Suggesting a discussion group based on indexing of the posts within that discussion group

• US 10,257,155 B2
• Filed: 03/10/2016
• Issued: 04/09/2019
• Est. Priority Date: 07/30/2004
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Inventors: Canning, Benjamin, Kikkert, Sabrina, Anderson, Stephen N.
• Primary Examiner(s): Greene, Joseph L
• Application Number:
  US15/067,130
• Publication Number:
  US 20160197879A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,125 Days
• Field of Search: 709206
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 51/04 Real-time or near real-time messaging, e.g. instant messaging [IM]
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 51/216 Handling conversation history, e.g. grouping of messages in sessions or threads
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 61/4594 Address books, i.e. directories containing contact information about correspondents telephone directories in user terminals H04M1/27453
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/10 in which an application is distributed across nodes in the network software deployment G06F8/60; multiprogramming arrangements G06F9/46
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/60 Scheduling or organising the servicing of application requests, e.g. requests for application data transmissions using the analysis and optimisation of the required network resources admission control or resource allocation H04L47/70

Abstract

A system and corresponding methods for recommending a discussion group as an appropriate place to post a message are provided. In one embodiment, the system searches a plurality of existing posts to identify the posts that are similar to a subject of a user'"'"'s message. The system identifies the discussion groups that contain the identified posts and selects one of the identified discussion groups to recommend as an appropriate discussion group to post the user'"'"'s message.

Claims

1. A method performed by a computing system for providing to a user contact information of a member of a community, the method comprising:

receiving from the user a request for contact information of a member who is recommended to respond to a message of the user;

receiving from the user a subject of the message;

searching a plurality of posts of the community to identify one or more posts that are similar to the received subject;

identifying a member of the community who posted at least one of the identified posts;

retrieving contact information of the identified member; and

sending to the user the retrieved contact information.

2. The method of claim 1 wherein the message is a question.

3. The method of claim 1 wherein multiple posts are identified that were posted by multiple members and wherein the identifying of the member identifies the member with the most identified posts that are answers.

4. The method of claim 1 wherein an identified post answers a question post.

5. The method of claim 1 wherein the identified member is a preferred member of the community.

6. The method of claim 1 wherein the identifying identifies a member who posted at least a threshold number of posts that are similar to the received subject.

7. The method of claim 1 further comprising sending to the user profile information for the identified member.

8. The method of claim 7 wherein the profile information includes an indication of a reputation of the identified member.

9. The method of claim 1 wherein the contact information includes an electronic mail address of the identified member so that the user can send the message as an electronic mail message to the identified member.

10. The method of claim 1 wherein the searching is performed by a search engine.

11. A computing system for recommending to a user a member of a community to respond to a message of the user, the computing system comprising:

a central processing unit; and

a memory storing instructions that when executed by the central processing unit cause computing system to;

receive from the user a subject of the message;

identify preferred members of the community who have participated in discussions relating to the subject of the message;

select an identified preferred member;

retrieve contact information of the selected preferred member; and

send to the user the retrieved contact information.

12. The computing system of claim 11 wherein the message is a question.

13. The computing system of claim 11 wherein the instructions further cause the computing system to maintain a list of subjects of discussions that preferred members participate in.

14. The computing system of claim 11 wherein the instructions, that cause the computing system to select an identified preferred member, select a preferred identified member based on number of posts of the identified preferred member that relate to the subject.

15. The computing system of claim 11 wherein the instructions further cause the computing system to send to the user profile information for the selected preferred member.

16. The computing system of claim 15 wherein the profile information includes an indication of a reputation of the selected preferred member.

17. The computing system of claim 11 wherein the contact information includes an electronic mail address of the selected preferred member so that the user can send the message as an electronic mail message to the select preferred member.

18. A memory that does not consist of a signal storing instructions that when executed by a computing system provide to a user contact information of a member of a community, the instructions comprising instructions that:

receive from the user a subject;

identify one or more posts of members of the community that are related to the received subject;

identify a member of the community who posted at least one of the identified posts; and

send to the user contact information of the identified member

wherein multiple posts are identified that were posted by multiple members and wherein the identified member is the member with the most posts that are answers.