CA2235821C - Yellow pages in cyberspace - Google Patents
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- CA2235821C CA2235821C CA002235821A CA2235821A CA2235821C CA 2235821 C CA2235821 C CA 2235821C CA 002235821 A CA002235821 A CA 002235821A CA 2235821 A CA2235821 A CA 2235821A CA 2235821 C CA2235821 C CA 2235821C
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- G—PHYSICS
- G06—COMPUTING; CALCULATING OR COUNTING
- G06F—ELECTRIC DIGITAL DATA PROCESSING
- G06F16/00—Information retrieval; Database structures therefor; File system structures therefor
- G06F16/10—File systems; File servers
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- G—PHYSICS
- G06—COMPUTING; CALCULATING OR COUNTING
- G06F—ELECTRIC DIGITAL DATA PROCESSING
- G06F16/00—Information retrieval; Database structures therefor; File system structures therefor
- G06F16/90—Details of database functions independent of the retrieved data types
- G06F16/95—Retrieval from the web
- G06F16/954—Navigation, e.g. using categorised browsing
Abstract
A system comprising a server (12) having memory (30), and a database (52) defined in the memory (30); and a client (16a) in communication with the server (12), the server (12) communicating to the client (16a) an interface (88) for use in requesting a search of the database (52), and the server (12) having virtual reality means (20, 64) for generating a virtual reality scene (64), the virtual reality scene varying depending on the insults of the search.
Description
CA 0223~821 1998-04-24 W O 97/15889 PCT~P9S/05060 PFSCI~IPTION
YELLOW PAGES IN CYBE~SPACE
T~?rhnical Field The invention relates to systems including databases. More p,~rticularly. the invention relates to systems including displays for displaying the results of a databasc search. The invention also relates to computer networks.
~ck~ro~lnd Art Yellow Pages are known by everyone as a directory of businesses, as well as a medium for advertising. The concept of Yellow Pages was developed more than 80 years ago. This type of directory contains information about businesses categorized by headings.
The categories are defined by type of product or service sold by the various businesses Some basic information (e.g.; business name, address, phone number) is provided for each included business. Additional inforrnation can be included if a business is willing to pay extra. For example, a business can pay extra to have an in-column or display add included.
Businesses find the Yellow Pages to be a useful advertising resource. Users find the Yellow Pages to be a handy resource for finding solutions to problems.
Yellow Pages are used in all developed countries. and many other countries.
Household members turn to Yellow Pages quite frequently (e.g.~ 100 times per year in the United States, 10-75 times per year in other countries). The Yellow Pages industry is very profitable. It is not uncommon for earnings after tax to exceed 25% of revenues. Worldwide revenues are higher than $15 billion.
Different Yellow Pages directories are published for different geographical regions ~e.,~~,.; cities~ metropolitan areas, counties, collections of towns~ etc). For different geographical regions there may be several publishers of competing Yellow Pages. In addition, there are vaLrious speciality Yellow Pages, such as ethnic Yellow Pages (e.g.~ the Black Pages~ etc) of businesses owned by certain ethnic groups~ toll free or '~800'' directories.
etc.
SUBSTITUI'E SffEEl (RULE 26) CA 0223~821 1998-04-24 W O 97/15889 PCTAEP9;/05~0 Publishers sell advertisements in Yellow Pages using various techni~ues. Loca} or regional telephone cornpanies often play a major part in sales of advertisin~ space. These local or regional telephone companies hire a sales agent, such as L.M. Berry (Tl~I) of Dayton, or Donnely (TM) to sell the advertising space.
Yellow pages directories found in different countries are similar in organization and appearance to those discussed above.
With the advent of the electronic age, there is a push to make tlle information normally contained in Yellow Pages available in electronic media. For example, it is known to provide CD ROMs containing at least the data of Yellow Pages, if not tlle advertising.
Such CD ROMs may be published by the sarne publishers who publish the paper versions of the Yellow Pages. The publishers may take the same data from the paper version~ and publish it on a CD ROM. Such electronic Yellow Pages may also be contained in commercial databases, such as DIALOG (SM~ databases. DIALOG is a service mark ofDialog Information Services, Inc., which is a subsidiary of Lockheed Corporation.
The advantages of having the information in an electronic form is that it becomes much easier to search the inforrnation. For exarnple, if you have a message to call a phone number, but cannot make out the callers narne, it is possible with an electronic version of the Yellow Pages to search for the phone number, and find the business name and address. Such a search is not easily perforrned with a paper version, because the data is typically organized alphabetically by business name, not numerically by phone number. Other types of searches are also possible. witll the electronic version, by using conventional database searchin~
techniques and boolean connectors.
Some electronic databases including Yellow Pages inforrnation are nou appearing on the Internet.
The Internet is a worldwide network of computers. Tlle Internet began under the name ARPANET. and was started by the Advanced Research Projects Agency of the U.S.
Department of Defense. For the military. computers are useful for command and control. and the original reason for ARPANET was to provide redundant connections between computers so as to have communications that are not subject to failure. Protocols were developed that allowed communications between computers over any available route. instead of a fixed route. A problem with an earlier protocol was that it restricted the number of computers that SUBSTITUTE SHEEl- (RULE 26) CA 0223~821 1998-04-24 WO g7/15889 PCT~EP9~/OSO60 could be on the ARPANET. A new protocol. called Tr~n.~mi~ion Control Protocol/lnternet Protocol (TCP/IP)~ was later developed, and is now one of the most widely accepted networking protocols. Universities and research facilities communicated over ARPANET.
In the late 1 980s, the National Science Foundation developed a network ~NSFNET) to connect its supercomp~ter centers, and this network used the TCP/IP protocols. Eventually.
publicly and privately funded networks including ARPANET and various other networks (UUCP, MILNET. I~SENET. BITNET, CSNET, NASA Science Internet) joined the NSFNET networks. and the collection of networks is called the Internet. The Internet today includes an international connection of intercommunicating networks, both privately and publicly funded. Most computer systems support TCP/IP, and connecting to the Internet is easy and inexpensive.
The World Wide Web is the multimedia aspect of the Internet. The World Wide Web originated at CERN (Centre Européen pour la Rechérche Nucleaire in Geneva. Switzerland3.
Hyperlinks in documents provide for immediate connection to other documents which may be on the same or on a different computer. By clicking or selecting hyperlinked terrns or graphics on a web page~ you are taken to another web page, or to another location in the web page you are currently reading. This is useful, for example. if reading a paper that has footnotes while reading the main text of document, you can select a hyperlinli and be taken directly to the appropriate footnote, and then, with a click of a button, back to the main text.
Hyperlinks are also useful for reading a document cont~;nin~ complex terminology for which definitions are hyperlinked. Further, some people collect a list of resources relevant to a topic of interest, and provide hyperlinks to each of the resources from a web page. Web pages are typically written using HTML (hyper text mark-up language). HTML documents or pages typically include text, and references to graphics files on the servers~ as well as hyperlinks.
When viewed on a client computer, the graphics are combined with the te.~it on a single screen, and some wordls are underlined or differently colored (or a box may appear around graphics~. If these special words or graphics are clicked on with a mouse~ a hyperlin};
prescribed in the HTML document will be followed. This will result in the client being connected to another document or file (eg.; graphics file, sound file~ etc.) which may or may not reside on a different server, or to another section of the same document. HTML is well known. and many references are a~ailable on-line that describe HTML. HTML is also SUBSmUTE SHEEr (RULE 26) CA 0223~821 1998-04-24 W O 97/15889 PCT~EP95/0~060 described in HTMT Sollrceboo~, by Ian S Graham, published by John Wiley & Sons, Inc.
~ITML documents that are loaded on servers can be viewed by remote computers (clients) that have web browsers loaded thereon. One well known web browser is Mosaic (TM), available from NCSA (the National Center for Supercomputing Applications at the University of Illinois at Ch~mp~ign-Urbana). Another popular web browser is Netscape (TM), available from ~etscape Cornmunications Corporation, SQ1 East ~Iiddlefield Road, Mountain View, California, 94043.
Hyperlinking is also known in other applications, such as in FoiloViews (TM) documents.
Web browsers such as Mosaic and Netscape allow a client to view text, graphics (eg.;
"GIFs", "JPEGs"), or a combination of text and graphics presented to the client from a server ~cecse~l by the client. The servers have unique URLs (uniform resource locators), using which, the client can connect to a desired server. The typical formal of a URL is HTTP://WWW.SERVER.COM/DOCUMENT.HTML, where ~'SERVER" would be replaced by the name of a server; "COM" would be replaced by a country code if the server is outside the U.S., or by "MIL't if a military server, or "ORG" if an org~ni7~tion or "EDU" if an educational server. etc; and where "DOCUMENT.HTML" would be replaced by the name of a document or file on the server which the client is açcPs~ing, or omitted to pull up a "home page" (a starting point for the web site). Web browsers can also be configured to launch "helper applications" when the client is presented with a file type that the browser cannot handle. File types are indicated by the extension after a dot (".") in the filename; e.g.: .JPG;
.GIF, .HTML. .WAV, .MPG, etc. If the client has loaded thereon viewer or player software that can handle such a file type, the browser on the client can be configured to start (launch) the viewer software (the helper application) acting on such files if they are received. For example, if the client receives a .WAV file (an audio file), the client ma~ automatically launch an audio player on the client computer so that the user at the client hears the sound without having to manually start the audio player on the client computer. Similarly. if the client receives a .MPG file (a soundless movie file in ' mpeg7' format)~ the client may automatically launch a rnpeg player to start a movie.
