jun- 18, 2001 criteria is received from a ?rst user. A search is performed

(51) Int Cl 7 G06F 17/30 based on the search criteria to retrieve records in one or more (52) Us‘ Ci """""""""""""""""""""""" " 707/3 databases that match the search criteria. A list of search (58) Field 0 """ " """""" 5 10 results based on the retrieved records is displayed to the ?rst

""""""""""""""""" " ’ ’ user. In response to the ?rst user’s selection of a particular

(56) References Cited search result in the list of search results, details of the particular search result are displayed to the ?rst user.

U.S. PATENT DOCUMENTS

5,717,914 A * 2/1998 Husick et al. ............... .. 707/5 28 Claims, 44 Drawing Sheets

K’ 29-9 WIRELESS HTML THIN WINDOWS/JAVA MOBILE/HANDHELD CONNECTED CLIENT CLIENT CLIENT THIN CLIENT USER INTERFACE USER INTERFACE

WAP BROWSERI IWEB BROWSERI IUSER INTERFACE‘ 2% 2g OBJECT MANAGER ' OBJECT MANAGER

, I BUSINESS OBJECTS BUSINESS OBJECTS BUSINESS COMPONENTS BUSINESS COMPONENTS

WEB SERVER LAN/WAN INTERNETIDIALUP DATA MANAGER DATA MANAGER

GAME/WAY WEBSERVER EXTENSION - SERVER I DATABASE

GATEWAY SERVER ‘

CONNECTION BROKERING / \ / 25°

ENTERPRISE SERVER / \ f 250 SERVER / \

SYNCHRONIZATION MANAGER 255 SERVER OBJECT MANAGER ASSIGNMENT MANAGER 7 MANAGER BUSWESS OBJECTS WORKFLDW MANAGER ,

BUSINESS COMPONENTS REPLICATION MANAGER

DATA MANAGER DATA MANAGER ‘\ I

I \\ // /' f 295 290 -

FILE SYSTEM DATABASE (DB2 UDS)

76E

U.S. Patent Mar. 23, 2004 Sheet 1 0f 44 US 6,711,565 B1

at 9: :

U.S. Patent Mar. 23, 2004 Sheet 3 0f 44 US 6,711,565 B1

/ m

WEB BRowSER 310

’\_/

WEB APPLICATION 315 (GENERATED HTML PAGES) ad

320 WEB SERVER ’\’

WEB SERvER [$25 EXTENSION

A

r f 330

SERVER

APPLICATION OBJECT MANAGER APPLICATION ‘ _

IDEFINITION (.SRF) — ' TEMPLATES

WEB ENGINE

K360 \340

\aas

-

U.S. Patent Mar. 23, 2004 Sheet 4 0f 44 US 6,711,565 B1

SIEBEI.

> v l }400 Favorites

410 SEARCH ICON 415

505 515

TOOLBAR, TABS, —I:l / & VISIBILITY SEARCH

FRAME SEARCH CENTER

CONTENT AREA RESULTS FRAME FRAME /

/ 500 510 520

FIG. 5

U.S. Patent Mar. 23, 2004 Sheet 5 0f 44 US 6,711,565 B1

600

610 CREATING ONE OR MORE SEARCH ENGINE OBJECTS W

615 CREATING ONE OR MORE SEARCH INDEX OBJECTS W

620 CREATING ONE OR MORE SEARCH CATEGORY '\/

OBJECTS

CREATING ONE OR MORE SEARCH DEFINITION Q25 OBJECTS

@

FIG. 6

U.S. Patent Mar. 23, 2004 Sheet 6 6f 44 US 6,711,565 B1

700

N

710 DEFINING A SEARCH ENGINE OBJECT V

l CREATING AND CONFIGURING RESULT FIELD OBJECTS 05 ASSOCIATED WITH THE DEFINED SEARCH ENGINE

OBJECT

&

FIG. 7

800

m U" NAM E "_

CLASS m

FIG. 8

U.S. Patent Mar. 23, 2004 Sheet 7 0f 44 US 6,711,565 B1

900

COLUMN NAME 905

CREATE COLUMN FLAG 9J9 (OPTIONAL)

DATA TYPE Q15 (OPTIONAL)

INDEX MODE w (OPTIONAL)

NAME 9g

TEXT LENGTH 9_3_Q (OPTIONAL)

