The objective of the present invention is to provide a document classification apparatus, which utilizes extracted keywords from the bodies of documents to classify the documents. The document classification apparatus is mainly made up of the following apparatus: A 5W1H keyword extraction apparatus that extracts keywords with 5W1H attributes in an entered document. The classification key setting apparatus that sets the 5W1H attributes entered by a user as classification keys. The classification item selection apparatus that selects keywords as classification items from the extracted keywords with the 5W1H attributes set as the classification keys. The document distribution apparatus that distributes a document including the previously selected classification items with the 5W1H attributes set as classification keys, into a cell corresponding to the classification items. Enabling documents to be classified from meaningful 5W1H viewpoints.

An switching apparatus including an information sending unit and an information receiving unit. The information sending unit has a selecting block for selecting an information item to be sent to another information system from among information items processed in an information processing system, a specifying block for specifying the information item selected by the selecting block as information to be sent to another information processing system, an extracting block for extracting the information item specified by the specifying block from the information items processed in the information processing system, and a sending block for sending the information item extracted by the extracting block to a predetermined communication system as information to be sent to another information processing system. The information receiving unit has a receiving block for receiving an information item transmitted from the predetermined communication system as information to be sent from another information processing system to the information processing system, and an information supply block for supplying the information item received by the receiving block to the information processing system.

In order to operate a plurality of utilities, the utilities are interconnected via a communication path. Each utility has a control device for controlling the utility and a memory for storing information factors which are used by the corresponding control device. The information factors corresponding to all the utilities are investigated by an extraction device to determine which are common to the utilities and which are related. Where the common information factors are identified, they are passed by the communication path to the memories of all the utilities. Similarly, when related information factors are found, a calculating device calculates common information which is also passed via the communication path to the memories of all the utilities. In this way, the utilities may operate more efficiently than when they are operated on a stand-alone basis. The investigation of the information factors, and the calculating of common information from related information factors may be distributed among the utilities or carried out by a common control device. The utilities may be electric power supply systems, district heating and cooling systems, sewage disposal systems, waste recovery systems, etc.

An information processing system has first and second electronic sub-systems, and control means for controlling the sub-systems. At least the first sub-system has a software representation registered with the control means. The control means changes a state of the first sub-system through interacting with the software representation. The first and second sub-systems are also capable of interacting directly with one another without the control means being involved. To avoid conflicts, at least the first sub-system is capable of de-registering with the control means so as to functionally disable its software representation at the control means.

A system configuration evaluation/proposal support method of supporting the effect evaluation of a support system for enhancing the business processing ability of a human and a system configuration proposal suitable to a business process, and a tool for the method are provided in the following manner. Data of a functional process model expressing a business process on a basic function element unit of information processing, a system configuration candidate constructed by a combination of an information system resource and a human resource, the degree of relationship between a functional process item and a related functional item provided by the system configuration candidate, the degree of importance of the functional process item, the degree of functional sufficiency of the provided functional item, and the degree of relationship of both items is defined. An operation for evaluating the functional support suitability of the system configuration candidate is executed by a mapping function calculation. A suitability analysis process, an analysis/evaluation result display process, and proposed system updating determination are performed.