Some forms of Yellow Pages directories are now available on the World Wide Web.
~or exarnple NYNEX rnaintains a web site.
SUBSrlTUTE SHEEr (RULE 26) - CA 0223~821 1998-04-24 Other networking protocols and hardware are also known and used for setting up networks such as local areas networks (LANs) and wide area networks (WANs).
Various businesses are finding it useful to be physically located close to otherbusinesses that sell the same or similar goods and services. Businesses that arelocated next to other businesses that sell similar goods and services see an increase in traffic (visits by potential customers) because the customer wllo is interested in a particular good or service can more easily comparison sllop or locate hard to find goods or services. For example, car dealers are frequently located near other car dealers, some restaurants are located near other restaurants, some furniture stores are located near other furniture stores, etG.
It would be desirable to provide Yellow Pages information in a visually stimulating manner so as to encourage advertising by businesses, and use of the Yellow Pages by consumers. It would also be desirable to present electronic information from a database in a form where similar goods and services are grouped together.
Hyperlinked documents are known in the art. See, for example, Arnon et al., Usin~ Structured Docllments For Implementin~ Product/Service Yellow Pa~es Architecture On The Inter~et. This reference discloses design of a data model for structured documents. A tree structure hierarchy is proposed.
Hyperlinking to visual information, instead of to text, is also known. See, for example, HyperImages: Using Object Recognition For Navigation Through Images In Multimedia, David Lowe, Athula Ginige, School of Electrical Engineering, University of Technology, Sydney, Australia.
Virtual Reality is also known in the art. See, for example, Scientific Graphics ~nd Visn~li7zltion Come to the Jnternet, Scientific Computer World, March, 1995, pp.
31-36.
l~ri~f l)~scription of the Drawir~
5a Preferred embodiments of the invention are described belo~v ~vith reference to the accompanying drawings, which are briefly described below.
FIG. 1 is a block diagram illustrating a system embodying the invention.
FIG. 2 is a block diagram illustrating in greater detail SOllle of the components included in the system of FIG. .
FIG. 3 is a flowchart illustrating operation of the system o~' ~IG. 1.
FIGS. 4A-B illustrate how a virtual reality scene is made.
FIGS. 5-10 illustrate sample virtual reality scenes prod~ d by tlle system of FIG. 1.
SU~'ll\lAlF~Y OF TH~, JNV~NTION
The invention provides a system comprising a server having a memory, and a database defined in the memory; and a client in communication with the server, the server communicating to the client an interface for use in requesting a search of the database, and W O 97/15889 PCT/EP9S~'O;OGO
the server having virtual reality means for generating a virtual reality scene, the virtual reality scene varying depending on the results of the search.
Another aspect of the invention provides a server comprising a memory, and a database defined in the memory, the ll~t~h~e including data about a f~rst classification of businesses, which data respectively includes business name, address, phone number, and goods or services provided by the business, the database further including data about a second classification of businesses~ which data respectively includes more data than is provided for each first classification business; communication hardware providing for communication between the server and clients via l'CP/IP; the server communicating to the client an interface for use in requesting a search of the database in response to a client connecting to the server.
and the server generating a virtual reality scene in response to the client requesting a search of the database, the virtual reality scene varying depending on the results of the search l~est ~odes for Carryin~ Out the InLvention ~nd ni~closure of Inv~ntion FIG. 1 illustrates a system 10 embodying the invention. The system l 0 comprises a server 12, which can be a minicomputer, a microcomputer~ a UNIX (TM ) machine, amainframe computer, a personal computer (PC~ such as an Intel (TM3 286. 386, 486, or Pentium (TM) personal computer or clone thereof or Apple ~TM), Macintosh ~TM). or PowerPC (TM) personal computer or clone thereof, or any other appropriate computer. The server 12 includes typical components (see FIG. 2) such as a processor 20. input devices 2'' (e.g.; keyboard and mouse3. output devices 24 (e.g.; monitor and printer), ROM 26~ RAM 28~
memory 30 (e.g. hard drive, disk drive, tape unit, CD-ROM, etc.), serial ports (not shown).
parallel ports (not shown), communication hardware 32, which may either be internal or externaL such as internal commur~ication cards (e.g.~ modem card or networkcard) or external communication hardware ~e.g.~ external modem), etc The server 12 has a multi-user. multi-tasking operating system such as UNIX (if the server is a UNIX machine). L~NUX (if the server is a personal computer). etc.
The system 10 further comprises (see FIG. I) a plurality of clients 16a-11 The clients 16a-h comprise computers such as minicomputers~ microcomputers, UNIX (TM) machines.
mainfrarne computers~ personal computers such as an Intel (TM) 286~ 386~ 486. or Pentium (TM) personal computers or clones thereof or Apple (TM). Macintosh (TM). or PowerPC
SUBSTI~UTE SHEEr (PiULE 26) CA 0223~821 1998-04-24 W O 97/15889 PCT~P95/O'~CO
(TM) personal computers or clones thereof, or any other applopliate computer. in any combination. In other words, the client 16a may be a different computer than the client 16b, which in turn may be different from the client 16c, etc. The clients 16a-h include typical ~ components (see FIG. 2) such as a processor 34, input devices 36 (e.g.; keyboard and mouse), output devices 38 (e.g.; monitor alld printer)~ RAM 40, ROM 42. memory 44 (hard drive, disk drive, tape unit, CD-ROM~ etc.), seria} ports (not shown), parallel ports (not shown).
communication hardware 46, which may either be internal or external, such as internal communication cards (e.g., modem card or network card) or external communicationhardware (e.g., external modem), etc. The clients 16a-h respective have loaded in memory 44 web browsers 48 such as Mosaic or Netscape (see FIG. 2). The clients 1 6a-h also respective have loaded in memory 44 virtual reality viewers 50. The terrn "virtual reallty'', as used herein, is not necessarily meant to describe the type of virtual reality that involves the use of gloves and helmets or goggles, but instead is used to describe the type of virtual reality that perrnits navigation through a scene, or manipulation of objects, using a mouse and keyboard, such as by using QuickTime VR, developed by Apple Computer, Inc., or the Virtual Reality Modeling Language (VRML). ~RML was apparently developed by Gavin Bell of SiliconGraphics, Inc.; Anthony Parisi~ Intervista Software; and Mark Pesce, VRML list moderator.
VRML is a language which can be used for developing multi-participant interactive simulations, and virtual worlds hyperlinked via the World Wide Web. In the illustrated embodiment, the multi-participant aspect of VRML is not necessarily used~ except that. of course, multiple client can access and use the server 12 simultaneously. The first version (Version 1.0) of VRMI, provides for creation of virtual worlds or scenes, and virtual objects.
A virtual reality scene is a space in which a user can navigate by looking up, looking down, turning around, zooming in, or zooming out. A virtual reality object is an interactive object. By clicking or dragging virtual reality objects, you can view different sides of the object to examine the object. Iike merchandise in a store. HTML pages can be hyperlinked to virtual reality objects.
HTML 3.0 ~a version of HTML) lets a HTML developer decide which portions of a screen are refreshed and which portions remain unchanged. Dynamically produced HTML
pages are known in the art.
SUBSTITUTE SHEEr ~F2ULE 26) WO 97/lS889 PCT~EP95/050C0 The QuickTime VR viewer can be obtained online by connecting to Apple's server (HTTP://QTVR.QUCKTIME.APPLE.COM).
The web browsers are each configured to launch the virtual reality viewer 50 as a "helper application~' when the client is presented with a virtual reality file type For example, with a Netscape browser, this is done by clicking or pulling down the "Options" menu.
clicking on "Preferences" so the preferences window opens, clicking on "Helper Applications" so the helper applications preferences window opens, and then selecting the virtual reality player (e.g.; C:~QTVR\PLAYER.EXE) to launch when a virtual reality type file is encountered (e.g., a file with extensions .WRL, .QT, or .MOV) New file types can be added by clicking the "New Type" button. File types are indicated by the extension after a dot (" '~) in the filename; e.g.: .JPG; .GIF, .HTML, .WAV, MPG~ etc. VRML files have the extension .WRL, and QuickTime VR files have the extension QT or .MOV (as do regular movies). More advanced virtual reality languages (or language versions) for use with the World Wide Web are also being developed, and are employed in alternative embodiments of the invention.
