# US 5,351,190 A · Communication apparatus and method establishing a language dependent sort order search

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- Number: US 5,351,190 A
- Document ID: US5351190A
- Status: Granted
- Kind: A
- Application number: 07/774,244
- Filed: 1991-10-10
- Granted: 1994-09-27
- Earliest claimed: 1990-10-17
- Assignees: Canon Kabushiki Kaisha
- Inventors: Masaya Kondo
- Web page: https://patentgrep.com/patent/US5351190A

## CPC

- H04N 1/32037: {Automation of particular transmitter jobs, e.g. multi-address calling, auto-dialing}
- H04M 1/2748: by matching character strings
- H04N: PICTORIAL COMMUNICATION, e.g. TELEVISION
- H04M: TELEPHONIC COMMUNICATION (circuits for controlling other apparatus via a telephone cable and not involving telephone switching apparatus G08)

## Abstract

A communication apparatus comprises a memory for storing telephone numbers of a plurality of communication destinations together with destination data including character information such as abbreviations; a search unit for searching the destination data stored in the memory; a selection unit for selecting a language; and a set unit for setting an order of search for the destination data by the search unit in accordance with the language selected by the selection unit.

## Claims

### Claim 1

A search apparatus comprising:
first memory means for storing telephone numbers of a plurality of communication destinations together with destination data including character information such as a destination name;
second memory means for storing a plurality of separate orders of search characters, each separate order corresponding to a different one of a plurality of languages;
selection means for selecting one of the plurality of languages; and
search means for searching the destination data stored in said first memory in accordance with the order of search characters stored in said second memory means regarding the one of the plurality of languages selected by said selection means.

### Claim 2 (depends on 1)

A search apparatus according to claim 1 wherein said search means arranges the destination data stored in advance and destination data newly stored in accordance with the selected language.

### Claim 3

A search apparatus comprising:
first memory means for storing data of a plurality of communication destinations including character information;
second memory means for storing a plurality of separate orders of search characters, each separate order corresponding to a different one of a plurality of languages;
selection means for selecting one of the plurality of languages; and
search means for searching the plurality of communication destinations stored in said first memory means in accordance with the order of search characters stored in said second memory means regarding the selected one of the plurality of languages.

### Claim 4 (depends on 3)

A search apparatus according to claim 3 wherein said search means arranges the communication destinations stored in advance and the communication destinations newly stored.

### Claim 5

A search apparatus having an electronic book function with registered character information data, comprising:
memory means for storing a plurality of separate orders of search characters, each separate order corresponding to a different one of a plurality of languages;
selection means for selecting one of the plurality of languages; and
search means for searching the registered character information in accordance with the order of search characters stored in the memory means regarding the one of the plurality of languages selected by said selection means.

### Claim 6 (depends on 5)

A search apparatus according to claim 5 wherein said search means arranges the character information registered in advance and newly stored character information.

### Claim 7

A method of searching a plurality of registered data including character information, comprising the steps of:
storing a plurality of separate orders of search characters, each separate order corresponding to a different one of a plurality of languages;
selecting one of the plurality of languages; and
searching the plurality of registered data in accordance with the order of search characters regarding the selected one of the plurality of languages.

### Claim 8 (depends on 7)

A method according to claim 7, wherein in said searching step the plurality of data registered in advance and newly added data are arranged.

### Claim 9 (depends on 7)

A method according to claim 7, wherein the plurality of registered data includes communication destination data.