Relationship management system determining contact pathways in a contact relational database
First Claim
1. A relationship management system adapted to be used with a processor, a database and a display device, comprising:
- a computer readable medium;
a database storage routine stored on the computer readable medium and adapted to store, within the database, contact information for one or more contacts and one or more user-contact pairs, wherein each user-contact pair includes a contact indication that indicates one of the contacts and a user indication that indicates one of the users;
a reference routine stored on the computer readable medium and adapted to be executed on the processor to access the database to determine whether a specified individual knows a specified contact, wherein the reference routine searches the user-contact pairs for the specified contact to locate at least one user-contact pair associated with the specified contact and wherein the reference routine determines one or more individuals that know the specified contact from the user-contact pairs; and
a display routine stored on the computer readable medium and adapted to be executed on the processor to display, on the display device, an indication of whether the specified individual knows the specified contact.
2 Assignments
0 Petitions
Accused Products
Abstract
A relationship management system using a database that stores contact information defining a set of contact individuals associated with each of the users of the database. An input routine stored on a computer readable medium is executed on a processor to accept an input of a target individual from a starting person who is a user of the system. A contact information access routine is executed on the processor to access contact information in the form of user-contact pairs stored in the database that are associated with the starting person and the target individual. A relationship connection routine is executed on the processor to utilize the user-contact pairs accessed by the contact information access routine and determine relationship connections that may link the starting person and the target individual. A display routine is executed to display to the starting person an indication of the potential relationship connections.
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Citations
36 Claims
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1. A relationship management system adapted to be used with a processor, a database and a display device, comprising:
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a computer readable medium;
a database storage routine stored on the computer readable medium and adapted to store, within the database, contact information for one or more contacts and one or more user-contact pairs, wherein each user-contact pair includes a contact indication that indicates one of the contacts and a user indication that indicates one of the users;
a reference routine stored on the computer readable medium and adapted to be executed on the processor to access the database to determine whether a specified individual knows a specified contact, wherein the reference routine searches the user-contact pairs for the specified contact to locate at least one user-contact pair associated with the specified contact and wherein the reference routine determines one or more individuals that know the specified contact from the user-contact pairs; and
a display routine stored on the computer readable medium and adapted to be executed on the processor to display, on the display device, an indication of whether the specified individual knows the specified contact. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5)
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6. A relationship management system configured to be used with a processor, a display device and a database that stores contact information defining a set of contacts associated with each of a plurality of users of the database, comprising:
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a computer readable medium;
an input routine stored on the computer readable medium and adapted to be executed on the processor to accept a designation of a target individual;
a contact information access routine stored on the computer readable medium and adapted to be executed on the processor to access the contact information in the form of user-contact pairs stored in the database;
a relationship determination routine stored on the computer readable medium and adapted to be executed on the processor to utilize the user-contact pairs accessed by the contact information access routine to determine at least one relationship that links relationships between an individual and the target individual; and
a display routine stored on the computer readable medium and configured to be executed on the processor to display, on the display device, an indication of the relationship. - View Dependent Claims (7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15)
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16. A relationship management system, comprising:
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a database storing contact relationship information for a multiplicity of individuals;
at least one access terminal in communicative connection with the database, the at least one access terminal having a processor, a memory and a display device;
an access routine stored in the memory and configured to be executed on the processor to access the database;
a reference routine stored in the memory and configured to determine a list of individuals having commonalities with a target individual from the contact relationship information stored in the database;
a relationship connection determination routine stored in the memory and configured to be executed on the processor to plot one or more relationship connections between a starting individual and the target individual through the individuals in the determined list; and
a display routine configured to be executed on the processor to display the relationship connections on the display device. - View Dependent Claims (17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22)
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23. A relationship management database system comprising:
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a database configured to store relationship information for a plurality of users;
at least one computer having access to at least a portion of the relationship information stored in the database and having a memory storing;
a search routine stored in the memory configured to be executed by the computer at the request of a requesting user to search the relationship information stored in the database concerning a starting person and a target person;
a user-contact reference routine stored in the memory configured to;
(a) determine a first set of user-contact pairs for the starting person, each of the first set of user-contact pairs for the starting person comprising the starting person as the user and one of a plurality of contacts known by the starting person and other users of the database as the contact; and
(b) determine a second set of user-contact pairs for the target person, each of the second set of user-contact pairs comprising the target person as the contact and users of the plurality of users who have the target person as a contact or have at least one shared commonality with the target person as the user;
a relationship pathway determination routine stored in the memory configured to be executed by the computer to determine one or more relationship pathways between the starting person and the target person from among the first set of user-contact pairs and the second set of user-contact pairs; and
a display routine configured to be executed by the computer to output the determined one or more relationship pathways to the requesting user. - View Dependent Claims (24, 25, 26, 27)
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28. A method of determining relationship connections in a database between a starting person and a target person, the method comprising:
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designating the target person within the database;
retrieving a first list of individuals from the database of users of the database having an actual or potential relationship connection to the starting person;
retrieving a second list of individuals from the database of users of the database having an actual or potential relationship connection with the target person;
plotting a contact relationship string between the requesting user and the target person through at least one individual common to both the first and second lists; and
displaying the plotted contact relationship string. - View Dependent Claims (29, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36)
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Specification