The clients 1 6a-h are respectively connected to the server 12 via communication links 14a-h. Some or all of the communication links 14a-h may be either temporary links or permanent links. The communication links 14a-h comprise satellite links, RF links, LAN
links, WAN links, telephone line links~ or any link for permitting communication between computers, in any combination. In other words, the link 14a may be a different type of link than the link 14b. Which in turn may be a different type of link than the link 14c. etc.
Although only a limited number of clients are shown cormected to the server 12, in the illustrated embodiment, a large number of clients can be simultaneously connected to the server 12.
Different protocols may be employed for communication between the clients 16a-h and the server 12. In the preferred embodiment~ the TCP/IP protocol is employed for communication between the server 12 and the clients 1 6a-h More particularly~ in the illustrated embodiment. the server 12 is node on the Internet. and one or more clients 16a-h selectively access the server 1~ In one embodiment~ one or more of the clients 16a-h are themselves servers m~int~ined by service providers (e.g.. Netcom (TM), CompuServe (TM).
AmericaOnline (TM), etc.) which provide for communication between a lar~e number of SlJBSTlTUTE SHEET (RULE 26) CA 0223~821 1998-04-24 W O 97/15889 PCT~EP9~/05060 subscribers (or users) J 8a-b and the server 12. Typically, but not necessarily, the subscribers I 8a-b will respectively comprise personal computers (Pcs).
The server 12 has a database 52 defined in the memory 30. ln the illustrated embodiment, such memory 30 comprises a hard disk drive having inforrnation arranged thereon to define the ~ h~ce 52, but could alternatively comprise one or more CD-ROMs, random access memory (RAM3, read only memory (ROM), optical storage~ tape storage, or any other a~ op-iate data storage medium.
In one embodiment, the ~l~t~b~ce 52 is a ~l~t~bzce of bl-cinf sses and contains a predeterrnined amount of basic information (e.g.; business name~ address, phone number) for each included business. In this embodiment, the database 52 includes additional information about a business if a husiness is willing to pay extra. The additional inforination comprises graphics (e.g., a storefront 98). size of display information. Iocation of display information, virtual reality scenes, virtual reality objects~ and hyperlinks, or any combination of such additional information for each business.
In one embodiment, the database is a Wide Area Inforrnation Servers (WAIS) ~ t~b~ce. In alternative embodiments, the ~l~t~ace of the server 12 is a Sybase (TM), or Oracle (TM) database. Other forms of databases can be employed. WAIS is designed as a client-server system, and WAIS clients are able to interrogate WAIS databases using a well Icnown protocol. Because this protocol is supported by many World Wide Web clients. it is usually possible for a client to directly interrogate a WAIS server by constructing a URl (uniform resource locator) including appropriate queries that points to the WAIS server. On the other hand, some clients do not support the WAIS protocol, and other methods, such as FORM interfaces, are provided from the server to the client for constructing WAIS queries.
FORM interfaces are known to those who use the World Wide Web. A FORM interface has fields that can be filled in, or pop up menus from which selections can be made. and usuall~
has a "SEND" or "QUERY" button and a "CLEAR'' or "CANCEL" button. There are a large number of gateway programs that allow non WAIS capable clients access to a WAIS server.
One server-side program for accomplishirig these tasks is WAIS.PL. a PERL
(practical extraction and reporting language) script (program) that obtains a query string from a client and passes the query to a WAIS ~l~t~h:lce query engine (WAISQ) at tlle server. and returns the results to the user as an HTML document.
SUBSTiTUTE SHEEr (RULE 26) Other server-side programs for accomplishing these tasks include SON-OF-WAIS.PL~a perl script written by Eric Lease Morgan of North Carolina State University Libraries;
KIDOWAIS.PL, another PERL script; SFGATE, which does not access a server-side WAIS
query engine but instead has WAIS client software built-in; WAlSGATE, available from WAIS lnc., and WWWWAIS, a C program that acts as a gateway between the programs (WAISQ and WAISSEA~CH) that search WAIS indexes and a FORM capable web browser.
There are also many software programs for linking the World Wide Web to commercial database packages like Oracle or Sybase. One is GSQT -ORACLE BACKEND,for use with ( )racle databases, which was written by Jarnes Pitkow of the Graphics, Visualization, and Usability Center at the Georgia Institute of Technology.
Another is WEB/GENERA, for use with Sybase databases, which was developed by Stanley Letovsky with support of the National Science Foundation.
Another is WDB, for use with Sybase databases, which allows use of high-level description files to specify the structure of a database and the format of responses so that an interface between the World Wide Web and a Sybase database can be developed without the need to write any code WDB was written by Bo Frese Rasmussen of the European Southern Observatory.
Another is GSQL, a C program, for use with Sybase or other SQL databases. GSQL
was written by Jason Ng of NCSA (National Center for Supercomputing Applications at the University of ~llinois at Champaign-Urbana) Another is HTORACLE, for use with Oracle databases. HTOracle was written by Arthus Secret of CERN (Centre Europeen pour la Récherche Nucleaire in Geneve.
Switzerland).
Another is ORAPLEX. for use with Oracle databases. ORAPLEX was written b,v Guy Decoux of the Institut National de la Recherché Agronomique in France.
Another is TR-WWW. which is a Macintosh-based search engine that works only with a MacHTTP (TM) server.
Most of the above ~l~t~b~e gateway programs, as well as detailed documentation discussing their use. is available via the World Wide Web. Documentation is also available in various books that describe the World Wide Web and HTML. Many such gatewa~
SUBSTITUTE SHEEr (RULE 26) CA 0223~821 1998-04-24 W O 97/15889 PCTAE~9Si~'OGO
programs are available by conTl~cting to NCSA's server at the University of Illinois.
Ch~rnr~i~n-Urbana (FTP://FTP.NCSA.UIUC.EDU).
The memory 30 of the server 12 is also loaded with graphics, virtual reality scenes and or virtual reality o~jects 54 that will be described below in greater detail.
FIGS. 3 and 5-10 illustrate operation ofthe system.
In step 56, one of the clients 16a-h connects to the server 1~. For example, the client connects to the server 12 via the World Wide Web by entering on a client browser the URL
of the seFver After step 56~ the system proceeds to step 58.
In step 58. the server 12 presents to the client a graphical user interface 88 including a query area 90 in which a search query can be generated. In one embodiment. this graphical user interface includes a FORM interface, discussed above. The interface optionally comprises pull down menus. ~n one embodiment, the graphical user interface 88 comprises a graphical representation of an elevator including an area 90 in which query information can be entered or selected from menus. In one embodiment, the elevator is a virtual reality space which the user of the client virtually enters, and within which the search query is generated.
In one embodiment, the user is able to select the number of L'hits" the user wants to see. In an alternative embodiment, the number of "hits" generated by the search is limited to a predeterrnined number. After step 58, the system proceeds to step 60. In one embodiment.
the interface is particularly suited for searching for business, and provides for searching at least by category (type of goods or services). In alternatively embodiments. the interface provides for searching of any desired field selected from a plurality of fields. such as category (type of goods or services), location, phone number. zip code, area code, subcategory (e.~.
type of cuisine - Piza, German, Vietnamese, Chinese). sublocation (Eastside. North.
Suburbs~ etc.).
At step 60, the client sends the search query to the server. After step 60. the system proceeds to step 62.
At step 62, the server performs the database search in response to the query. In the illustrated embodiment, visual indicators give the appearance of movement of the elevator while the search request is being processed. ~or example. floor indicators 92a-f can change to give the impression the elevator is ascending or descending. Movement of bars or other graphics 94a-e can take place to give the impression of a window 96 in the elevator, and SUBSTITUTE SHEET (RULE 26) _~ CA 0223~821 1998-04-24 r nlovement of the elevator (e.g. a movie, such as QuickTime movie or MPEG movie, silllulates movement of the elevator). After step 62, the system proceeds to step 64.
At step 64, the serYer creates a virtual reality space by selecting and asseulbling graphics or virtual reality spaces and items in response to the results of the dat.lbase search. At step 66, the server 12 sends a virtual reality space to the client.
~;~t s~ep 68, the client recognizes that virtual reality information is being sent, and laullclles a virtual reality ~,-iewer (e.g. a web browser launches a virtual reality helper al-l-lication such as QuickTime for Virtual Reality).
For example, in one embodiment, a navigable virtual reality scene is presented c~)lnl-rising a street llaving storefronts 98, 100, 102, 104, 106, 108 representing the best hits from the database search. In one embodiment, a predetermined minimum amount of information about each business Is provided on the street (e.g. on a lett~rbox at the end of the street or on a window or door of a small storefront). If the business is one that paid e~tra, it will have a storefront. Businesses that pay extra may also have a storefront closer to the elevator or a different size.
In one embodiment, the virtual reality scene includes areas (e.g. billboards) including advertising of related products or services. For example, if the search ~i~as a .searcll for restaurants, a billboard 101 may show an advertisement for a cola product~
In one embodiment, the advertising comprises a movie (e.g., a movie playing within an area of the screen, such as to give the appearance of a movie projected on a building or billboard). Individual businesses may have their own signs ~ hich may rotate, for example. Other features of streets, such as street lamps, phone booths, etc., may be presented for added visual effect.
