MECHANISMS FOR EFFICIENT AUTOCOMPLETION IN XML SEARCH APPLICATIONS

Mechanisms are described for providing auto-completion capability in a user interface that allows users to search for XML tags and data in a collection of XML documents. A user searching for data in XML documents might not be aware of the entire structure of the data. A path context may be specified for narrowing the search to a particular set of nodes within the documents in the collection. When the user is in the process of typing in an XML tag name, but prior to submitting the tag name to the search engine, the user interface presents an ordered list of completed XML tags that match the prefix typed by the user. The order of the tags in the list reflects the frequency of the completed tags found within the specified path context of the collection of documents. Likewise, when the user is in the process of typing a string of text to be searched for within the value of XML nodes in the set of documents, but prior to submitting the test string to the search engine, the user interface presents an ordered list of completed text strings that match the partially specified text, where the order of the completed text strings reflects their frequency within the specified path context in the collection of documents.