Method and system for manually maintaining item authority

Abstract

An item authority system is provided. The item authority system uses rules to identify item definitions that match or potentially match an item description. When a unique match is found, then the item authority system may indicate that the item description describes the same item as the item definition. If multiple matches or only potential matches are identified, then the item authority system may allow a user to manually indicate which item definition matches.

1 . A method in a computer system for matching item descriptions to item definitions, the method comprising:
 receiving an indication of item definitions that possibly match an item description;   displaying an indication of attributes of the item description and the possibly matching item definitions;   receiving from a user a selection of one of the possibly matching item definitions; and   designating that the selected item definition matches the item description.   
     
     
         2 . The method of  claim 1  wherein the displaying includes displaying a similarity score for each item definition indicating its similarity to the item description. 
     
     
         3 . The method of  claim 1  wherein the possibly matching item definitions include ambiguously matching item definitions. 
     
     
         4 . The method of  claim 1  wherein the possibly matching item definitions include potentially matching item definitions. 
     
     
         5 . The method of  claim 1  wherein the item definitions are identified as possibly matching the item description based on rules that specify how to generate a similarity score based on similarity between the item definition and an item description. 
     
     
         6 . The method of  claim 5  wherein an item definition and an item description have attributes with values and wherein a rule indicates how to generate a similarity score based on similarity between the values of the attributes of the item definition and the item description. 
     
     
         7 . The method of  claim 5  wherein a rule includes one or more filters, each filter specifying how to generate a filter similarity score, wherein the similarity score for an item definition is the filter similarity score that indicates the item definition is most similar to the item description. 
     
     
         8 . The method of  claim 7  wherein an item definition and an item description have attributes with values and wherein a filter specifies an attribute scoring technique for one or more attributes that generates an attribute similarity score for that attribute and specifies how to combine the generated attribute similarity scores to generate a filter similarity score. 
     
     
         9 . The method of  claim 7  wherein a filter indicates a threshold filter similarity score wherein, when the filter similarity score generated in accordance with the filter meets the threshold filter similarity score, the item definition matches the item description. 
     
     
         10 . The method of  claim 5  wherein a rule includes one or more filters, each filter specifying how to identify item definitions that possibly match the item description. 
     
     
         11 . The method of  claim 1  including providing a potentially matching threshold similarity score for an item definition to be considered as potentially matching the item description. 
     
     
         12 . The method of  claim 1  wherein when more than one item definition has a similarity score that indicates it is a match, identifying those item definitions as ambiguously matching item definitions. 
     
     
         13 . The method of  claim 1  wherein the item definitions that possibly match an item description have similarity scores and discarding item definitions whose similarity score does not pass a resolution similarity score. 
     
     
         14 . A computer system for manually matching item definitions to item descriptions, comprising:
 an item resolution component that allows a user to manually match possibly matching item definitions to item descriptions, the item definitions being automatically identified as possibly matching; and   a match component that allows unmatched item descriptions representing items in inventory to be manually matched to item definitions.   
     
     
         15 . The computer system of  claim 14  including a review component that allows the automatic matching of item definitions to item descriptions to be reviewed by a user. 
     
     
         16 . The computer system of  claim 14  wherein the match component allows new item definitions to be manually defined based on unmatched item descriptions. 
     
     
         17 . The computer system of  claim 14  wherein the match component allows duplicate item definitions to be merged into a single item definition. 
     
     
         18 . The computer system of  claim 14  including a data structure that includes the identifications of possibly matching item definitions for item descriptions and similarity scores for the item definitions. 
     
     
         19 . The computer system of  claim 14  wherein the match component calculates a similarity score representing the similarity between an item definition and an item description. 
     
     
         20 . The computer system of  claim 19  wherein the similarity scores are calculated based on a rule that specifies one or more scoring metrics. 
     
     
         21 .- 42 . (canceled)