In the illustrated embodiment, if a user of a client navigates into one of the storefronts, the user is sent by hyperlink to a server m~inl~ined by the associated business. In an alternatiye embodiment, if a user of a client navigates into one of the storefronts, the user encounters another virtual reality space in which the user may pick up and inspect virtual objects, and make purchases via the server 12.
CA 0223~821 1998-04-24 W O 97/15889 PCT/~gsJl~5cco It should be noted that the appearance of the street presented will vary depending on the results of the cl~t~kz~e search. The presented street will have an appearance of interest to the user doing the search, and will have storefronts of businesses of interest to that user (e.g.~
in a certain geographic location. such as within a certain zip code, providing certain goods or services~ or having a certain name). Thus, like bll~in~sses are grouped together for the user's convenience on a boulevard. In one embodiment, the appearance of the street (excluding the storefronts) changes depending on the selected category; e.g. because people go to restaurants at night, a search for restaurants can produce a nightttme scene. Different types of music can play while a user navigates through a scene depending on the category selected.
Alternatively, audible advertising can ply while the user navigates through the scene.
FIGS. 4A and 4B illustrate one embodiment of making a virtual reality scene to be used in displaying database search results. As illustrated in FIG. 4A~ a carnera 70 is used to take several pictures of an actual street from various vantage points. These photographs are ~ligiti7etl and electronically stitched together, as illustrated in FIG. 4B. To allow stitching of photographs where the camera turns corners, the images are warped such that straight lines become curved lines, so that all adjacent photographs can be stitched together side by side to form a panorama. The virtual reality player in the client computer only views one small portion of the stitched photograph panorama at a time, and unwarps that portion so that straight lines appear straight. As the user navigates in the scene, the virtual reality player keeps up with the user's movements, unwarping and displaying the user's vantage point of the panorama on the fly. In an alternative embodiment. the virtual reality streets are formed usmg ammatlons.
In one embodiment, the server contains a regular graphic (e.g. a GIF or JPEG) of a storefront for each business~ and the server creates a virtual reality scene by stitching together graphics in response to the results of a database search.
Objects displayed when entering certain stores are virtual reality objects. Virtual reality objects are unlike scenes because scenes involve navigating through a single panoramic image, whereas objects are defined from a number of images of the object taken at different angles. In an alternative embodiment, the virtual reality objects are formed using animations.
SUBSTITUTE SHEET (RULE 26) CA 0223~821 1998-04-24 wo 97/lS889 PCTJEP95~'05060 FIGS. 5-10 illustrate screens that are sent from the server to the client in response to a database search ~uery.
F~G. S illustrates the graphic interface and how any of various avai1able fields can be searched.
FIG. 6 illustrates that the elevator door will open after the virtual reality scene has been constructed.
FIG. 7 illustrates a scene after a user has navigated part way down a street.
FIG. 8 illustrates a user facing a storefront. The storefront can contain inforrnation that is typically contained in a Yellow Pages ad. ~f the user advances, the store is entered.
This can result in the client connected to the home page of the store or other results, such as a virtual reality scene of a store interior including virtual reality objects.
~ IG. 9 illustrates that a user can re-enter the elevator to perfolm a new search.
FIG. 10 illustrates an alternative street created in response to a different search.
Thus, a system has been described which provides for presentation of Yellow Pages information in a more appealing format.
The invention has been described in language more or less specific as to structural and methodical features. It is to be understood, however, that the invention is not limited to the specific features shown and described, since the means herein disclosed comprise preferred forms of putting the invention into effect. The invention is, therefore, ciaimed in any of its forms or modifications within the proper scope of the appended claims.
Industrial Applicabili~y The invention has applicability in the fields of merch~nc~i7ing, advertizing~ and communication networks. The invention also has applicability in shipping and labelling.
For example~ one embodiment of the invention includes means communicating with the server 12 for automatically shipping a product purchased on-line by a user of a client 1 6a-h. In one embodiment, a user can make a purchase after virtually entering a store from one of the street scenes shown in FIGS. 7-lO; e.g., by clicking on a desired item (or selecting it frorn a list)~ and entering credit card information and shipping address inforrnation at the client when requested by the server. In this embodiment. the server is a secure server~ and at least the credit card information is encrypted while travelling from the client 16a-h to the ser~er SUBSTITUTE SHEET (RULE 26) W O 97/15889 PCTAEP9~/05060 12. The server is conntocte~ to an automated label maker. and electronically passes the shipping address to the label maker, where a shipping label is automaticall~ printed.
In one embodiment, the system further comprises an electronic credit card verifying ~p~dLIlS, of the type commonly found in restaurants and stores, in communication with the server. The credit card verifying m~chine is connected to a phone line and, when the server receives an order, the credit card verifying machine dials up and communicates with a credit card issuer to verify that a card nu nber is valid, and so as to receive an approval code for a transaction. In alternative embodiments, credit card verification takes place via a computer network. electronic funds transfer is employed, or a service such as Cybercash (TM) is employed.
SUBSTITUTE SHEEr (RllLE 26)
YELLOW PAGES IN CYBE~SPACE
T~?rhnical Field The invention relates to systems including databases. More p,~rticularly. the invention relates to systems including displays for displaying the results of a databasc search. The invention also relates to computer networks.
~ck~ro~lnd Art Yellow Pages are known by everyone as a directory of businesses, as well as a medium for advertising. The concept of Yellow Pages was developed more than 80 years ago. This type of directory contains information about businesses categorized by headings.
The categories are defined by type of product or service sold by the various businesses Some basic information (e.g.; business name, address, phone number) is provided for each included business. Additional inforrnation can be included if a business is willing to pay extra. For example, a business can pay extra to have an in-column or display add included.
Businesses find the Yellow Pages to be a useful advertising resource. Users find the Yellow Pages to be a handy resource for finding solutions to problems.
Yellow Pages are used in all developed countries. and many other countries.
Household members turn to Yellow Pages quite frequently (e.g.~ 100 times per year in the United States, 10-75 times per year in other countries). The Yellow Pages industry is very profitable. It is not uncommon for earnings after tax to exceed 25% of revenues. Worldwide revenues are higher than $15 billion.
Different Yellow Pages directories are published for different geographical regions ~e.,~~,.; cities~ metropolitan areas, counties, collections of towns~ etc). For different geographical regions there may be several publishers of competing Yellow Pages. In addition, there are vaLrious speciality Yellow Pages, such as ethnic Yellow Pages (e.g.~ the Black Pages~ etc) of businesses owned by certain ethnic groups~ toll free or '~800'' directories.
etc.
SUBSTITUI'E SffEEl (RULE 26) CA 0223~821 1998-04-24 W O 97/15889 PCTAEP9;/05~0 Publishers sell advertisements in Yellow Pages using various techni~ues. Loca} or regional telephone cornpanies often play a major part in sales of advertisin~ space. These local or regional telephone companies hire a sales agent, such as L.M. Berry (Tl~I) of Dayton, or Donnely (TM) to sell the advertising space.
Yellow pages directories found in different countries are similar in organization and appearance to those discussed above.
With the advent of the electronic age, there is a push to make tlle information normally contained in Yellow Pages available in electronic media. For example, it is known to provide CD ROMs containing at least the data of Yellow Pages, if not tlle advertising.
Such CD ROMs may be published by the sarne publishers who publish the paper versions of the Yellow Pages. The publishers may take the same data from the paper version~ and publish it on a CD ROM. Such electronic Yellow Pages may also be contained in commercial databases, such as DIALOG (SM~ databases. DIALOG is a service mark ofDialog Information Services, Inc., which is a subsidiary of Lockheed Corporation.
The advantages of having the information in an electronic form is that it becomes much easier to search the inforrnation. For exarnple, if you have a message to call a phone number, but cannot make out the callers narne, it is possible with an electronic version of the Yellow Pages to search for the phone number, and find the business name and address. Such a search is not easily perforrned with a paper version, because the data is typically organized alphabetically by business name, not numerically by phone number. Other types of searches are also possible. witll the electronic version, by using conventional database searchin~
techniques and boolean connectors.
Some electronic databases including Yellow Pages inforrnation are nou appearing on the Internet.
The Internet is a worldwide network of computers. Tlle Internet began under the name ARPANET. and was started by the Advanced Research Projects Agency of the U.S.
Department of Defense. For the military. computers are useful for command and control. and the original reason for ARPANET was to provide redundant connections between computers so as to have communications that are not subject to failure. Protocols were developed that allowed communications between computers over any available route. instead of a fixed route. A problem with an earlier protocol was that it restricted the number of computers that SUBSTITUTE SHEEl- (RULE 26) CA 0223~821 1998-04-24 WO g7/15889 PCT~EP9~/OSO60 could be on the ARPANET. A new protocol. called Tr~n.~mi~ion Control Protocol/lnternet Protocol (TCP/IP)~ was later developed, and is now one of the most widely accepted networking protocols. Universities and research facilities communicated over ARPANET.
