RESOURCE AVAILABILITY FOR USER ACTIVITIES ACROSS DEVICES

• US 20070299796A1
• Filed: 06/27/2006
• Published: 12/27/2007
• Est. Priority Date: 06/27/2006
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Corporation
• Inventors: Oliver, Nuria M., Czerwinski, Mary P., Murillo, Oscar E., Fernandez, Roland L., Robertson, George G., Macbeth, Steven W., Tan, Desney S., Meyers, Brian R.
• Granted Patent: US 7,620,610 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 706/16
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/10 Office automation; Time management

Abstract

A system that can integrate activities across machines and/or devices is disclosed. The innovation can be used in an “asynchronous” manner that enables a user to move or direct a set of activities and/or tasks within an activity from one device to another. Further, the system can facilitate adapting user interface factors with respect to a particular device such that a user can “synchronously” utilize all devices for the given activities and/or tasks. In other words, the “synchronous” scenario enables a user to share activity information between devices when simultaneously utilizing multiple devices in accordance with a particular activity.

Claims

1. A system that facilitates activity-centric computing, comprising:

a receiving component that accepts activity information; and

an activity processing component that determines a task of an activity based upon the activity information and delegates the task to at least one activity-enabled device.

2. The system of claim 1, the activity processing component includes a task delegation component that assigns the task to a plurality of activity-enabled devices.

3. The system of claim 2, the activity processing component further comprises an activity state determination component that establishes a state of the activity, the activity processing component employs the state to assign the task to the plurality of activity-enabled devices.

4. The system of claim 2, the activity processing component further comprises a device control component that selects the at least one activity-enabled device from a plurality of available devices.

5. The system of claim 4, the device control component further comprises a synchronization component that synchronizes the activity information between a subset of the plurality of available devices.

6. The system of claim 4, the device control component further comprises a security component that manages access to data related to the activity based at least in part upon one of a user role, a security policy and data confidentiality.

7. The system of claim 4, the device control component further comprises a functionality scaling component that at least one of limits and expands functionality of an application related to the activity with respect to the at least one activity-enabled device.

8. The system of claim 2, the receiving component further gathers context information;

the activity processing component employs the context information to delegate the task to the at least one activity-enabled device.

9. The system of claim 8, the context information is at least one of an activity context, an environment context, a user context, a device profile, a user profile and a group profile.

10. The system of claim 2, the task delegation component employs a learned model to delegate the task to the at least one activity-enabled device.

11. The system of claim 10, the learned model is established via a machine learning and reasoning (MLR) mechanism.

12. The system of claim 11, the MLR mechanism employs at least one of supervised, unsupervised or semi-supervised methods to acquire the learned model.

13. A computer-implemented method of accomplishing an activity via a plurality of devices, comprising:

receiving activity information;

determining a state of the activity based at least in part upon the activity information, the state identifies a plurality of tasks related to the activity;

determining a plurality of activity-enabled devices; and

delegating a subset of the plurality of tasks to a subset of the plurality of activity-enabled devices.

14. The method of claim 13, further comprising gathering context data, the act of delegating a subset of the plurality of tasks employs the context data to determine the subset of the plurality of activity-enabled devices.

15. The method of claim 14, the context data is at least one of an activity context, an environment context, a user context, a device profile, a user profile and a group profile.

16. The method of claim 13, further comprising synchronizing the activity information between the subset of the plurality of activity enabled devices.

17. The method of claim 13, further comprising suggesting at least one of the plurality of activity-enabled devices based at least in part upon a device profile.

18. A system that facilitates collaborating a plurality of activity-enabled devices, comprising:

means for determining a state of an activity; and

means for automatically transferring the activity to an activity-enabled device based at least in part upon the state.

19. The system of claim 18, further comprising means for synchronizing data associated with the activity onto a subset of the plurality of activity-enabled devices.

20. The system of claim 19, further comprising means for suggesting the activity-enabled device based at least in part upon a device profile.