TYPE 9.35

FIG. 9

U.S. Patent Mar. 23, 2004 Sheet 8 0f 44 US 6,711,565 B1

1000

1010 DEFINING A SEARCH INDEX OBJECT w

‘I015 CREATING A SEARCH TABLE OBJECT FOR THE DEFINED ’\/

SEARCH INDEX OBJECT

I CREATING ONE OR MORE INDEX FIELD OBJECTS FOR v

THE CREATED SEARCH TABLE OBJECT

I CREATING ONE OR MORE FILTER FIELD OBJECTS FOR '-\/

THE CREATED SEARCH TABLE OBJECT

END

FIG. 10

U.S. Patent Mar. 23, 2004 Sheet 9 0f 44 US 6,711,565 B1

1100

NAME Hi5

INDEX BUSINESS HE COMPONENT

DATABASE TABLE FLAG M

1200

TABLE NAME 1295

ENGINE 1——°

FIG. 12

U.S. Patent Mar. 23, 2004 Sheet 10 0f 44 US 6,711,565 B1

1300

1310 SELECTING A DESIRED INDEX FIELD w

1320 MAPPING THE SELECTED INDEX FIELD TO A RESULT "\/

FIELD

1325 CHOOSING THE INDEX FIELD TYPE w

@

FIG. 13

U.S. Patent Mar. 23, 2004 Sheet 11 0f 44 US 6,711,565 B1

1400

N

BUSINESS COMPONENT 1410 FIELD —

RESULT FIELD 141 (OPTIONAL)

INDEX FIELD TYPE 1420 (OPTIONAL)

sEOuENOE M25

1450

N NAME E

COLUMN NAME M

DATA TYPE 1555 (OPTIONAL)

INDEX MODE M (OPTIONAL)

SEQUENCE 1475

TEXT LENGTH 14 O (OPTIONAL) '—

FIG. 14B

U.S. Patent Mar. 23, 2004 Sheet 12 0f 44 US 6,711,565 B1

1500

1510 DEFINING A SEARCH CATEGORY OBJECT W

1515 ASSOCIATING THE DEFINED SEARCH CATEGORY TO A "V

SEARCH INDEX

1520 DEFINING A DRILLDOWN VIEW, A DRILLDOWN ’\/

BUSINESS COMPONENT, AND A DESTINATION FIELD

I 1525

DEFINING A PICK VIEW

U.S. Patent Mar. 23, 2004 Sheet 13 0f 44 US 6,711,565 B1

1600

N NAME @

SEARCH INDEX m

DRILLDOWN BUSINESS 1s 5 COMPONENT (OPTIONAL)

DHILLDOWN VIEW 1520 (OPTIONAL) “*

RESULT IDENTIFIER 1625 (OPTIONAL)

FIG. 16

U.S. Patent Mar. 23, 2004 Sheet 14 0f 44 US 6,711,565 B1

1700

APPLET _1705

VIEW m

NAME L5

DESTINATION FIELD 1 (OPTIONAL)

FIG. 17

U.S. Patent Mar. 23, 2004 Sheet 15 0f 44 US 6,711,565 B1

1800

(‘\J

181 O SPECIFYING A NAME FOR THE SEARCH DEFINITION w

1815 PROVIDING A SPECIFICATION FOR SORTING SEARCH ’\/

RESULTS

7

1820 ASSOCIATING ONE OR MORE SEARCH CATEGORY *V OBJECTS TO THE SEARCH DEFINITION OBJECT

I CREATING ONE OR MORE CUSTOM RESULT FIELDS rV OBJECTS FOR THE SEARCH DEFINITION OBJECT

I

E)

FIG. 18A

/ 1850

NAME 1855

SORT SPECIFICATION (OPTIONAL)

1 860

FIG. 18B

U.S. Patent Mar. 23, 2004 Sheet 16 0f 44 US 6,711,565 B1

1 900

E NAME

DISPLAY NAME 131g

FILTER SEARCH SPECIFICATION (OPTIONAL) 1g_15

USE FILTERED SEARCH 1_92_(_) (OPTIONAL)

SEQUENCE 192 (OPTIONAL) _5

FIG. 19

U.S. Patent Mar. 23, 2004 Sheet 17 0f 44 US 6,711,565 B1

2000

DISPLAY NAME lQl? (OPTIONAL)

DISPLAY FORMAT 2010 (OPTIONAL) _

NAME m

SCALING FACTOR 2929 (OPTIONAL)

SEQUENCE 3-5

TEXT ALIGNMENT mg (OPTIONAL)

USE IN SEARCH _2__5 (OPTIONAL)

VISIBLE ;_0 (OPTIONAL)

WIDTH M (OPTIONAL)

FIG. 20

U.S. Patent Mar. 23, 2004 Sheet 19 0144

FIG. 22

US 6,711,565 B1

RECEIVING THE SEARCH CATEGORY AND SEARCH @210 TEXT 0R KEYWORD ENTERED BY THE usER

PASSING THE SEARCH CATEGORY AND sEARcH TEXT 2215 OR KEYWORD TO A VIRTUAL BUSINESS COMPONENT

(VBC)

INVOKING THE sEARcH EXECUTION sERvlcE T0 X2320 PERFORM A SEARCH AND GENERATE SEARCH

RESULTS

CACHING THE SEARCH RESULTS GENERATED FROM THE \2/225 sEARcH