Real time notification of activities that occur in a web-based collaboration environment

• US 10,554,426 B2
• Filed: 06/03/2011
• Issued: 02/04/2020
• Est. Priority Date: 01/20/2011
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Box Incorporated
• Original Assignee: Box Incorporated
• Inventors: Ghods, Sam, Goldberg, Arnold, Jourda, Florian, Lee, David T., Mand, Arshdeep
• Primary Examiner(s): Dollinger, Tonia L
• Assistant Examiner(s): Cooney, Adam A
• Application Number:
  US13/152,982
• Publication Number:
  US 20120192086A1
• Time in Patent Office: 3,168 Days
• Field of Search: 709204-206
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/10 Office automation; Time management
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 12/1813 for computer conferences, e.g. chat rooms instant messaging H04L51/04; protocols for multimedia communication H04L65/1101; arrangements for multi-party communication H04L65/403; telephonic conference arrangements H04M3/56; television conference systems H04N7/15
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 12/1859 adapted to provide push services, e.g. data channels
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 63/02 for separating internal from external traffic, e.g. firewalls
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/535 Tracking the activity of the user network monitoring arrangements H04L43/00; recording of computer activity G06F11/34
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/55 Push-based network services

Abstract

Systems and methods of real time notification of activities that occur in a web-based collaboration environment are disclosed. In one aspect, embodiments of the present disclosure include a method, which may be implemented on a system, for selecting a recipient of a notification an activity according to criteria determined based on a workspace in which the activity was performed in the online collaboration platform and/or sending the notification of the activity to the recipient such that the recipient is notified in real time or near real time to when the activity occurred.

Claims

1. A computer-implemented method of notifying recipient collaborators of activities occurring in an online collaboration platform, the method comprising:

selecting, by a processor of a web server hosting the online collaboration platform, a recipient collaborator for notification of an activity occurring on an item in a workspace of the online collaboration platform, wherein the selection is made according to criteria determined based on the workspace in which the activity occurred in the online collaboration platform, and wherein the online collaboration platform is configured to include multiple workspaces, each workspace configured to have multiple items on which activities can be performed by a set of collaborators associated with the workspace;

sending the notification of the activity to the recipient collaborator based on a relevance of the notification to the recipient collaborator, wherein the relevance is determined based, at least in part, on a first set of activities performed by the recipient collaborator in the online collaboration platform within a first duration before the activity occurred on the item and a second set of activities performed by the recipient collaborator in a second duration before the activity occurred on the item, the second duration being greater than the first duration; and

presenting the notification via a user interface of the online collaboration platform to the recipient collaborator, wherein the notification is presented via the user interface among multiple notifications in an order, wherein the presenting includes;

computing a priority rating of each of the notifications based on a pre-defined priority rating explicitly assigned by the recipient collaborator to a type of activity associated with each of the notifications or a pre-defined priority rating explicitly assigned by the recipient collaborator to a user related to the activity,

selecting the notifications whose priority rating exceeds a specified threshold to generate selected notifications,

determining the order of the selected notifications based on the priority rating, and

automatically adjusting, by the online collaboration platform, the amount of information to be displayed in the notification.

2. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, further comprising a notification server implementing a push technology, wherein the notification is sent by the notification server.

3. The computer-implemented method of claim 2, wherein the push technology is implemented using one or more of long polls or HTTP streaming.

4. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein the workspace is associated with an enterprise and the criteria specifies that the recipient collaborator that is selected is an employee of the enterprise.

5. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein, the criteria is determined based on permissions or roles configured for the workspace.

6. The computer-implemented method of claim 5, wherein the permissions or roles for the workspace are configured by a creator or administrative user of the workspace.

7. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein the criteria is determined based on permissions or roles associated with the item on which the activity occurred.

8. The computer-implemented method of claim 7, wherein the permissions or roles associated with the item are set by, a creator of the item or an administrative user of the workspace.

9. The computer-implemented method of claim 7, wherein the workspace includes multiple items each having individually configurable permissions or roles.

10. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein the notification is presented via the user interface to the recipient collaborator when the recipient collaborator accesses one or more of the workspace or a different workspace.

11. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein the notification is presented via the user interface among other notifications in an order based on a rule that is configurable by the recipient collaborator.

12. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein the notification is presented via the user interface among other notifications based on a chronological order.

13. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein the relevance of the notification to the recipient collaborator includes one or more of, contextual and temporal parameters.

14. The computer-implemented method of claim 13, wherein the contextual parameters provide metrics indicating the recipient collaborator'"'"'s current activity in the online collaboration platform.

15. The computer-implemented method of claim 13, wherein the temporal parameters provide metrics indicating the recipient collaborator'"'"'s activities in the online collaboration platform over a period of time.

16. The computer-implemented method of claim 13, wherein the temporal parameters indicate a frequency with which the recipient collaborator has accessed the item or a frequency with which the recipient collaborator has accessed the workspace in which the activity was performed.

17. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein automatically adjusting the amount of information to be displayed in the notification includes automatically adjusting the amount of information based on characteristics of a computing device on which the notification is presented.

18. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein automatically adjusting the amount of information to be displayed in the notification includes automatically adjusting the amount of information based on a resource availability in a computing device on which the notification is presented, or a resource availability in of a network using which the online collaboration platform presents the notification to the computing device.

19. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein the type of activity associated with each of the notifications comprises one of adding the item to the workspace, deleting the item from the workspace, modifying the item in the workspace, adding a collaborator to the workspace, deleting a collaborator from the workspace, or modifying a collaborator within the workspace.

20. A computer-implemented method of providing notifications of activities occurring in a web-based collaboration environment, the method, comprising:

detecting an activity performed by a user on an item associated with a workspace in the web-based collaboration environment, wherein the web-based collaboration environment is configured to include multiple workspaces each configured to have multiple items on which activities can be performed by a set of users associated with the workspace;

providing a notification of the activity performed by the user to another user of the set of users associated with the workspace based on a relevance of the notification to the another user, wherein the relevance is determined based, at least in part, on whether the another user performed a first set of activities on the item in the workspace within a first duration before the activity occurred on the item and a second set of activities on the item within a second duration before the activity occurred on the item, the second duration being greater than the first duration, wherein the another user meets a criteria; and

presenting the notification via a user interface of the web-based collaboration environment to the another user, wherein the notification is presented via the user interface among multiple notifications in an order, wherein the presenting includes;

computing a priority rating of each of the notifications based on a pre-defined priority rating explicitly assigned by the recipient collaborator to a type of activity associated with each of the notifications or a pre-defined priority rating explicitly assigned by the recipient collaborator to a user related to the activity and wherein the type of activity associated with each of the notifications comprises one of adding the item to the workspace, deleting the item from the workspace, modifying the item in the workspace, adding a collaborator to the workspace, deleting a collaborator from the workspace, or modifying a collaborator within the workspace,

selecting the notifications whose priority rating exceeds a specified threshold to generate selected notifications,

determining the order of the selected notifications based on the priority rating, and

automatically adjusting, by the web-based collaboration

environment, the amount of information to be displayed in the notification.

21. The computer-implemented method of claim 20, wherein providing the notification comprises depicting the notification through a web accessible application used by the another user to access the web-based collaboration environment.

22. The computer-implemented method of claim 20, wherein providing the notification comprises providing the notification to the another user if the another user is online in the web-based collaboration environment.

23. The computer-implemented method of claim 20, wherein providing the notification comprises sending the notification to the another user via one or more of email, SMS or an RSS feed.

24. The computer-implemented method of claim 20, further comprising deploying the web-based collaboration platform in an enterprise setting wherein the criteria specifies that the another user be an employee of the enterprise in which the web-based collaboration environment is deployed.

25. The computer-implemented method of claim 20, wherein the activity includes one or more of, adding, deleting, or modifying collaborators in the workspace.

26. The computer-implemented method of claim 20, wherein the activity is performed on the item in the workspace and includes one or more of, adding, deleting, modifying the item in the workspace, downloading or uploading of the item in the workspace, or deletion of editing of the item in the workspace.

