Inventors:
Kurt E. Partridge - Palo Alto CA, US
Robert R. Price - Palo Alto CA, US
Nicolas B. Ducheneaut - Sunnyvale CA, US
Assignee:
Palo Alto Research Center Incorporated - Palo Alto CA
International Classification:
G06F 15/16
US Classification:
709217, 709203, 707767, 706 21, 706 25, 706 45
Abstract:
A system facilitates automatically determining the hypothetical context information or the distribution of hypothetical contexts. During operation, the system receives a request from a user for one or more recommendations. The system also receives a current context substantially associated with the request. The system then determines a hypothetical context for the request, wherein the hypothetical context may be determined by considering several sources of information, including but not limited to the current context, past contexts, and relationships between the current context and past contexts. Next, the system determines one or more recommendations for the user based on the hypothetical context. Finally, the system returns the one or more recommendations to the user.