Search Result Grouping with Dynamic Layouts and Visual Indicators
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Solution Overview
Problem
Current information search systems face challenges in presenting search results in a user-friendly manner, particularly due to large volumes of results, terse descriptions, limited display space, and the inability to showcase all results at once, leading to user difficulty in identifying relevant information.
Innovation Solution
A user interface that groups search results based on relevance, using varying column layouts, typefaces, color-coding, and graphical indicators to differentiate between responsive and less responsive results, allowing users to view summaries and expand to full versions as needed.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Loss of information
If search results are displayed with detailed information for each item, then the user can better understand each result, but the amount of space required to display results increases
Solution Approach 1:
The patent segments search results into multiple pages, with each page containing a limited number of result items. This segmentation allows detailed information to be displayed for each item while controlling the total display space required by distributing content across multiple pages.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent introduces pagination as an additional dimension for organizing search results. Instead of displaying all results in a single linear sequence, results are organized across multiple pages, effectively using the page number dimension to manage the display space while maintaining information completeness.
2Loss of time
If all search results are displayed on a single page, then the user can see all results at once, but the display area required increases significantly
Solution Approach 1:
The patent divides search results into multiple pages, displaying a manageable number of results on each page. This segmentation reduces the display area required on any single page while minimizing navigation time by keeping frequently accessed results on the first few pages.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent implements dynamic pagination where the number of results per page and the total number of pages adjusts based on the available display area and the total number of search results. This dynamic adjustment optimizes the balance between navigation time and display area utilization.
3Ease of operation
If search results are presented in a uniform format, then the interface is simple to implement, but the user cannot quickly identify relevant information among diverse results
Solution Approach 1:
The patent applies local quality by allowing different result items to have different formatting characteristics based on their relevance and type. High-relevance results can be displayed with more prominent formatting, while less relevant results use simpler formatting, helping users quickly identify important information while maintaining overall interface simplicity.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent uses color changes and graphical indicators to differentiate between results of varying relevance. This visual differentiation helps users quickly identify relevant information without complicating the interface, as the color coding provides intuitive cues about result quality.
4Loss of information
If the description of each search result is made more comprehensive, then the user can better assess relevance, but the space required to display the same number of results decreases
Solution Approach 1:
The patent segments both the display space and the result descriptions. By providing comprehensive descriptions for each result item and organizing results across multiple pages, the system maintains high description quality while preserving the ability to display multiple results through strategic use of pagination.
Data Source
AI summary
A system for displaying information to a user is disclosed. The system comprises a grouping module that organizes data items into groups that are ranked based upon at least one attribute of the data items. Also included is a presentation module that presents the ranked groups of data items to a user along with a group indicator. Methods for using the disclosed system are additionally provided.