In the late 1 980s, the National Science Foundation developed a network ~NSFNET) to connect its supercomp~ter centers, and this network used the TCP/IP protocols. Eventually.
publicly and privately funded networks including ARPANET and various other networks (UUCP, MILNET. I~SENET. BITNET, CSNET, NASA Science Internet) joined the NSFNET networks. and the collection of networks is called the Internet. The Internet today includes an international connection of intercommunicating networks, both privately and publicly funded. Most computer systems support TCP/IP, and connecting to the Internet is easy and inexpensive.
The World Wide Web is the multimedia aspect of the Internet. The World Wide Web originated at CERN (Centre Européen pour la Rechérche Nucleaire in Geneva. Switzerland3.
Hyperlinks in documents provide for immediate connection to other documents which may be on the same or on a different computer. By clicking or selecting hyperlinked terrns or graphics on a web page~ you are taken to another web page, or to another location in the web page you are currently reading. This is useful, for example. if reading a paper that has footnotes while reading the main text of document, you can select a hyperlinli and be taken directly to the appropriate footnote, and then, with a click of a button, back to the main text.
Hyperlinks are also useful for reading a document cont~;nin~ complex terminology for which definitions are hyperlinked. Further, some people collect a list of resources relevant to a topic of interest, and provide hyperlinks to each of the resources from a web page. Web pages are typically written using HTML (hyper text mark-up language). HTML documents or pages typically include text, and references to graphics files on the servers~ as well as hyperlinks.
When viewed on a client computer, the graphics are combined with the te.~it on a single screen, and some wordls are underlined or differently colored (or a box may appear around graphics~. If these special words or graphics are clicked on with a mouse~ a hyperlin};
prescribed in the HTML document will be followed. This will result in the client being connected to another document or file (eg.; graphics file, sound file~ etc.) which may or may not reside on a different server, or to another section of the same document. HTML is well known. and many references are a~ailable on-line that describe HTML. HTML is also SUBSmUTE SHEEr (RULE 26) CA 0223~821 1998-04-24 W O 97/15889 PCT~EP95/0~060 described in HTMT Sollrceboo~, by Ian S Graham, published by John Wiley & Sons, Inc.
~ITML documents that are loaded on servers can be viewed by remote computers (clients) that have web browsers loaded thereon. One well known web browser is Mosaic (TM), available from NCSA (the National Center for Supercomputing Applications at the University of Illinois at Ch~mp~ign-Urbana). Another popular web browser is Netscape (TM), available from ~etscape Cornmunications Corporation, SQ1 East ~Iiddlefield Road, Mountain View, California, 94043.
Hyperlinking is also known in other applications, such as in FoiloViews (TM) documents.
Web browsers such as Mosaic and Netscape allow a client to view text, graphics (eg.;
"GIFs", "JPEGs"), or a combination of text and graphics presented to the client from a server ~cecse~l by the client. The servers have unique URLs (uniform resource locators), using which, the client can connect to a desired server. The typical formal of a URL is HTTP://WWW.SERVER.COM/DOCUMENT.HTML, where ~'SERVER" would be replaced by the name of a server; "COM" would be replaced by a country code if the server is outside the U.S., or by "MIL't if a military server, or "ORG" if an org~ni7~tion or "EDU" if an educational server. etc; and where "DOCUMENT.HTML" would be replaced by the name of a document or file on the server which the client is açcPs~ing, or omitted to pull up a "home page" (a starting point for the web site). Web browsers can also be configured to launch "helper applications" when the client is presented with a file type that the browser cannot handle. File types are indicated by the extension after a dot (".") in the filename; e.g.: .JPG;
.GIF, .HTML. .WAV, .MPG, etc. If the client has loaded thereon viewer or player software that can handle such a file type, the browser on the client can be configured to start (launch) the viewer software (the helper application) acting on such files if they are received. For example, if the client receives a .WAV file (an audio file), the client ma~ automatically launch an audio player on the client computer so that the user at the client hears the sound without having to manually start the audio player on the client computer. Similarly. if the client receives a .MPG file (a soundless movie file in ' mpeg7' format)~ the client may automatically launch a rnpeg player to start a movie.
Some forms of Yellow Pages directories are now available on the World Wide Web.
~or exarnple NYNEX rnaintains a web site.
SUBSrlTUTE SHEEr (RULE 26) - CA 0223~821 1998-04-24 Other networking protocols and hardware are also known and used for setting up networks such as local areas networks (LANs) and wide area networks (WANs).
Various businesses are finding it useful to be physically located close to otherbusinesses that sell the same or similar goods and services. Businesses that arelocated next to other businesses that sell similar goods and services see an increase in traffic (visits by potential customers) because the customer wllo is interested in a particular good or service can more easily comparison sllop or locate hard to find goods or services. For example, car dealers are frequently located near other car dealers, some restaurants are located near other restaurants, some furniture stores are located near other furniture stores, etG.
It would be desirable to provide Yellow Pages information in a visually stimulating manner so as to encourage advertising by businesses, and use of the Yellow Pages by consumers. It would also be desirable to present electronic information from a database in a form where similar goods and services are grouped together.
Hyperlinked documents are known in the art. See, for example, Arnon et al., Usin~ Structured Docllments For Implementin~ Product/Service Yellow Pa~es Architecture On The Inter~et. This reference discloses design of a data model for structured documents. A tree structure hierarchy is proposed.
Hyperlinking to visual information, instead of to text, is also known. See, for example, HyperImages: Using Object Recognition For Navigation Through Images In Multimedia, David Lowe, Athula Ginige, School of Electrical Engineering, University of Technology, Sydney, Australia.
Virtual Reality is also known in the art. See, for example, Scientific Graphics ~nd Visn~li7zltion Come to the Jnternet, Scientific Computer World, March, 1995, pp.
31-36.
l~ri~f l)~scription of the Drawir~
5a Preferred embodiments of the invention are described belo~v ~vith reference to the accompanying drawings, which are briefly described below.
FIG. 1 is a block diagram illustrating a system embodying the invention.
FIG. 2 is a block diagram illustrating in greater detail SOllle of the components included in the system of FIG. .
FIG. 3 is a flowchart illustrating operation of the system o~' ~IG. 1.
FIGS. 4A-B illustrate how a virtual reality scene is made.
FIGS. 5-10 illustrate sample virtual reality scenes prod~ d by tlle system of FIG. 1.
SU~'ll\lAlF~Y OF TH~, JNV~NTION
The invention provides a system comprising a server having a memory, and a database defined in the memory; and a client in communication with the server, the server communicating to the client an interface for use in requesting a search of the database, and W O 97/15889 PCT/EP9S~'O;OGO
the server having virtual reality means for generating a virtual reality scene, the virtual reality scene varying depending on the results of the search.
Another aspect of the invention provides a server comprising a memory, and a database defined in the memory, the ll~t~h~e including data about a f~rst classification of businesses, which data respectively includes business name, address, phone number, and goods or services provided by the business, the database further including data about a second classification of businesses~ which data respectively includes more data than is provided for each first classification business; communication hardware providing for communication between the server and clients via l'CP/IP; the server communicating to the client an interface for use in requesting a search of the database in response to a client connecting to the server.
and the server generating a virtual reality scene in response to the client requesting a search of the database, the virtual reality scene varying depending on the results of the search l~est ~odes for Carryin~ Out the InLvention ~nd ni~closure of Inv~ntion FIG. 1 illustrates a system 10 embodying the invention. The system l 0 comprises a server 12, which can be a minicomputer, a microcomputer~ a UNIX (TM ) machine, amainframe computer, a personal computer (PC~ such as an Intel (TM3 286. 386, 486, or Pentium (TM) personal computer or clone thereof or Apple ~TM), Macintosh ~TM). or PowerPC (TM) personal computer or clone thereof, or any other appropriate computer. The server 12 includes typical components (see FIG. 2) such as a processor 20. input devices 2'' (e.g.; keyboard and mouse3. output devices 24 (e.g.; monitor and printer), ROM 26~ RAM 28~
memory 30 (e.g. hard drive, disk drive, tape unit, CD-ROM, etc.), serial ports (not shown).
parallel ports (not shown), communication hardware 32, which may either be internal or externaL such as internal commur~ication cards (e.g.~ modem card or networkcard) or external communication hardware ~e.g.~ external modem), etc The server 12 has a multi-user. multi-tasking operating system such as UNIX (if the server is a UNIX machine). L~NUX (if the server is a personal computer). etc.
