Method and System for a Hosted Mobile Management Service Architecture

• US 20080194276A1
• Filed: 02/12/2007
• Published: 08/14/2008
• Est. Priority Date: 02/12/2007
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Amazon Technologies, Inc. (Amazon.com, Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Oomble, Inc.
• Inventors: LIN, Daniel J., Hess, Christopher K.
• Granted Patent: US 7,751,807 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 455/466
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 61/5014 using dynamic host configuration protocol [DHCP] or bootstrap protocol [BOOTP]
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/02 based on web technology, e.g. hypertext transfer protocol [HTTP]
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/14 Session management for real-time applications in data packet communications networks H04L65/1066
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/75 Indicating network or usage conditions on the user display
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 24/00 Supervisory, monitoring or testing arrangements
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/00 Services specially adapted for wireless communication networks; Facilities therefor
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 76/10 Connection setup
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 88/02 Terminal devices

Abstract

A hosted mobile management service is provided for enabling a user to access a centralized account through a web browser on a terminal in order to manage the user'"'"'s media information, such as digital music and photos. Any modifications made by user through the web browser are transparently sent to the user'"'"'s mobile device where a thin client application receives such modification information and interacts with the mobile device'"'"'s file system to reconcile such modifications.

Claims

1. A system for enabling a user to utilize a web site to manage multimedia data for access by an application on a mobile device, wherein the mobile device supports data packet based communications over a mobile network system, the system comprising:

a web server component configured to record actions taken by the user on the web site to manage the multimedia data;

a communications engine component configured to;

(i) initiate a network connection with the mobile device, (ii) extract, for each action that relates to the application, a set of file system operation instructions specific to the application, and (iii) transmit each set of file system operation instructions to the mobile device through the network connection; and

a mobile software component resident on the mobile device, wherein the software component is configured to;

(i) receive file system operation instructions from the communications engine component and (ii) perform file system operations corresponding to the received file system operation instructions on the file system of the mobile device.

2. The system of claim 1 further comprising an actions database coupled to the communications engine component for storing sets of file system operation instructions relating to the actions taken by the user on the web site.

3. The system of claim 2 wherein certain of the actions taken by the user relate to at least one different application on the mobile device.

4. The system of claim 3 wherein certain of the sets of file system operation instructions stored on the actions database are specific to the at least one different application on the mobile device.

5. The system of claim 2 wherein the communications engine component is configured to query the actions database in order to extract, for each action that relates to the application, a set of file system operation instructions specific to the application.

6. The system of claim 2 further comprising a content database coupled to the communications engine component for storing at least a portion of the multimedia data.

7. The system of claim 6 wherein at least one file system operation instruction stored in the actions database relates to copying multimedia data stored in the content database to the mobile device.

8. The system of claim 1 wherein each file system operation instruction received by the mobile software component corresponds to one file system operation performed by the mobile software component.

9. The system of claim 1 wherein the mobile software component is further configured to run in the background.

10. The system of claim 1 wherein the communications engine component is configured to transmit an SMS message to the mobile device, wherein the SMS message comprises an IP address of the communications engine component, in order to initiate the network connection with the mobile device.

11. The system of claim 10 wherein the mobile software component is further configured to:

(i) extract the IP address the SMS message and (ii) establish the network connection as a TCP connection with the communications engine component through the IP address.

12. The system of claim 10 wherein the mobile software component is launched upon receipt by the mobile device of the SMS message by a push registry of the mobile device.

13. The system of claim 1 wherein the mobile network system is a cellular network system.

14. The system of claim 1 wherein the web server component is a Java servlet.

15. The system of claim 1 wherein the multimedia data is selected from the group consisting of songs, videos, photos, images, ringtones, mobile games and personal contact information.

16. A method for providing a user a web site to manage multimedia data for use by an application on a mobile device, the method comprising:

recording actions taken by the user on the web site;

extracting, for each action relating to the application, a set of file system operation instructions specific to the application.

initiating a network connection with the mobile device; and

transmitting each set of file system operations instructions to the mobile device through the network connection.

17. The method of claim 16 wherein the step of extracting, for each action relating to the application, a set of file system operation instructions specific to the application occurs by querying an actions database for storing sets of file system operation instructions relating to the actions taken by the user on the web site.

18. The method of claim 17 wherein querying the actions database includes submitting, for each action, identifying information relating to such action, the mobile device and the application.

19. The method of claim 16 further comprising the step of extracting a multimedia file from a contents database for storing at least a portion of the multimedia data and including the multimedia file in at least one of the file system operation instructions in at least one of the sets.

20. The method of claim 16 wherein the step of initiating a network connection with the mobile device occurs by transmitting an SMS message to the mobile device, wherein the SMS message comprises an IP address.

21. The method of claim 16 further comprising the steps of (i) extracting, for each action relating to at least one different application, a set of file system operation instructions specific to the at least one different application, and (ii) transmitting each set of file system operations instructions specific to the at least one different application to the mobile device through the network connection.