Hitachi, Ltd.

Itsuko Kiuchi

Hiromichi Fujisawa

Atsushi Hatakeyama

David Cohn

Tetsuya Hashimoto

Naoko Yamazaki

Minoru Wakabayashi

A multi-lingual information retrieval system which includes an information storage section for storing information, a data storage section for storing data for language conversion and for converting the stored information to strings of characters in natural language expressions in order to enable a person's interpretation, an interface section for user's interaction operations for information retrieval, a retrieval section for retrieving information from the information storage section in response to a request for a retrieval from the interface section, and an output section for outputting a retrieved result of the retrieval section. The data storage section coexistently stores the information therein in a plurality of different languages, thereby making possible to retrieve identical information by use of the plurality of different languages.

Knowledge based information retrieval system

An information storage and retrieval system which permits storage of fact information represented in terms of conceptual concepts expressing things and relational concepts expressing relations therebetween on a knowledge base, easy inputting and correction of the fact information, easy browsing and retrieval of the fact information and display of the fact information with effective use of a limited view area, and also to provide a display method used in the information storage and retrieval system. The system includes a device for inputting fact information with respect to a specific relational concept according to a template pattern by using a multi-window function on the basis of information obtained from a concept dictionary for defining hierarchical relations between concepts and a grammar rule for defining semantic structures of cases and concepts allowed to be used in the cases; a device for storage and retrieval of fact information; and a device for displaying fact information in a fact window and displaying a hierarchy of conceptual concepts and relational concepts in a node tree window.

Information storage and retrieval system and display method therefor

In method of displaying items of information organized in a hierarchical structure, a hierarchical tree of nodes is displayed, which are items of information, classified based on a specified concept. The user selects an intended node from among the nodes on the displayed hierarchical tree and enters a concept for classifying nodes of sub-concepts of the selected nodes. The selected node and a partial hierarchical tree that is created based on the entered; concept are displayed.

Method and apparatus for displaying items of information organized in a

An information retrieval system with good human-interface methods to give the system ease-of-use having two distinctive features with the first being visual interface and the second being natural language interpretation. The visual interface provides for one is visual interaction for local search and natural language interpretation provides for linguistic interaction for global search. The visual interface provides versatile views onto the contents of the knowledge base that the system has, controlling mechanisms for browsing through the knowledge base, a capability of showing relevant information for the users, and a mechanism for editing a query expression that describes information to retrieve. By using the visual interface for information retrieval, the users can easily create query expressions, by consulting and reacting with the system. The natural language interpretation makes use of a conceptual network as a knowledge-base that stores important concepts and relationships among these concepts. Based on knowledge and information represented in the conceptual network, the meaning of a noun phrase or a nominal compound which is a string of adjectives and nouns with some prepositions can be inferred. The inferred interpretation of such a noun phrase is paraphrased into an expression that the information retrieval system can handle. Therefore, the user of the system can simply describe the desired information in a language to get the desired information.

When a network representing the relationship among immense concepts is indicated using a multi-window function, a concept network display system simultaneously displays a superconcept for a current concept in the network, a network representing the subsumption relation of the current concept, and a network representing generic and instance relations of the current concept in a dynamically linked relationship. The concept network display system also edits the displays of the networks by rewriting displayed networks in response to selection of a new current concept, and displays a history of the current concepts without repetition.

System for displaying concept networks

An information retrieval system with good human-interface methods to give the system ease-of-use having two distinctive features with the first being visual interface and the second being natural language interpretation. The visual interface provides for visual interaction for local search and natural language interpretation provides for linguistic interaction for global search. The visual interface provides versatile views onto the contents of the knowledge base that the system has, controlling mechanisms for browsing through the knowledge base, a capability of showing relevant information for the users, and a mechanism for editing a query expression that describes information to retrieve. By using the visual interface for information retrieval, the users can easily create query expressions, by consulting and reacting with the system. The natural language interpretation makes use of a conceptual network as a knowledge-base that stores important concepts and relationships among these concepts. Based on knowledge and information represented in the conceptual network, the meaning of a noun phrase or a nominal compound which is a string of adjectives and nouns with some prepositions can be inferred. The inferred interpretation of such a noun phrase is paraphrased into an expression that the information retrieval system can handle. Therefore, the user of the system can simply describe the desired information in a language to get the desired information.

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Tokyo, Japan

Itsuko Kiuchi