27. The computer-implemented method of claim 20, wherein the activity includes creating a discussion topic in the workspace.

28. The computer-implemented method of claim 20, wherein the activity is performed in relation to a discussion topic in the workspace.

29. The computer-implemented method of claim 20, wherein the activity includes, one or more of, adding a response to a discussion topic, deleting a response a discussion topic, or editing a response a discussion topic in the workspace.

30. The computer-implemented method of claim 20, wherein the activity includes, one or more of, identifying, selecting, adding, deleting, and modifying a tag in the item.

31. The computer-implemented method of claim 20, wherein the activity includes, one or more of, preview of the item or comment of the item.

32. The computer-implemented method of claim 20, wherein the activity includes, one or more of, setting or changing permissions of the item, sharing the item, or emailing a link to the item.

33. The computer-implemented method of claim 32, wherein the sharing of the item includes, embedding a link to the item on another website.

34. A computer-implemented method of notification of activities that occur in a web-based collaboration environment, the method, comprising:

detecting a triggering activity occurring on an item in a workspace of the web-based collaboration environment;

selecting a user for notification of the triggering activity based, at least in part, on the workspace in which the activity occurred, wherein the user is a collaborator in the web-based collaboration environment;

providing a notification of the triggering activity to the user in the web-based collaboration environment; and

presenting the notification in a feed stream among other notifications through a user interface of the web-based collaboration environment according to a relevancy of the triggering activity to the user as determined based on current or recent activity performed by the user on the item in the workspace within a first duration before the triggering activity occurred on the item and activities performed by the user on the item in a second duration before the triggering activity occurred on the item, the second duration being greater than the first duration, wherein the notification is presented in the feed stream among multiple notifications in an order, wherein the presenting includes;

computing a priority rating of each of the notifications based on a pre-defined priority rating explicitly assigned by the recipient collaborator to a type of activity associated with each of the notifications or a pre-defined priority rating explicitly assigned by the recipient collaborator to a user related to the activity and wherein the type of activity associated with each of the notifications comprises one of adding the item to the workspace, deleting the item from the workspace, modifying the item in the workspace, adding a collaborator to the workspace, deleting a collaborator from the workspace, or modifying a collaborator within the workspace,

selecting the notifications whose priority rating exceeds a specified threshold to generate selected notifications,

determining the order of the selected notifications based on the priority rating, and

automatically adjusting, by the web-based collaboration

environment, the amount of information to be displayed in the notification.

35. The computer-implemented method of claim 34, wherein the web-based collaboration environment is used in an enterprise setting and each enterprise is associated with one or more workspaces of the web-based collaboration environment.

36. The computer-implemented method of claim 34, wherein the current or recent activity of the user includes actions on a same item with which the triggering activity the user is being notified of relates to.

37. The computer-implemented method of claim 34, wherein the current or recent activity of the user includes dialogues or comments regarding a same item with which the triggering activity the user is being notified of relates to.

39. The system of claim 37, further comprising a notification server that sends the notification using a push technology.

38. A system for notifying a recipient collaborator of activities that occur in an online collaboration platform, the method, comprising:

one or more processors; and

a memory unit having instructions stored thereon which, when executed by the one or more processors, cause the system to;

detect a triggering activity occurring on an item in a workspace of the web-based collaboration environment;

select a user for notification of the triggering activity based, at least in part, on the workspace in which the activity occurred, wherein the user is a collaborator in the web-based collaboration environment;

provide a notification of the triggering activity to the user in the web-based collaboration environment; and

present the notification in a feed stream among other notifications through a user interface of the web-based collaboration environment according to a relevancy of the triggering activity to the user as determined based on current or recent activity performed by the user on the item in the workspace within a first duration before the triggering activity occurred on the item and activities performed by the user on the item in a second duration before the triggering activity occurred on the item, the second duration being greater than the first duration, wherein the notification is presented in the feed stream among multiple notifications in an order, wherein the presenting includes;

