Voice integrated VOIP system

• US 20050111439A1
• Filed: 09/29/2004
• Published: 05/26/2005
• Est. Priority Date: 09/11/2000
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: R2 Solutions LLC (Acacia Research Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Yahoo! Inc. (Apollo Global Management, Inc.)
• Inventors: Yarlagadda, Madhu, Nakayama, David H., Loo, Patrick
• Granted Patent: US 7,760,705 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 370/352
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 65/103 in the network
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 65/104 in the network
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 65/1043 Gateway controllers, e.g. media gateway control protocol [MGCP] controllers
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 65/1101 Session protocols
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 65/80 Responding to QoS
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 9/40 Network security protocols
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 2201/40 using speech recognition speech recognition per se G10L15/00
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 2201/60 Medium conversion
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 3/2272 Subscriber line supervision circuits, e.g. call detection circuits
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 3/493 Interactive information services, e.g. directory enquiries ; Arrangements therefor, e.g. interactive voice response [IVR] systems or voice portals
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 3/533 Voice mail systems
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 7/12 for working between exchanges having different types of switching equipment, e.g. power-driven and step by step or decimal and non-decimal
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 7/1225 Details of core network interconnection arrangements

Abstract

An integrated VoIP unified message processing system includes a voice platform that processes data in native VoIP format. There is no use of hardware telephone interface cards (TICs) or software transcoding to transform data to PCM or other formats. Cost reductions are achieved by the elimination of expensive dedicated hardware and scalability is achieved by obviating the need for software transcoding.

Claims

1. A method for providing telephone application services using a managed VOIP network, where voice data transmitted over the network is codified in a native VOIP format, said method comprising the acts of:

providing a plurality of channels for handling incoming telephone calls and a shared memory, accessible to all channels, storing response voice data in native VOIP format;

receiving a first incoming telephone call, including a first plurality of received IP packets encapsulating voice data in native format, from a service requestor over the managed VOIP network;

setting up a connection between the incoming telephone call and a first one of said channels for handling the incoming telephone call;

identifying a requested service;

accessing response voice data, stored in the native VOIP format in said shared memory, responsive to the requested service;

encapsulating said response voice data in a second plurality of response IP packets; and

sending said second plurality of response IP packets over said managed VOIP network to the service requestor.

2. The method of claim 1 where said act of identifying a requested service comprises the acts of:

processing voice data in native format, extracted from said received IP packets, to identify a requested service;

extracting voice data from said received IP packets; and

performing speech analysis on extracted voice data to identify the service requested.

3. The method of claim 1 where said act of identifying a requested service comprises the acts of:

identifying a DTMF signal;

determining a requested service associated with an identified DTMF signal;

4. The method of claim 1 where said act of accessing response voice data further comprising the acts of:

determining whether said requested service requires text to speech (TTS) conversion;

if so invoking a TTS module that converts text to non-native voice data not in native VOIP format;

converting said non-native voice data to native VOIP format.

5. The method of claim 1 where said act of accessing response voice data further comprising the acts of:

determining whether received voice data will be processed by a speech recognition module;

if so, converting said native VOIP format voice data to non-native format voice data prior to speech recognition.

6. The method of claim 1 further comprising the act of:

extracting calling ID line data from VOIP call signaling protocol to obtain location information about the service requester;

accessing customized voice data, in native VOIP format, from said shared memory;

encapsulating said customized voice data in customized IP packets; and

sending said customized IP packets to the service requestor over the managed VoIP network.

7. The method of claim 1 further comprising the act of:

providing an I/O thread for each channel for managing all I/O, with I/O thread performing the following acts;

while playing a message, giving higher priority to data transmission than to data reception; and

while recording a message, giving higher priority to data reception than to data transmission.

8. The method of claim 1 further comprising the acts of:

providing a plurality of message access servers for controlling access to shared memory; and

utilizing a service requester ID to access a user database holding an association between the ID and a home MAS for accessing response data for the service requestor.

9. (canceled)

10. A method for processing calls, the method comprising:

storing a plurality of voice responses in a native VOIP format;

receiving a call from a VOIP network;

determining a service for the call, the service requiring a voice response;

determining one or more voice responses from the plurality of voice responses stored in the native VOIP format; and

sending the one or more voice responses in one or more packets through the VOIP network.

11. The method of claim 10, further comprising:

buffering the one or more voice responses in a buffer; and

sending the one or more voice responses from the buffer through the VOIP network.

12. The method of claim 10, further comprising providing a bidirectional thread configured to process the call and provide the one or more responses.

13. The method of claim 12, further comprising while sending the one or more voice responses, giving higher priority to data transmission than to data reception.

14. The method of claim 12, further comprising while receiving information for the call, giving higher priority to data reception than to data transmission.

15. The method of claim 10, further comprising:

receiving a message for the call; and

storing the message in the native VOIP format.

16. A voice over IP (VOIP) device comprising:

storage configured to store a plurality of voice responses in a native VOIP format;

one or more threads configured to process a call from a VOIP network, wherein a thread comprises;

logic to determine a service for the call, the service requiring a voice response;

logic to determine one or more voice responses from the plurality of voice responses stored in the native VOIP format; and

logic to send the one or more voice responses in one or more packets through the VOIP network.

17. The VOIP device of claim 16, further comprising:

message storage configured to store a message received for the call, wherein the thread is configured to store the message in the storage.

18. The VOIP device of claim 16, wherein while the thread is sending the one or more voice responses, the thread is configured to give higher priority to data transmission than to data reception.

19. The VOIP device of claim 16, wherein while the thread is receiving information for the call, the thread is configured to give higher priority to data reception than to data transmission.