The system 10 further comprises (see FIG. I) a plurality of clients 16a-11 The clients 16a-h comprise computers such as minicomputers~ microcomputers, UNIX (TM) machines.
mainfrarne computers~ personal computers such as an Intel (TM) 286~ 386~ 486. or Pentium (TM) personal computers or clones thereof or Apple (TM). Macintosh (TM). or PowerPC
SUBSTI~UTE SHEEr (PiULE 26) CA 0223~821 1998-04-24 W O 97/15889 PCT~P95/O'~CO
(TM) personal computers or clones thereof, or any other applopliate computer. in any combination. In other words, the client 16a may be a different computer than the client 16b, which in turn may be different from the client 16c, etc. The clients 16a-h include typical ~ components (see FIG. 2) such as a processor 34, input devices 36 (e.g.; keyboard and mouse), output devices 38 (e.g.; monitor alld printer)~ RAM 40, ROM 42. memory 44 (hard drive, disk drive, tape unit, CD-ROM~ etc.), seria} ports (not shown), parallel ports (not shown).
communication hardware 46, which may either be internal or external, such as internal communication cards (e.g., modem card or network card) or external communicationhardware (e.g., external modem), etc. The clients 16a-h respective have loaded in memory 44 web browsers 48 such as Mosaic or Netscape (see FIG. 2). The clients 1 6a-h also respective have loaded in memory 44 virtual reality viewers 50. The terrn "virtual reallty'', as used herein, is not necessarily meant to describe the type of virtual reality that involves the use of gloves and helmets or goggles, but instead is used to describe the type of virtual reality that perrnits navigation through a scene, or manipulation of objects, using a mouse and keyboard, such as by using QuickTime VR, developed by Apple Computer, Inc., or the Virtual Reality Modeling Language (VRML). ~RML was apparently developed by Gavin Bell of SiliconGraphics, Inc.; Anthony Parisi~ Intervista Software; and Mark Pesce, VRML list moderator.
VRML is a language which can be used for developing multi-participant interactive simulations, and virtual worlds hyperlinked via the World Wide Web. In the illustrated embodiment, the multi-participant aspect of VRML is not necessarily used~ except that. of course, multiple client can access and use the server 12 simultaneously. The first version (Version 1.0) of VRMI, provides for creation of virtual worlds or scenes, and virtual objects.
A virtual reality scene is a space in which a user can navigate by looking up, looking down, turning around, zooming in, or zooming out. A virtual reality object is an interactive object. By clicking or dragging virtual reality objects, you can view different sides of the object to examine the object. Iike merchandise in a store. HTML pages can be hyperlinked to virtual reality objects.
HTML 3.0 ~a version of HTML) lets a HTML developer decide which portions of a screen are refreshed and which portions remain unchanged. Dynamically produced HTML
pages are known in the art.
SUBSTITUTE SHEEr ~F2ULE 26) WO 97/lS889 PCT~EP95/050C0 The QuickTime VR viewer can be obtained online by connecting to Apple's server (HTTP://QTVR.QUCKTIME.APPLE.COM).
The web browsers are each configured to launch the virtual reality viewer 50 as a "helper application~' when the client is presented with a virtual reality file type For example, with a Netscape browser, this is done by clicking or pulling down the "Options" menu.
clicking on "Preferences" so the preferences window opens, clicking on "Helper Applications" so the helper applications preferences window opens, and then selecting the virtual reality player (e.g.; C:~QTVR\PLAYER.EXE) to launch when a virtual reality type file is encountered (e.g., a file with extensions .WRL, .QT, or .MOV) New file types can be added by clicking the "New Type" button. File types are indicated by the extension after a dot (" '~) in the filename; e.g.: .JPG; .GIF, .HTML, .WAV, MPG~ etc. VRML files have the extension .WRL, and QuickTime VR files have the extension QT or .MOV (as do regular movies). More advanced virtual reality languages (or language versions) for use with the World Wide Web are also being developed, and are employed in alternative embodiments of the invention.
The clients 1 6a-h are respectively connected to the server 12 via communication links 14a-h. Some or all of the communication links 14a-h may be either temporary links or permanent links. The communication links 14a-h comprise satellite links, RF links, LAN
links, WAN links, telephone line links~ or any link for permitting communication between computers, in any combination. In other words, the link 14a may be a different type of link than the link 14b. Which in turn may be a different type of link than the link 14c. etc.
Although only a limited number of clients are shown cormected to the server 12, in the illustrated embodiment, a large number of clients can be simultaneously connected to the server 12.
Different protocols may be employed for communication between the clients 16a-h and the server 12. In the preferred embodiment~ the TCP/IP protocol is employed for communication between the server 12 and the clients 1 6a-h More particularly~ in the illustrated embodiment. the server 12 is node on the Internet. and one or more clients 16a-h selectively access the server 1~ In one embodiment~ one or more of the clients 16a-h are themselves servers m~int~ined by service providers (e.g.. Netcom (TM), CompuServe (TM).
AmericaOnline (TM), etc.) which provide for communication between a lar~e number of SlJBSTlTUTE SHEET (RULE 26) CA 0223~821 1998-04-24 W O 97/15889 PCT~EP9~/05060 subscribers (or users) J 8a-b and the server 12. Typically, but not necessarily, the subscribers I 8a-b will respectively comprise personal computers (Pcs).
The server 12 has a database 52 defined in the memory 30. ln the illustrated embodiment, such memory 30 comprises a hard disk drive having inforrnation arranged thereon to define the ~ h~ce 52, but could alternatively comprise one or more CD-ROMs, random access memory (RAM3, read only memory (ROM), optical storage~ tape storage, or any other a~ op-iate data storage medium.
In one embodiment, the ~l~t~b~ce 52 is a ~l~t~bzce of bl-cinf sses and contains a predeterrnined amount of basic information (e.g.; business name~ address, phone number) for each included business. In this embodiment, the database 52 includes additional information about a business if a husiness is willing to pay extra. The additional inforination comprises graphics (e.g., a storefront 98). size of display information. Iocation of display information, virtual reality scenes, virtual reality objects~ and hyperlinks, or any combination of such additional information for each business.
In one embodiment, the database is a Wide Area Inforrnation Servers (WAIS) ~ t~b~ce. In alternative embodiments, the ~l~t~ace of the server 12 is a Sybase (TM), or Oracle (TM) database. Other forms of databases can be employed. WAIS is designed as a client-server system, and WAIS clients are able to interrogate WAIS databases using a well Icnown protocol. Because this protocol is supported by many World Wide Web clients. it is usually possible for a client to directly interrogate a WAIS server by constructing a URl (uniform resource locator) including appropriate queries that points to the WAIS server. On the other hand, some clients do not support the WAIS protocol, and other methods, such as FORM interfaces, are provided from the server to the client for constructing WAIS queries.
FORM interfaces are known to those who use the World Wide Web. A FORM interface has fields that can be filled in, or pop up menus from which selections can be made. and usuall~
has a "SEND" or "QUERY" button and a "CLEAR'' or "CANCEL" button. There are a large number of gateway programs that allow non WAIS capable clients access to a WAIS server.
One server-side program for accomplishirig these tasks is WAIS.PL. a PERL
(practical extraction and reporting language) script (program) that obtains a query string from a client and passes the query to a WAIS ~l~t~h:lce query engine (WAISQ) at tlle server. and returns the results to the user as an HTML document.
SUBSTiTUTE SHEEr (RULE 26) Other server-side programs for accomplishing these tasks include SON-OF-WAIS.PL~a perl script written by Eric Lease Morgan of North Carolina State University Libraries;
KIDOWAIS.PL, another PERL script; SFGATE, which does not access a server-side WAIS
query engine but instead has WAIS client software built-in; WAlSGATE, available from WAIS lnc., and WWWWAIS, a C program that acts as a gateway between the programs (WAISQ and WAISSEA~CH) that search WAIS indexes and a FORM capable web browser.
There are also many software programs for linking the World Wide Web to commercial database packages like Oracle or Sybase. One is GSQT -ORACLE BACKEND,for use with ( )racle databases, which was written by Jarnes Pitkow of the Graphics, Visualization, and Usability Center at the Georgia Institute of Technology.
Another is WEB/GENERA, for use with Sybase databases, which was developed by Stanley Letovsky with support of the National Science Foundation.
Another is WDB, for use with Sybase databases, which allows use of high-level description files to specify the structure of a database and the format of responses so that an interface between the World Wide Web and a Sybase database can be developed without the need to write any code WDB was written by Bo Frese Rasmussen of the European Southern Observatory.
Another is GSQL, a C program, for use with Sybase or other SQL databases. GSQL
was written by Jason Ng of NCSA (National Center for Supercomputing Applications at the University of ~llinois at Champaign-Urbana) Another is HTORACLE, for use with Oracle databases. HTOracle was written by Arthus Secret of CERN (Centre Europeen pour la Récherche Nucleaire in Geneve.
Switzerland).
Another is ORAPLEX. for use with Oracle databases. ORAPLEX was written b,v Guy Decoux of the Institut National de la Recherché Agronomique in France.
Another is TR-WWW. which is a Macintosh-based search engine that works only with a MacHTTP (TM) server.
Most of the above ~l~t~b~e gateway programs, as well as detailed documentation discussing their use. is available via the World Wide Web. Documentation is also available in various books that describe the World Wide Web and HTML. Many such gatewa~
SUBSTITUTE SHEEr (RULE 26) CA 0223~821 1998-04-24 W O 97/15889 PCTAE~9Si~'OGO
programs are available by conTl~cting to NCSA's server at the University of Illinois.
