Session initiation protocol message processing

An Internet telephony system for providing information to a user, comprising:

• a memory;
• and
• a processor communicatively coupled to the memory, wherein the Internet telephone system performs a method comprising:
• receiving from the user, by an Interactive Voice Response, IVR, system, a message including a Session Initiation Protocol, SIP, header;
• identifying, by the IVR system, using a string pattern matching operation, a stored regular expression pattern which matches a character string, of a set of possible character strings to which the stored regular expression matches, in a user part of the SIP message header, one portion of the character string identifying an IVR application mapped to the stored pattern, and a further portion of the character string identifying one or more variables for use by the application wherein the SIP message header comprises a Uniform Resource Identifier (URI), the URI comprising the character string in the user part of the SIP message header, and wherein the user need not know a computer URI;
• identifying, by the application, information by applying the values of the one or more variables;
• and
• communicating, by the IVR system, the information to the user.

A computer program product for providing information to a user in an Internet telephony environment, the computer program product comprising:

• a computer readable storage medium having a computer readable program stored therein, wherein the computer readable program, when executed on a computing device, causes the computing device to:
• receive from the user, by an Interactive Voice Response, IVR, system, a message including a Session Initiation Protocol, SIP, header;
• identify, by the IVR system, using a string pattern matching operation, a stored regular expression pattern which matches a character string, of a set of possible character strings to which the stored regular expression matches, in a user part of the SIP message header, one portion of the character string identifying an IVR application mapped to the stored pattern, and a further portion of the character string identifying one or more variables for use by the application wherein the SIP message header comprises a Uniform Resource Identifier (URI), the URI comprising the character string in the user part of the SIP message header, and wherein the user need not know a computer URI;
• identify, by the application, information by applying the values of the one or more variables;
• and
• communicate, by the IVR system, the information to the user.