US 6,977,993 B2Granted

Integrated telephone call and context notification mechanism

AssigneeMicrosoft Corporation

InventorsBryan T. Starbuck, Deana R. Fuller, Martijn E. Van Tilburg

Life of this patent

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Abstract

A mechanism for placing a telephone call while at the same time communicating context (e.g., subject, importance and/or nature) of the telephone call. The caller uses a mechanism on a user interface to instruct a caller computing system to place a telephone call to a callee computing system. Using the same user interface, the caller also identifies some contextual information for the telephone call such as, for example, the subject, importance and/or nature of the telephone call. The caller computing system then constructs a call invitation data structure that includes both an invitation to the callee to engage in a telephone conversation and the user-entered identification of the context of the telephone call. Upon receiving the call invitation data structure, the callee computing system reads the identification of the context of the telephone call, and then takes appropriate action based on the context for the telephone call.

Claims9

Dependent claims

In a network capable of communicating a telephone conversation between a caller computing system and a callee computing system, a method for the caller and callee computing system to communicate context for the telephone call, the method comprising the following:

an act of the caller computer system receiving an instruction to place a telephone call to the callee computing system;
an act of the caller computing system receiving a user-entered identification of a context for the telephone call;
an act of the caller computing system constructing a call invitation data structure that includes both an invitation to the callee to engage in a telephone conversation and the user-entered identification of the context of the telephone call;
an act of the caller computing system transmitting the call invitation data structure to be transmitted to the callee computing system;
an act of the callee computing system receiving the call invitation data structure;
an act of the callee computing system reading the identification of the context of the telephone call from the call invitation data structure;
and
an act of permitting a user to define at the callee computing system one or more rules for causing the callee computing system automatically to take one or more actions in response to the identification of the context of the telephone call from the call invitation data structure;
and
an act of the callee computing system automatically taking one or more actions depending on the context of the telephone call and based on the one or more rules.

7 more elements

A computer program product for use in a network capable of communicating a telephone conversation between a caller computing system and a callee computing system, the computer program product for implementing a method for the callee computing system to take action in response to receiving a telephone call depending on a communicated context for the received telephone call, the computer program product comprising one or more computer-readable media having thereon computer-executable instructions that, when executed by one or more processors of the callee computing system, cause the callee computing system to perform the method, the method comprising the following:

an act of detecting receipt of a call invitation data structure that includes both an invitation to the callee to engage in a telephone conversation and an identification of a context of the telephone call;
an act of reading the identification of the context of the telephone call from the call invitation data structure;
an act of causing a user interface to be displayed on the callee computing system, the user interface including a display of the identification of the context of the telephone call from the call invitation data structure, a mechanism for accepting the received call, and a mechanism for rejecting the received call;
an act of permitting a user to define one or more rules for causing the callee computing system automatically to take one or more actions in response to the identification of the context of the telephone call from the call invitation data structure;
and
an act of the callee computing system automatically taking one or more actions depending on the context of the telephone call and based on the one or more rules, wherein the one or more rules are based on one or more criteria selected from a group consisting of an anticipated subject of the conversation, an estimated importance of the conversation, an indication of whether the telephone conversation is personal or work-related, and one or more user defined time periods.

3 more elements

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.

Facts

Application: 10/835,823Filed 30 Apr 2004
Published: US 2005/0243982 A13 Nov 2005
Granted: 20 Dec 2005
Term ends: Not estimatedThe source records don’t support an estimate.

Classification15 codes

H04M 1/663
With means for preventing unauthorised or fraudulent calling: preventing unauthorised calls to a telephone set
H04M 1/2478
Telephone sets including user guidance or feature selection means facilitating their use: telephone terminals specially adapted for non-voice…
H04M 1/575
Arrangements for indicating or recording the number of the calling subscriber at the called subscriber's set: means for retrieving and displaying…
H04M 1/72454
With means for adapting the functionality of the device according to specific conditions: according to context-related or environment-related…