Ch~rnr~i~n-Urbana (FTP://FTP.NCSA.UIUC.EDU).
The memory 30 of the server 12 is also loaded with graphics, virtual reality scenes and or virtual reality o~jects 54 that will be described below in greater detail.
FIGS. 3 and 5-10 illustrate operation ofthe system.
In step 56, one of the clients 16a-h connects to the server 1~. For example, the client connects to the server 12 via the World Wide Web by entering on a client browser the URL
of the seFver After step 56~ the system proceeds to step 58.
In step 58. the server 12 presents to the client a graphical user interface 88 including a query area 90 in which a search query can be generated. In one embodiment. this graphical user interface includes a FORM interface, discussed above. The interface optionally comprises pull down menus. ~n one embodiment, the graphical user interface 88 comprises a graphical representation of an elevator including an area 90 in which query information can be entered or selected from menus. In one embodiment, the elevator is a virtual reality space which the user of the client virtually enters, and within which the search query is generated.
In one embodiment, the user is able to select the number of L'hits" the user wants to see. In an alternative embodiment, the number of "hits" generated by the search is limited to a predeterrnined number. After step 58, the system proceeds to step 60. In one embodiment.
the interface is particularly suited for searching for business, and provides for searching at least by category (type of goods or services). In alternatively embodiments. the interface provides for searching of any desired field selected from a plurality of fields. such as category (type of goods or services), location, phone number. zip code, area code, subcategory (e.~.
type of cuisine - Piza, German, Vietnamese, Chinese). sublocation (Eastside. North.
Suburbs~ etc.).
At step 60, the client sends the search query to the server. After step 60. the system proceeds to step 62.
At step 62, the server performs the database search in response to the query. In the illustrated embodiment, visual indicators give the appearance of movement of the elevator while the search request is being processed. ~or example. floor indicators 92a-f can change to give the impression the elevator is ascending or descending. Movement of bars or other graphics 94a-e can take place to give the impression of a window 96 in the elevator, and SUBSTITUTE SHEET (RULE 26) _~ CA 0223~821 1998-04-24 r nlovement of the elevator (e.g. a movie, such as QuickTime movie or MPEG movie, silllulates movement of the elevator). After step 62, the system proceeds to step 64.
At step 64, the serYer creates a virtual reality space by selecting and asseulbling graphics or virtual reality spaces and items in response to the results of the dat.lbase search. At step 66, the server 12 sends a virtual reality space to the client.
~;~t s~ep 68, the client recognizes that virtual reality information is being sent, and laullclles a virtual reality ~,-iewer (e.g. a web browser launches a virtual reality helper al-l-lication such as QuickTime for Virtual Reality).
For example, in one embodiment, a navigable virtual reality scene is presented c~)lnl-rising a street llaving storefronts 98, 100, 102, 104, 106, 108 representing the best hits from the database search. In one embodiment, a predetermined minimum amount of information about each business Is provided on the street (e.g. on a lett~rbox at the end of the street or on a window or door of a small storefront). If the business is one that paid e~tra, it will have a storefront. Businesses that pay extra may also have a storefront closer to the elevator or a different size.
In one embodiment, the virtual reality scene includes areas (e.g. billboards) including advertising of related products or services. For example, if the search ~i~as a .searcll for restaurants, a billboard 101 may show an advertisement for a cola product~
In one embodiment, the advertising comprises a movie (e.g., a movie playing within an area of the screen, such as to give the appearance of a movie projected on a building or billboard). Individual businesses may have their own signs ~ hich may rotate, for example. Other features of streets, such as street lamps, phone booths, etc., may be presented for added visual effect.
In the illustrated embodiment, if a user of a client navigates into one of the storefronts, the user is sent by hyperlink to a server m~inl~ined by the associated business. In an alternatiye embodiment, if a user of a client navigates into one of the storefronts, the user encounters another virtual reality space in which the user may pick up and inspect virtual objects, and make purchases via the server 12.
CA 0223~821 1998-04-24 W O 97/15889 PCT/~gsJl~5cco It should be noted that the appearance of the street presented will vary depending on the results of the cl~t~kz~e search. The presented street will have an appearance of interest to the user doing the search, and will have storefronts of businesses of interest to that user (e.g.~
in a certain geographic location. such as within a certain zip code, providing certain goods or services~ or having a certain name). Thus, like bll~in~sses are grouped together for the user's convenience on a boulevard. In one embodiment, the appearance of the street (excluding the storefronts) changes depending on the selected category; e.g. because people go to restaurants at night, a search for restaurants can produce a nightttme scene. Different types of music can play while a user navigates through a scene depending on the category selected.
Alternatively, audible advertising can ply while the user navigates through the scene.
FIGS. 4A and 4B illustrate one embodiment of making a virtual reality scene to be used in displaying database search results. As illustrated in FIG. 4A~ a carnera 70 is used to take several pictures of an actual street from various vantage points. These photographs are ~ligiti7etl and electronically stitched together, as illustrated in FIG. 4B. To allow stitching of photographs where the camera turns corners, the images are warped such that straight lines become curved lines, so that all adjacent photographs can be stitched together side by side to form a panorama. The virtual reality player in the client computer only views one small portion of the stitched photograph panorama at a time, and unwarps that portion so that straight lines appear straight. As the user navigates in the scene, the virtual reality player keeps up with the user's movements, unwarping and displaying the user's vantage point of the panorama on the fly. In an alternative embodiment. the virtual reality streets are formed usmg ammatlons.
In one embodiment, the server contains a regular graphic (e.g. a GIF or JPEG) of a storefront for each business~ and the server creates a virtual reality scene by stitching together graphics in response to the results of a database search.
Objects displayed when entering certain stores are virtual reality objects. Virtual reality objects are unlike scenes because scenes involve navigating through a single panoramic image, whereas objects are defined from a number of images of the object taken at different angles. In an alternative embodiment, the virtual reality objects are formed using animations.
SUBSTITUTE SHEET (RULE 26) CA 0223~821 1998-04-24 wo 97/lS889 PCTJEP95~'05060 FIGS. 5-10 illustrate screens that are sent from the server to the client in response to a database search ~uery.
F~G. S illustrates the graphic interface and how any of various avai1able fields can be searched.
FIG. 6 illustrates that the elevator door will open after the virtual reality scene has been constructed.
FIG. 7 illustrates a scene after a user has navigated part way down a street.
FIG. 8 illustrates a user facing a storefront. The storefront can contain inforrnation that is typically contained in a Yellow Pages ad. ~f the user advances, the store is entered.
This can result in the client connected to the home page of the store or other results, such as a virtual reality scene of a store interior including virtual reality objects.
~ IG. 9 illustrates that a user can re-enter the elevator to perfolm a new search.
FIG. 10 illustrates an alternative street created in response to a different search.
Thus, a system has been described which provides for presentation of Yellow Pages information in a more appealing format.
The invention has been described in language more or less specific as to structural and methodical features. It is to be understood, however, that the invention is not limited to the specific features shown and described, since the means herein disclosed comprise preferred forms of putting the invention into effect. The invention is, therefore, ciaimed in any of its forms or modifications within the proper scope of the appended claims.
Industrial Applicabili~y The invention has applicability in the fields of merch~nc~i7ing, advertizing~ and communication networks. The invention also has applicability in shipping and labelling.
For example~ one embodiment of the invention includes means communicating with the server 12 for automatically shipping a product purchased on-line by a user of a client 1 6a-h. In one embodiment, a user can make a purchase after virtually entering a store from one of the street scenes shown in FIGS. 7-lO; e.g., by clicking on a desired item (or selecting it frorn a list)~ and entering credit card information and shipping address inforrnation at the client when requested by the server. In this embodiment. the server is a secure server~ and at least the credit card information is encrypted while travelling from the client 16a-h to the ser~er SUBSTITUTE SHEET (RULE 26) W O 97/15889 PCTAEP9~/05060 12. The server is conntocte~ to an automated label maker. and electronically passes the shipping address to the label maker, where a shipping label is automaticall~ printed.
In one embodiment, the system further comprises an electronic credit card verifying ~p~dLIlS, of the type commonly found in restaurants and stores, in communication with the server. The credit card verifying m~chine is connected to a phone line and, when the server receives an order, the credit card verifying machine dials up and communicates with a credit card issuer to verify that a card nu nber is valid, and so as to receive an approval code for a transaction. In alternative embodiments, credit card verification takes place via a computer network. electronic funds transfer is employed, or a service such as Cybercash (TM) is employed.
