Oracle International Corporation

Ping Wang

Jayant Sharma

Liujian Qian

Ji Yang

A geographic data relational database and a spatial library of routines that access and analyze spatial data are used to convert an identified location to a set of geographic coordinate pairs. A geocoder engine applies the spatial library routines to the geographic data in the relational database, and based on the identified location and a set of matching rules, produces the set of geographic coordinates. The geographic data may be derived from multiple sources. The rules may specify, for example, that only geographic coordinates corresponding to an exact match of the identified location are to be returned, or that matching of certain attributes may be relaxed. The identified location may be, for example, the intersection of two streets, an address, a postal area code such as a zip code.

Geocoding using a relational database

Business directory services allow definitions of custom category hierarchies and different search methods, such as, for example, search by location, distance from an addressable location, partial or complete business name, and category. A stepwise refinement search interface provides capability for searching within search results using different search methods or categories. Thus, a user does not have to refine and re-enter search criteria in order to get a progressively selective search. This is particularly useful for mobile phone or hand-held device users who would prefer not to have to re-enter the criteria on each search but rather incrementally refine the search criteria.

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Stanford, CA, United States of America

Ping Wang