receiving the input data comprising a search string having a plurality of elements, at least some of the elements forming part of an ideogrammatic writing system;

converting a subset of the plurality of elements to a set of terms using at least one method selected from the group consisting of polylogogrammatic semantic disambiguation, hanzee acronym expansion, kanji acronym expansion, and business word recognition;

wherein the converting step comprises normalizing traditional and simple versions of the ideogrammatic writing system;

generating a plurality of keys from the set of terms;

determining from the stored data (a) optimization of said plurality of keys, thus yielding optimized keys, and (b) candidates that share a commonality with said optimized keys, thus yielding key intersections and a quantity for said key intersections; generating a cost function for said key intersections;

prioritizing said key intersections according to said cost function, thus yielding cost-prioritized key intersections;

retrieving match candidates in order of said cost-prioritized key intersections, and bounded by a pre-determined threshold and said quantity;

wherein the retrieving step further comprises generating a matchgrade, a confidence code, and a match data profile for each match candidate based on a degree of match; and

selecting a best match from the match candidates.