Constrained search is a useful technique for dealing with feature correspondence problems frequently encountered in machine vision. In this paper,an indexing scheme, inspired by the Dewey decimal notation, is proposed forsimplifying the implementation of the search algorithm. This scheme alsoenables the algorithm to be easily realized in hardware in view that the algorithm characterized by the scheme will behave like a digital counter. Throughanalyzing the complexity of the search algorithm, a process, that can be usedto select a robust subset of features and constraints for the purpose of objectrecognition, is presented. Experiments demonstrate the feasibilities of boththe algorithm and the process.