Portable Electronic Device for Instant Messaging Multiple Recipients

• US 20090177981A1
• Filed: 09/30/2008
• Published: 07/09/2009
• Est. Priority Date: 01/06/2008
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Apple Inc.
• Original Assignee: Apple Inc.
• Inventors: Christie, Greg, Lemay, Stephen O., Van Os, Marcel, Santamaria, Justin, Doll, Evan Russell
• Granted Patent: US 8,407,603 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 715/758
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/04883 for inputting data by handwriting, e.g. gesture or text
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/04886 by partitioning the display area of the touch-screen or the surface of the digitising tablet into independently controllable areas, e.g. virtual keyboards or menus
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/107 Computer-aided management of electronic mailing [e-mailing]
• 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 12/1831 Tracking arrangements for later retrieval, e.g. recording contents, participants activities or behavior, network status
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 51/04 Real-time or near real-time messaging, e.g. instant messaging [IM]
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 1/72436 for text messaging, e.g. short messaging services [SMS] or e-mails

Abstract

A portable electronic device with a touch screen display displays a list of instant messaging conversations including a group conversation. The group conversation includes a first multi-recipient identifier and a group conversation indicia. In response to detecting a user selection of the group conversation, the device displays a set of outgoing messages from a user of the device to multiple recipients in a chronological order and a second multi-recipient identifier. The device receives a new outgoing message for the group conversation entered by the user of the device through the touch screen display, and responds to detecting a user request to send the new outgoing message to the multiple recipients by sending the new outgoing message to the multiple recipients in the group conversation. The new outgoing message is appended to the set of outgoing messages displayed on the touch screen display.

Claims

1. A computer-implemented method, comprising:

at a portable electronic device with a touch screen display,

displaying a list of instant messaging conversations including a group conversation, wherein the group conversation includes a first multi-recipient identifier and a group conversation indicia;

in response to detecting a user selection of the group conversation, displaying a set of outgoing messages from a user of the device to multiple recipients in a chronological order and a second multi-recipient identifier;

receiving a new outgoing message for the group conversation entered by the user of the device through the touch screen display; and

in response to detecting a user request to send the new outgoing message to the multiple recipients,

sending the new outgoing message to the multiple recipients in the group conversation; and

appending the new outgoing message to the set of outgoing messages displayed on the touch screen display.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the first multi-recipient identifier identifies a subset, not all, of the multiple recipients and the second multi-recipient identifier identifies all of the multiple recipients.

3. The method of claim 1, further including:

displaying an error message indicating a communication error in connection with sending the new outgoing message to at least one of the multiple recipients;

displaying a resend-message icon on the touch screen display; and

resending the new outgoing message to the at least one of the multiple recipients in response to a user selection of the resend-message icon.

4. The method of claim 3, further including displaying the error message and the resend-message icon before appending the new outgoing message to the set of outgoing messages.

5. The method of claim 3, further including displaying the error message and the resend-message icon after appending the new outgoing message to the set of outgoing messages.

6. The method of claim 1, further including:

after appending the new outgoing message to the set of outgoing messages,

displaying the list of conversations in response to detecting a user request to return to the list of conversations; and

updating the display of the group conversation in the list of conversations by replacing a previously-displayed outgoing message associated with the group conversation with the new outgoing message.

7. The method of claim 1, further including:

receiving a reply message from a recipient in the multiple recipients in response to the new outgoing message, wherein there is an existing conversation between the user of the device and the recipient in the list of conversations;

updating the existing conversation between the user of the device and the recipient by appending the reply message to previous messages in the existing conversation between the user of the device and the recipient; and

in response to detecting a user selection of the existing conversation between the user of the device and the recipient, displaying the reply message and the previous messages in the existing conversation between the user of the device and the recipient.

8. The method of claim 7, wherein the previous messages in the existing conversation between the user of the device and the recipient includes each of the set of outgoing messages in the group conversation.

9. The method of claim 7, wherein the previous messages in the existing conversation between the user of the device and the recipient includes none of the set of outgoing messages in the group conversation.

10. The method of claim 1, further including:

receiving a reply message from a recipient in the multiple recipients in response to the new outgoing message, wherein there is no existing conversation between the user of the device and the recipient in the list of conversations;

generating a new conversation between the user of the device and the recipient that includes the reply message; and

in response to detecting a user selection of the new conversation between the user of the device and the recipient, displaying the reply message.

11. The method of claim 10, wherein generating the new conversation between the user of the device and the recipient further includes:

inserting into the new conversation between the user of the device and the recipient each of the set of outgoing messages in the group conversation; and

appending the reply message from the recipient to the inserted set of outgoing messages in the new conversation between the user of the device and the recipient.

