Contact management in a serverless peer-to-peer system

• US 20060239279A1
• Filed: 04/22/2005
• Published: 10/26/2006
• Est. Priority Date: 04/22/2005
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Corporation
• Inventors: Rao, Ravi T., Tao, Kevin R., Anirudh, Anirudh, Weisberg, Tomer, Thaler, David G., Parks, Upshur Warren III, Classen, Andre R., Gupta, Rohit
• Granted Patent: US 7,571,228 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 370/401
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/104 Peer-to-peer [P2P] networks
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/54 Presence management, e.g. monitoring or registration for receipt of user log-on information, or the connection status of the users

Abstract

Systems and methods are described that facilitate the management of contact information, at least some of the contact information related to entities in a serverless, peer-to-peer system. A contact store may store information regarding which other entities of a plurality of other entities are authorized to monitor presence of a user entity. Presence of an entity may generally indicate the willingness and/or ability of the entity to communicate and/or collaborate with other entities, for example. The contact store may also store information regarding which other entities of the plurality of other entities the presence of which should be monitored by the system. A user entity may be able to add contacts to and/or delete contacts from the contact store, for example. The user entity may also be able to modify the contact store to modify which other entities are authorized to monitor presence of the user entity and/or which other entities the presence information of which should be monitored by the system, for example.

Claims

1. A method for managing contact information for use in a serverless system, the method comprising:

storing contact information in a contact store on one or more peer computing systems associated with a user entity, the contact information including a data structure for each other entity of a plurality of other entities;

modifying the contact store to indicate a first set of other entities to which presence information regarding the user entity is to be transmitted by the one or more peer computing systems associated with the user entity to peer computing systems associated with the first set of other entities; and

modifying the contact store to indicate a second set of other entities to which presence information regarding the second set of entities is to be received by the one or more peer computing systems associated with the user entity from peer computing systems associated with the second set of other entities;

wherein the first set of entities is capable of being different than the second set of entities.

2. A method according to claim 1, further comprising at least one of:

modifying the contact store to add a new structure for a new other entity;

modifying the contact store to delete one of the structures corresponding to one of the other entities in the plurality of other entities;

modifying the contact store to modify information in one of the structures corresponding to one of the other entities in the plurality of other entities;

retrieving information from one of the structures corresponding to one of the other entities in the plurality of other entities;

retrieving indications of the other entities for which information is stored in the contact store;

retrieving at least one indication of at least one property associated with one of the other entities from one of the structures corresponding to the one of the other entities;

or

retrieving indications of properties associated with one of the other entities from one of the structures corresponding to the one of the other entities.

3. A method according to claim 2, wherein modifying the contact store to modify information in one of the structures comprises at least one of:

adding indications of properties associated with the other entity corresponding to the one of the structures;

or

deleting indications of properties associated with the other entity corresponding to the one of the structures.

4. A method according to claim 1, further comprising:

receiving information associated with a new other entity in an extensible markup language; and

parsing the information associated with the new other entity.

5. A method according to claim 1, wherein modifying the contact store to indicate the first set of other entities comprises at least one of:

modifying the contact store to add a new structure for a new other entity;

modifying the contact store to delete one of the structures corresponding to one of the other entities in the plurality of other entities;

or

modifying the contact store to modify information in one of the structures corresponding to one of the other entities in the plurality of other entities.

6. A method according to claim 1, wherein modifying the contact store to indicate the second set of other entities comprises at least one of:

modifying the contact store to add a new structure for a new other entity;

modifying the contact store to delete one of the structures corresponding to one of the other entities in the plurality of other entities;

or

modifying the contact store to modify information in one of the structures corresponding to one of the other entities in the plurality of other entities.

7. A method according to claim 6, further comprising generating an indicator of a modification of the contact store in response to at least one of modifying the contact store to add the new structure, modifying the contact store to delete the one of the structures, or modifying the contact store to modify information in the one of the structures.

8. A method according to claim 1, further comprising storing in the contact store a data structure for the user entity.

9. A method according to claim 8, further comprising referencing the data structure for the user entity using a NULL value.

10. A method according to claim 1, wherein storing contact information in the contact store on one or more peer computing systems associated with the user entity comprises storing contact information in a non-volatile memory.

11. A method according to claim 1, further comprising storing the contact information on at least two peer computing systems associated with the user entity.

12. A method according to claim 1, further comprising storing in the contact store at least one data structure for at least one other entity having a computing system on a server-based network.

13. A method for managing contact information for use in a serverless system, the method comprising:

storing, in a contact store on one or more peer computing systems associated with a user entity, contact information associated with a plurality of other entities;

for each other entity in the plurality of other entities, storing in the contact store a presence publication indicator, the presence publication indicator to indicate whether the one or more peer computing systems are to transmit presence information associated with the user entity to one or more peer computing systems associated with the corresponding other entity; and

for each other entity in the plurality of other entities, storing in the contact store a presence subscription indicator, the presence subscription indicator to indicate whether the one or more peer computing systems are to receive presence information associated with the corresponding other entity from one or more peer computing systems associated with the corresponding other entity.

14. A method according to claim 13, further comprising at least one of:

modifying the contact store to add contact information for a new other entity;

modifying the contact store to delete information corresponding to one of the other entities in the plurality of other entities;

modifying the contact store to modify information corresponding to one of the other entities in the plurality of other entities;

retrieving information from the contact store corresponding to one of the other entities in the plurality of other entities;

retrieving indications of the other entities for which information is stored in the contact store;

retrieving at least one indication of at least one property associated with one of the other entities from one of the structures corresponding to the one of the other entities;

or

retrieving indications of properties associated with one of the other entities from one of the structures corresponding to the one of the other entities.

15. A method according to claim 14, further comprising generating an indicator of a modification of the contact store in response to at least one of modifying the contact store to add contact information for the new other entity, modifying the contact store to delete information corresponding to the one of the other entities, or modifying the contact store to modify information corresponding to the one of the other entities.

16. A method according to claim 13, further comprising:

receiving information associated with a new other entity in an extensible markup language; and

parsing the information associated with the new other entity.

17. A method according to claim 13, further comprising storing in the contact store contact information associated with the user entity.

18. A method according to claim 13, further comprising storing the contact information on at least two peer computing systems associated with the user entity.

19. A method according to claim 13, further comprising storing in the contact store contact information associated with at least one other entity having a computing system on a server-based network.

20. A peer computing system comprising:

a contact store to store contact information, the contact store capable of indicating a first set of entities to which presence information regarding a user entity is to be provided and capable of indicating a second set of other entities from which presence information regarding the second set other entities is to be received;

a contact manager to modify the contact information; and

a presence system coupled to the contact store, the presence system configured to transmit presence information associated with the user entity to peer computing systems associated with the first set of entities and configured to request from peer computing systems associated with the second set of entities presence information regarding the second set other entities.

21. A peer computing system according to claim 20, further comprising an authentication system coupled to the contact store to authenticate information received from other entities based on information in the contact store.