GROUP COMMUNICATION SERVER

• US 20070281724A1
• Filed: 06/04/2007
• Published: 12/06/2007
• Est. Priority Date: 06/06/2006
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: NTT Docomo Incorporated (Nippon Telegraph and Telephone Corporation)
• Original Assignee: NTT Docomo Incorporated (Nippon Telegraph and Telephone Corporation)
• Inventors: Isobe, Shin-Ichi, Yabusaki, Masami
• Granted Patent: US 8,068,866 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 455/518
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 12/1822 Conducting the conference, e.g. admission, detection, selection or grouping of participants, correlating users to one or more conference sessions, prioritising transmission
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 65/1101 Session protocols
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 65/4038 with floor control

Abstract

It is an object of the present invention to ensure readily communication between subgroups with reduced trouble to the user in the group communication in terms of subgroup formation and so on. A group communication server according to an embodiment of the present invention provides terminals with an intercommunication function between a plurality of terminals belonging to the same group, specifically a group communication function. The group communication server comprises a group information database for storing subgroup information that specifies terminals belonging to subgroups comprising a plurality of terminals of the terminals belonging to the group, and timing information that indicates a timing for establishing connection for intercommunication between the terminals belonging to these subgroups, and a group management unit and connection control unit which constitute control means for executing a control to establish connection between the terminals belonging to the subgroups specified by the subgroup information at a timing specified by the timing information stored in the group information database.

Claims

1. A group communication server for providing a terminal with an intercommunication function between a plurality of terminals belonging to the same group, comprising:

a group information database for storing subgroup information that specifies terminals belonging to subgroups comprising a plurality of terminals of the terminals belonging to the group, and timing information that indicates a timing for establishing connection for intercommunication between the terminals belonging to these subgroups; and

control means for executing a control to establish the connection between the terminals belonging to the subgroups specified by the subgroup information at a timing specified by the timing information stored in the group information database.

2. The group communication server according to claim 1, further comprising registration means for receiving input of the subgroup information and the timing information and registering the two information items in the group information database.

3. The group communication server according to claim 1, further comprising determination means for determining the terminals belonging to the subgroups by receiving input of mode information that indicates the number of the subgroups and the number of terminals belonging to the subgroups, and registering this determined information in the group information database as the subgroup information.

4. The group communication server according to claim 3, wherein the group information database further stores information that indicates attributes of users of the terminals, and

the determination means, referring to the attributes of the users of the terminals, determines the terminals belonging to the subgroups on the basis of rules set in advance.

5. The group communication server according to claim 1, wherein the subgroup information constitutes information in which a terminal ID that specifies the terminal is associated with a subgroup ID that specifies the subgroup, and

the group information database stores a group ID that specifies the group in association with the subgroup ID.