SUBSTITUTE SHEEr (RllLE 26)
Claims (30)
1. A server (12) configured to communicate with a client (16a) that selectively connects to the server (12), the server (12) comprising:
a memory (30), and a database (52) defined in the memory (30), the database (52) including data about businesses, which data includes at least the names of respective businesses;
communication hardware providing for communication between the server (12) and the client (16a);
the server (12) being configured to communicate to the client (16a) an interface (88) for use in requesting a search of the database (52) in response to a client (16a) connecting to the server (12), and the server (12) being configured to generate a screen display in response to the client (16a) requesting a search of the database (52);
CHARACTERIZED IN THAT:
the generated screen display varies depending on the results of the search and includes graphics items arranged to provide the appearance of at least part of a commercial area;
at least some of the graphics items have the appearance of storefronts (98, 100.
102, 104, 106, 108);
respective graphics items are associated with respective businesses;
the screen display is navigable to reveal graphics items adjacent those that are displayed; and the selection of individual graphics items for inclusion in the screen display varies depending on the results of the search.
a memory (30), and a database (52) defined in the memory (30), the database (52) including data about businesses, which data includes at least the names of respective businesses;
communication hardware providing for communication between the server (12) and the client (16a);
the server (12) being configured to communicate to the client (16a) an interface (88) for use in requesting a search of the database (52) in response to a client (16a) connecting to the server (12), and the server (12) being configured to generate a screen display in response to the client (16a) requesting a search of the database (52);
CHARACTERIZED IN THAT:
the generated screen display varies depending on the results of the search and includes graphics items arranged to provide the appearance of at least part of a commercial area;
at least some of the graphics items have the appearance of storefronts (98, 100.
102, 104, 106, 108);
respective graphics items are associated with respective businesses;
the screen display is navigable to reveal graphics items adjacent those that are displayed; and the selection of individual graphics items for inclusion in the screen display varies depending on the results of the search.
2. A server (12) in accordance with claim 1 wherein the businesses are respectively classified in the database (52) as either belonging to a first classification, or a second classification, and wherein the screen display visually differentiates any second classification business which meet the criteria of the search from first classification businesses which meet the criteria of the search.
3. A server (12) in accordance with claim 1 wherein the data, in the database (52), about respective businesses further includes the address of the business.
4. A server (12) in accordance with claims 1, 2, or 3 wherein the data, in the database (52), about respective businesses further includes the phone number of the business.
5. A server (12) in accordance with Claim 1 wherein the data, in the database (52), about respective businesses further includes the goods or services provided by the business.
6. A server (12) in accordance with claims 1, 2, 3, or 5 wherein the appearance of the respective storefronts (98, 100, 102, 104, 106, 108) depends on the results of the search.
7. A server (12) in accordance with claims 1, 2, 3, or 5 wherein the graphics items are hyperlinked to respective web pages.
8. A server (12) in accordance with claims 1, 2, 3, or 5 wherein the interface (88) has the appearance of an elevator.
9. A server (12) in accordance with claims 1, 2, 3, or 5 wherein the server (12) generates a virtual reality scene (64) in response to the client (16a) requesting a search of the database (52), the virtual reality scene (64) defining the screen display.
10. A system comprising:
a server having a memory, and a database defined in the memory; and a client in communication with the server, the server communicating to the client an interface for use in requesting a search of the database, and the server having virtual reality means for generating a virtual reality scene comprising a space in which a user can navigate by zooming in, zooming out and turning around, the virtual reality scene varying depending on the results of the search.
a server having a memory, and a database defined in the memory; and a client in communication with the server, the server communicating to the client an interface for use in requesting a search of the database, and the server having virtual reality means for generating a virtual reality scene comprising a space in which a user can navigate by zooming in, zooming out and turning around, the virtual reality scene varying depending on the results of the search.
11. A system in accordance with claim 10 wherein the database comprises business names, phone numbers, and descriptions of products or services, for a plurality of businesses.
12. A system in accordance with claim 10 wherein the virtual reality scene is created using VRML.
13. A system in accordance with claim 10 wherein the server communicates with the client using TCP/IP.
14. A system in accordance with claim 10 wherein the client includes a web browser, and wherein the client accesses the server using the web browser.
15. A system in accordance with claim 10 wherein the client includes a web browser, and a virtual reality viewer, and wherein the virtual reality viewer is launched by the web browser when the client receives the virtual reality scene from the server.
16. A system in accordance in with claim 10 wherein the database comprises at least two classifications of entries describing businesses, the entries including a first classification including a predetermined minimum amount of data concerning a business, and a second classification including more data concerning the business than the first classification.
17. A system in accordance with claim 10 wherein the virtual reality scene generated by the server presents the appearance of a street including storefronts of businesses.
18. A system in accordance with claim 10 wherein the virtual reality scene generated by the server presents the appearance of a street including storefronts of businesses, and wherein the appearance of the storefronts depends on the results of the search.
19. A system in accordance with claim 10 wherein the database comprises at least two classifications of entries describing businesses, the entries including a first classification including a predetermined minimum amount of data concerning a business, and a second classification including more data concerning the business than the first classification, wherein the virtual reality scene generated by the server presents the appearance of a street including storefronts of businesses, wherein the appearance of the storefronts depends on the results of the search, and wherein the appearance of the storefronts comprises a first set of storefronts corresponding to the first classification of entries, and a second set of storefronts corresponding to the second classification of entries.
20. A system in accordance with claim 10 wherein the interface has the appearance of an elevator.
21. A system in accordance with claim 10 wherein the interface has the appearance of an elevator and is a virtual reality space.
22. A system in accordance with claim 10 wherein the interface has the appearance of an elevator, and wherein the elevator appears to move while the server performs a database search.
23. A server comprising:
a memory, and a database defined in the memory, the database including data about a first classification of businesses, which data respectively includes business name, address, phone number, and goods or services provided by the business, the database further including data about a second classification of businesses, which data respectively includes more data than is provided for each first classification business;
communication hardware providing for communication between the server and clients via TCP/IP;
the server communicating to the client an interface for use in requesting a search of the database in response to a client connecting to the server, and the server generating a virtual reality scene in response to the client requesting a search of the database, the virtual reality scene comprising a space in which a user can navigate by zooming in, zooming out and turning around, the virtual reality scene varying depending on the results of the search.
a memory, and a database defined in the memory, the database including data about a first classification of businesses, which data respectively includes business name, address, phone number, and goods or services provided by the business, the database further including data about a second classification of businesses, which data respectively includes more data than is provided for each first classification business;
communication hardware providing for communication between the server and clients via TCP/IP;
the server communicating to the client an interface for use in requesting a search of the database in response to a client connecting to the server, and the server generating a virtual reality scene in response to the client requesting a search of the database, the virtual reality scene comprising a space in which a user can navigate by zooming in, zooming out and turning around, the virtual reality scene varying depending on the results of the search.
24. A system in accordance with claim 23 wherein the virtual reality scene is created using VRML.
25. A system in accordance with claim 23 wherein the virtual reality scene includes information about businesses which meet criteria of the search, and wherein the virtual reality scene visually differentiates any second classification businesses which meet the criteria of the search from first classification businesses which meet the criteria of the search.
26. A system in accordance with claim 25 wherein the virtual reality scene generated by the server presents the appearance of a street including storefronts of businesses.
27. A system in accordance with claim 23 wherein the virtual reality scene generated by the server presents the appearance of a street including storefronts of businesses, and wherein the appearance of the storefronts depends on the results of the search.
28. A system in accordance with claim 23 wherein the interface has the appearance of an elevator.
29. A system in accordance with claim 23 wherein the interface has the appearance of an elevator and is a virtual reality space.
30 A system in accordance with claim 23 wherein the interface has the appearance of an elevator, and wherein the elevator appears to move while the server performs a database search.
Applications Claiming Priority (3)
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| US08/548,873 US5737533A (en) | 1995-10-26 | 1995-10-26 | System for generating a virtual reality scene in response to a database search |
| US08/548,873 | 1995-10-26 | ||
| PCT/EP1995/005060 WO1997015889A1 (en) | 1995-10-26 | 1995-12-15 | Yellow pages in cyberspace |
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| CA2235821A1 CA2235821A1 (en) | 1997-05-01 |
| CA2235821C true CA2235821C (en) | 2001-11-27 |
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| CA002235821A Expired - Fee Related CA2235821C (en) | 1995-10-26 | 1995-12-15 | Yellow pages in cyberspace |
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| EP (1) | EP0858635B1 (en) |
| AU (1) | AU698115B2 (en) |
| CA (1) | CA2235821C (en) |
| DE (1) | DE69515918T2 (en) |
| ES (1) | ES2146794T3 (en) |
| PT (1) | PT858635E (en) |
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- 1995-12-15 PT PT95942713T patent/PT858635E/en unknown
- 1995-12-15 ES ES95942713T patent/ES2146794T3/en not_active Expired - Lifetime
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- 1995-12-15 AU AU43883/96A patent/AU698115B2/en not_active Ceased
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| US6002853A (en) | 1999-12-14 |
| EP0858635B1 (en) | 2000-03-22 |
| DE69515918T2 (en) | 2000-10-26 |
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|---|---|---|---|
| EEER | Examination request | ||
| MKLA | Lapsed |
Effective date: 20151215 |