computing a priority rating of each of the notifications based on a pre-defined priority rating explicitly assigned by the recipient collaborator to a type of activity associated with each of the notifications or a pre-defined priority rating explicitly assigned by the recipient collaborator to a user related to the activity and wherein the type of activity associated with each of the notifications comprises one of adding the item to the workspace, deleting the item from the workspace, modifying the item in the workspace, adding a collaborator to the workspace, deleting a collaborator from the workspace, or modifying a collaborator within the workspace,

selecting the notifications whose priority rating exceeds a specified threshold to generate selected notifications, and

determining the order of the selected notifications based on the priority rating, and

automatically adjusting, by the web-based collaboration environment, the amount of information to be displayed in the notification.

40. A computer readable storage medium having instructions stored thereon which, when executed by one or more processors of an online collaboration platform, cause the online collaboration platform to:

detect an activity performed by a user on an item associated with a workspace in the web-based collaboration environment, wherein the web-based collaboration environment is configured to include multiple workspaces each configured to have multiple items on which activities can be performed by a set of users associated with the workspace;

provide a notification of the activity performed by the user to another user of the set of users associated with the workspace based on a relevance of the notification to the another user, wherein the relevance is determined based, at least in part, on whether the another user performed a first set of activities on the item in the workspace within a first duration before the activity occurred on the item and a second set of activities in a second duration before the activity occurred on the item, the second duration being greater than the first duration, wherein the another user meets a criteria; and

present the notification via a user interface of the online collaboration platform to the another user, wherein the notification is presented via the user interface among multiple notifications in an order, wherein presenting the notification includes;

computing a priority rating of each of the notifications based on a pre-defined priority rating explicitly assigned by the recipient collaborator to a type of activity associated with each of the notifications or a pre-defined priority rating explicitly assigned by the recipient collaborator to a user related to the activity and wherein the type of activity associated with each of the notifications comprises one of adding the item to the workspace, deleting the item from the workspace, modifying the item in the workspace, adding a collaborator to the workspace, deleting a collaborator from the workspace, or modifying a collaborator within the workspace,

selecting the notifications whose priority rating exceeds a specified threshold to generate selected notifications, and

determining the order of the selected notifications based on the

priority rating, and

automatically adjusting, by the online collaboration platform, the amount of information to be displayed in the notification.

41. The computer readable storage medium of claim 40, wherein to provide the notification, the online collaboration platform depicts the notification through a web accessible application used by the another user to access the web-based collaboration environment.

42. The computer readable storage medium of claim 40, further comprising:

detecting when the another user is online in the web-based collaboration environment, wherein the notification is provided when the another user is online in the web-based collaboration environment.

43. The computer readable storage medium of claim 40, wherein to provide the notification, the online collaboration platform sends the notification to the another user via one or more of email, SMS or an RSS feed.

44. The computer readable storage medium of claim 40, wherein the web-based collaboration platform is configurable for deployment in an enterprise setting, and wherein the criteria specifies that the another user be an employee of the enterprise in which the web-based collaboration environment is deployed.

45. The computer readable storage medium of claim 40, wherein the activity includes one or more of, adding, deleting, or modifying collaborators in the workspace, downloading or uploading of the item in the workspace, deletion of editing of the item in the workspace, or creating a discussion topic in the workspace.

46. The computer readable storage medium of claim 40, wherein the activity is performed in relation to a discussion topic in the workspace and includes one or more of adding a response to the discussion topic, deleting a response to the discussion topic, or editing a response to the discussion topic in the workspace.

47. The computer readable storage medium of claim 40, wherein the activity includes, one or more of, identifying, selecting, adding, deleting, and modifying a tag in the item.

48. The computer readable storage medium of claim 40, wherein the activity includes, one or more of, preview of the item or comment of the item.

49. The computer readable storage medium of claim 40, wherein the activity includes, one or more of, setting or changing permissions of the item, sharing the item, or emailing a link to the item.

50. The computer readable storage medium of claim 40, wherein the sharing of the item includes, embedding a link to the item on another website.