PROVIDING A SERVER AGENT FOR A MOBILE DEVICE WITH REFRESH

• US 20080139177A1
• Filed: 02/12/2008
• Published: 06/12/2008
• Est. Priority Date: 11/10/2003
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Snapchat Inc (Snap, Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Yahoo! Inc. (Apollo Global Management, Inc.)
• Inventors: Jiang, Zhaowei C., Cui, Yingqing L., Zhou, Min
• Granted Patent: US 7,818,397 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 455/412.2
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/9535 Search customisation based on user profiles and personalisation
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/14 Session management for real-time applications in data packet communications networks H04L65/1066
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/55 Push-based network services
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/00 Services specially adapted for wireless communication networks; Facilities therefor

Abstract

The invention enables one or more agents to gather information from at least one server on a network and automatically provide this information to an inbox on a server and then providing it to an inbox on a mobile device if a wireless connection to the mobile device is available. A server agent facility provides for preprocessing requests for information from the mobile device, including, collecting the information out of band, filtering the collected information, and packaging the information for delivery in a format suitable for the mobile device. A server agent within the server agent facility may actively collect the information based on a variety of factors, including but not limited to, time, event(s), user profile, mobile device profile, request(s), alert(s), and historical behavior.

Claims

1. A network device for providing information to a mobile device over a network comprising:

a transceiver for receiving and sending information to the mobile device; and

a processor configured to perform actions, including;

collecting information to be sent to the mobile device over the network;

packaging the collected information into a format useable at the mobile device;

if the network device determines that the mobile device is inaccessible, waiting until the mobile device is accessible, and independent of a request from the mobile device performing a refresh of the collected information in part by re-collecting the information and then sending the refreshed information to the mobile device.

2. The network device of claim 1, wherein collecting the information further comprises:

receiving a request for information from the mobile device;

performing a query for the requested information;

performing another query for information related to the requested information but not constituting a response to the request for information; and

providing the requested information obtained from the query with the related information from the other query to form the collected information.

3. The network device of claim 1, wherein if the network device determines that the mobile device is inaccessible further comprises:

determining if the mobile device is inaccessible based on if a network bandwidth to the mobile device is below a threshold, and if the bandwidth is below the threshold, indicating that the mobile device is inaccessible.

4. The network device of claim 1, wherein collecting the information is performed at the network device using an agent module comprising a search agent and a forward looking agent module.

5. The network device of claim 1, wherein packaging the collected information further comprises at least one of compressing the collected information or encrypting the collected information.

6. The network device of claim 1, wherein collecting information further comprises:

determining if a request for information to be collected can be batched with one or more other requests for information, wherein at least one of the one or more other requests for information is received from a second client device; and

if the request can be batched with one or more other requests, performing a batched request for the requested information.

7. A mobile device that is useable to receive information from a server device over a network, the mobile device comprising:

a transceiver that is arranged to receive and to send messages over the network to the server device; and

a processor that is configured and arranged to perform actions, comprising;

sending a request for information to the server device, wherein the server device is configured to perform a search for the information, and to collect the information requested;

if a network connection between the mobile device and the server device has a bandwidth below a threshold or is otherwise inaccessible, waiting for the network connection to be above the threshold and the network connection to be accessible to the server device; and

receiving the information requested from the server device, wherein the server device is further configured to perform a refresh of the collected information at least during the inaccessibility of the mobile device by in part performing another search for the information in absence of receiving another request for the information from the mobile device, and wherein the received information includes the refreshed information.

8. The mobile device of claim 7, wherein receiving the information further comprises receiving additional information that is associated with an alert.

9. The mobile device of claim 7, wherein receiving the information further comprises receiving information from the server device that is related to the requested information but does not constitute a response to the request for information.

10. The mobile device of claim 7, wherein receiving the information further comprises receiving additional information beyond the requested information based on a search by the server device using in part behavioral data of a user of the mobile device.

11. The mobile device of claim 10, wherein the additional information is also refreshed by performing another search by the server device for the additional information if the mobile device is inaccessible, and independent of receiving by the server device another request for information.

12. A system useable to provide information to a client device over a network, comprising:

an agent module that is configured to perform actions, including collecting information based in part on performing a searching for the information, wherein at least some of the information is associated with a request for information from the client device;

a packaging module that is configured to receive the collected information and to prepare the collected information into a format useable by the client device; and

a delivery agent that is configured and arranged to receive the packaged information, and to determine if the client device is accessible, and if the client device is determined to be inaccessible, waiting until the client device is accessible, absent another request from the client device, employing in part the agent module and the packaging module to perform a refresh of the collected information, re-packaging the refreshed information and sending the refreshed and re-packaged information to the client device over the network.

13. The system of claim 12, wherein agent module is configured to perform a query for additional information that is related to the request for information but does not constitute a response to the request, wherein at least some of the additional information includes advertisement information.

14. The system of claim 13, wherein performing the refresh further comprises performing a refresh of the additional information.

15. The system of claim 12, wherein collecting information further comprises, in part, collecting information based on a result of receiving an alarm condition, and wherein at least some of the collected information further comprises a notification of a presence of the alarm condition.

16. The system of claim 12, wherein collecting the information further comprises filtering the collected information using an editor agent.

17. A method for use in providing information to a client device over a network, comprising:

receiving at a server device a request for information from the client device over the network;

collecting the requested information;

performing a query for additional information that is related to the request but does not constitute a response to the request;

at the server device, if the client device is inaccessible over the network, waiting until the client device is accessible over the network, absent another request for the information from the client device, performing a refresh by re-collecting the information and performing another query for the additional information, and sending the refreshed information to the client device over the network.

18. The method of claim 17, wherein performing the query for additional information further comprises, employing historical or behavioral data obtained about a user of the client device to predict what additional information to obtain during the query.

19. The method of claim 17, wherein the server device is configured to determine if the client device is inaccessible based in part on if a bandwidth of a connection between the server device and the client device is below a threshold.

20. The method of claim 17, wherein the additional information further comprises push information.