Aggregating content from different content sources at a cloud service

• US 10,536,504 B2
• Filed: 01/16/2018
• Issued: 01/14/2020
• Est. Priority Date: 06/24/2013
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Inventors: Lecroy, Jonathan, Brar, Gurashish, Yap, Joe, Wang, Victor, Alev, Umut, Kanamaluru, Vamsi, Gavrilov, Dmitri, Roth, Tali, Desai, Aditi, Borysenko, Mike, Bernstein, Ethan, Tousignant, Patrick, Garcia, Fernando
• Primary Examiner(s): Mirza, Adnan M
• Application Number:
  US15/872,014
• Publication Number:
  US 20180139264A1
• Time in Patent Office: 728 Days
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/107 Computer-aided management of electronic mailing [e-mailing]
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/109 Time management, e.g. calendars, reminders, meetings or time accounting
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/1093 Calendar-based scheduling for persons or groups
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 51/216 Handling conversation history, e.g. grouping of messages in sessions or threads
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 65/40 Support for services or applications
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 65/403 Arrangements for multi-party communication, e.g. for conferences data switching systems for conference H04L12/18; arrangements for connecting several subscribers to a common circuit, i.e. affording conference facilities H04M3/56; television conferencing systems H04N7/15
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/02 based on web technology, e.g. hypertext transfer protocol [HTTP]
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/1095 Replication or mirroring of data, e.g. scheduling or transport for data synchronisation between network nodes

Abstract

A cloud service stores and aggregates content that is obtained from different content sources using different protocols. For example, the content may include electronic messages, calendar information, contacts, social network content, feed data, search results, and the like. The cloud service aggregates content for each user based on the user'"'"'s configuration settings. The cloud service may perform processing on the aggregated content before it is delivered and displayed to the user on the client device. For example, one or more views may be generated and stored by the cloud service before the view is requested from the client. Changes made to the aggregated content on the client may be synchronized with the content source. Searches may be made across all or a portion of the different content sources that are aggregated for a user.

Claims

1. A system, comprising:

a processor and memory;

an operating environment executing using the processor; and

a content manager that is configured to perform actions comprising;

aggregating, by a cloud service, first content from a first provider and second content from a second provider to generate aggregated content;

using a delivery protocol to deliver at least a part of the aggregated content to a client computing device;

receiving, from the client computing device, a change to the aggregated content, wherein the change relates to at least the first content or the second content;

storing the change at the cloud service;

when the change relates to the first content, communicating the change to the first provider; and

when the change relates to the second content, communicating the change to the second provider.

2. The system of claim 1, wherein aggregating the first content and the second content comprises obtaining at least one of:

electronic messages;

calendar information;

or

contact information associated with a user of the client computing device.

3. The system of claim 1, wherein aggregating the first content and the second content comprises obtaining at least one of:

social network content obtained from a social network;

search results obtained from a search engine;

or

feed content.

4. The system of claim 1, wherein aggregating the first content and the second content comprises obtaining the first content from the first provider using a first protocol and obtaining the second content from the second provider using a second protocol.

5. The system of claim 4, wherein the first protocol and the second protocol are different.

6. The system of claim 1, wherein the first provider and the second provider are the same, wherein the first content is associated with a first user and the second content is associated with a second user, and wherein the first user and the second user are different.

7. The system of claim 1, wherein the actions further comprise:

receiving an indication of a change to the first content from the first provider;

updating the aggregated content based on the change; and

providing an indication of the change to the client computing device.

8. A method for aggregating content at a cloud service, comprising:

generating aggregated content based on first content from a first provider and second content from a second provider;

storing the aggregated content at the cloud service, wherein the aggregated content is associated with a user;

using a delivery protocol to deliver at least a part of the aggregated content to a client computing device of the user;

receiving, from the client computing device, a change to the aggregated content, wherein the change relates to at least the first content or the second content;

storing the change at the cloud service;

when the change relates to the first content, communicating the change to the first provider; and

when the change relates to the second content, communicating the change to the second provider.

9. The method of claim 8, wherein the first content and the second content each comprise at least one of:

an electronic message;

calendar information;

or

contact information associated with the user of the client computing device.

10. The method of claim 8, wherein generating the aggregated content comprises obtaining at least one of:

social network content obtained from a social network;

search results obtained from a search engine;

or

feed content.

11. The method of claim 8, wherein generating the aggregated content comprises obtaining the first content from the first provider using a first protocol and obtaining the second content from the second provider using a second protocol.

12. The method of claim 11, wherein the first protocol and the second protocol are different.

13. The method of claim 8, wherein the first provider and the second provider are the same, wherein the first content is associated with a first user and the second content is associated with a second user, and wherein the first user and the second user are different.

14. The method of claim 8, wherein the actions further comprise:

receiving an indication of a change to the first content from the first provider;

updating, at the cloud service, the aggregated content based on the change; and

providing an indication of the change to the client computing device.

15. A method for aggregating content at a cloud service, comprising:

aggregating, by a cloud service, first content from a first provider and second content from a second provider to generate aggregated content;

using a delivery protocol to deliver at least a part of the aggregated content to a client computing device;

receiving, from the client computing device, a change to the aggregated content, wherein the change relates to at least the first content or the second content;

storing the change at the cloud service;

when the change relates to the first content, communicating the change to the first provider; and

when the change relates to the second content, communicating the change to the second provider.

16. The method of claim 15, wherein aggregating the first content and the second content comprises obtaining at least one of:

electronic messages;

calendar information;

or

contact information associated with a user of the client computing device.

17. The method of claim 15, wherein aggregating the first content and the second content comprises obtaining at least one of:

social network content obtained from a social network;

search results obtained from a search engine;

or

feed content.

18. The method of claim 15, wherein aggregating the first content and the second content comprises obtaining the first content from the first provider using a first protocol and obtaining the second content from the second provider using a second protocol, and wherein the first protocol and the second protocol are different.

19. The method of claim 15, wherein the first provider and the second provider are the same, wherein the first content is associated with a first user and the second content is associated with a second user, and wherein the first user and the second user are different.

20. The method of claim 15, wherein the actions further comprise:

receiving an indication of a change to the first content from the first provider;

updating the aggregated content based on the change; and

providing an indication of the change to the client computing device.