Electronic shopping basket

• US 20040254855A1
• Filed: 07/19/2004
• Published: 12/16/2004
• Est. Priority Date: 10/30/2000
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Corporation
• Inventors: Shah, Darshatkumar
• Granted Patent: US 7,162,443 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 705/26
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/06 Buying, selling or leasing transactions
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0609 Buyer or seller confidence or verification
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0623 Item investigation
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0633 Lists, e.g. purchase orders, compilation or processing

Abstract

A shopping basket system includes a shopping basket component and a wish or gift list component. The functionality of the shopping basket system may be invoked via a graphical image, such as an icon, on a web browser or a desktop of the client computer. The user may browse registered sites on the Internet and drag and drop products into the user'"'"'s shopping basket. All products may then be purchased concurrently regardless of the site that the product was found. The drag and drop capability is provided by the programmability of the shopping basket. A common schema can be employed for describing items (e.g., products and services) to be purchased from registered sites. In one aspect of the invention the common schema is provided in the extensible Markup. Language (XML). The shopping basket system is provided with a search engine for searching for products on a user'"'"'s wish or gift list over the Internet. The search results are provided to the user, which can be added to the user'"'"'s shopping basket list. In one aspect of the invention, the shopping basket system is programmable, such that any application program may access a user'"'"'s shopping basket system and add items to the user'"'"'s shopping basket based on items found in a user'"'"'s wish list.

Claims

1. A system that locates items of interest in connection with electronic shopping, comprising:

a first component that stores at least one item of interest; and

a second component that searches for sources that provide the at least one item of interest and returns search results based on the sources identified as providing the at least one item of interest, the results are utilized to purchase the item of interest.

2. The system of claim 1, the second component is a search engine.

3. The system of claim 1, further comprising a filter component that limits the number of sources that are identified.

4. The system of claim 1, further comprising a shopping basket component that retains at least one identified item of interest.

5. The system of claim 4, the shopping basket component is programmable.

6. The system of claim 4, the second component adds a description associated with at least one identified item of interest to the shopping basket component.

7. The system of claim 1, further comprising a third component associated with at least one potential source of the at least one item of interest, the third component accesses the list of at least one item of interest and determines if the at least one potential source provides the at least one item of interest.

8. The system of claim 1, further comprising a fourth component that is associated with one of a desktop application and a browser, the fourth component receives a description associated with the at least one item of interest.

9. The system of claim 8, the description provides an association between the at least one item of interest and a source thereof.

10. The system of claim 8, the description conforms to an XML schema.

11. The system of claim 1, further comprising an ordering component that orders the at least one item of interest from an identified source.

12. The system of claim 1, the first component is a wish list.

13. The system of claim 1, the second component is an application program.

14. The system of claim 1, further comprising an authentication component that provides information to identified sources to facilitate purchasing the item of interest.

15. A computer-implemented method for locating an item of interest, comprising:

listing the item of interest in a wish list;

searching for electronic merchants that provide the item of interest, the search is performed over a network; and

returning results that are based on identifying an electronic merchant associated with the item of interest.

16. The method of claim 15, further comprising adding the identified item of interest to a shopping basket.

17. The method of claim 15, further comprising providing access to information in the wish list to a plurality of electronic merchants that potentially provide the item of interest.

18. The method of claim 15, further comprising providing access to an electronic shopping basket list to identified electronic merchants, which add the item of interest to the electronic shopping basket list.

19. The method of claim 17, the plurality of electronic merchants access the information in the wish list by querying an application program interface associated with the wish list and receiving information from the application program interface based on the query.

20. The method of claim 15, further comprising associating an electronic shopping basket list with a graphical image on one of a desktop application and a browser on a client.

21. The method of claim 15, further comprising adding at least a second item of interest to the wish list.

22. The method of claim 21, further comprising locating at least one electronic merchant that provides both items of interest in the wish list, adding both items of interest to an electronic shopping basket, and concurrently ordering both items of interest in the electronic shopping basket list from the electronic merchant.

23. The method of claim 15, further comprising providing authentication information to the electronic merchant, the information facilitates purchasing the item of interest from the electronic merchant.

24. The method of claim 15, the item of interest is listed in the wish list with associated price information.

25. A data packet transmitted between two or more computer components that, facilitates locating an item of interest comprising:

information related to at least one item in a wish list, the information is utilized to search for sources that provide the at least one item of interest, and search results that are based on identified sources are returned.

26. A computer readable medium storing computer executable components that facilitates locating an item of interest, comprising:

a component that stores a list of items of interest;

a component that searches a network for sources that provide the item of interest; and

a component that returns information indicative of at least one of the sources that provide the item of interest and the item of interest.

27. A system that facilitates obtaining items of interest, comprising:

means for identifying items of interest;

means for locating networked sources that provide the identified items of interest; and

means for concurrently ordering the items of interest from the networked sources.