Generic product finder system and method

Abstract

A generic product finder system that provides the capability of managing and performing searches on configurable products in a J2EE application. The generic product finder system includes a manager component for performing searches in response to a search query; a product component for persisting a plurality of product information and interacting with the manger component in conducting searches of the product information; a product metadata component that interacts with the manager component for defining a product; and a search configuration component that interacts with the manager component for constructing a set of search rules in a product search configuration. Internally, the product finder system represents products with a specification divided into parameters representing characteristics and optional attributes. This specification exists in a generic state by the use of Java objects. Multiple product specifications may co-exist and their information is persisted by the use of entity beans. The generic product also contains a session bean that acts as manager and single point-of-entry to the product information. Since the products are maintained in a generic form, search rules can be constructed and applied to the product set to perform complex queries.