12. The method of claim 1, further including:

in response to detecting user selection of the group conversation, displaying a detail icon adjacent to the second multi-recipient identifier; and

in response to detecting user selection of the detail icon, replacing the second multi-recipient identifier with a set of contact icons, each contact icon representing one of the multiple recipients; and

in response to detecting user selection of one of the set of contact icons, displaying contact information of a corresponding recipient in the multiple recipients.

13. The method of claim 12, further including:

in response to detecting user selection of the detail icon, replacing the detail icon with a hide detail icon; and

in response to detecting user selection of the hide detail icon, replacing the set of contact icons with the second multi-recipient identifier.

14. The method of claim 12, wherein one of the set of contact icons is a telephone number.

15. The method of claim 1, wherein the new outgoing messages are Short Messaging Service (SMS), Multimedia Messaging Service, or Enhanced Messaging Service (EMS) messages.

16. The method of claim 1, wherein the group conversation and the new outgoing message are part of an instant messaging application on the portable electronic device;

the portable electronic device includes a plurality of applications in addition to the instant messaging application; and

one or more of the plurality of additional applications are used while sending the new outgoing message.

17. The method of claim 16, further including:

displaying on top of a non-messaging application an error message indicating a communication error in connection with sending the new outgoing message to at least one of the multiple recipients and a resend-message icon on the touch screen display;

resending the new outgoing message to the at least one of the multiple recipients in response to detecting a user selection of the resend-message icon; and

ceasing to display the error message on top of the non-messaging application.

18. The method of claim 1, wherein the multiple recipients in the group conversation are selected by:

(a) in response to detecting a finger gesture on an add recipient icon, displaying a list of contacts on the touch screen;

(b) in response to detecting a finger swipe gesture on the contact list, scrolling the list of contacts on the touch screen;

(c) in response to detecting a finger gesture on a contact in the list of contacts, adding the contact to the multiple recipients, and generating a corresponding recipient icon in a message recipient field on the touch screen display; and

repeating operations (a)-(c) until all of the multiple recipients are selected.

19. The method of claim 18, further including:

in response to one or more finger gestures on one or more keys corresponding to one or more letters on a soft keyboard displayed on the touch screen display, displaying the one or more letters in the message recipient field on the touch screen display.

20. A portable electronic device, comprising:

a touch screen display;

one or more processors;

memory; and

one or more programs, wherein the one or more programs are stored in the memory and configured to be executed by the one or more processors, the programs including;

instructions for displaying a list of instant messaging conversations including a group conversation, wherein the group conversation includes a first multi-recipient identifier and a group conversation indicia;

instructions for, in response to detecting a user selection of the group conversation, displaying a set of outgoing messages from a user of the device to multiple recipients in a chronological order and a second multi-recipient identifier;

instructions for receiving a new outgoing message for the group conversation entered by the user of the device through the touch screen display; and

instructions for, in response to detecting a user request to send the new outgoing message to the multiple recipients,

sending the new outgoing message to the multiple recipients in the group conversation; and

appending the new outgoing message to the set of outgoing messages displayed on the touch screen display.

21. A computer readable storage medium having stored therein instructions, which when executed by a portable electronic device with a touch screen display, cause the device to:

display a list of instant messaging conversations including a group conversation, wherein the group conversation includes a first multi-recipient identifier and a group conversation indicia;

in response to detecting a user selection of the group conversation, display a set of outgoing messages from a user of the device to multiple recipients in a chronological order and a second multi-recipient identifier;

receiving a new outgoing message for the group conversation entered by the user of the device through the touch screen display; and

in response to detecting a user request to send the new outgoing message to the multiple recipients, send the new outgoing message to the multiple recipients in the group conversation and append the new outgoing message to the set of outgoing messages displayed on the touch screen display.

22. A graphical user interface on a portable electronic device with a touch screen display, comprising:

a list of instant messaging conversations between a user of the device and one or more respective other persons, the list of conversations including a group conversation that includes a first multi-recipient identifier and a group conversation indicia, wherein;

in response to detecting a user selection of the group conversation, a set of outgoing messages from the user of the device to multiple recipients in a chronological order and a second multi-recipient identifier are displayed on the touch screen display;

a new outgoing message for the group conversation entered by the user of the device is received through the touch screen display; and

in response to detecting a user request to send the new outgoing message to the multiple recipients, the new outgoing message is sent to the multiple recipients in the group conversation and the new outgoing message is appended to the set of outgoing messages displayed on the touch screen display.

23. The graphical user interface of claim 22, wherein:

after the user request to send the new outgoing message is processed,

one or more user interface objects associated with a non-messaging application are displayed on the touch screen display;

an error message indicating a communication error in connection with sending the new outgoing message to at least one of the multiple recipients and a resend-message is displayed on the touch screen display; and

the new outgoing message is resent to the at least one of the multiple recipients in response to a user selection of the resend-message icon; and

the error message ceases to be displayed.

24. A portable electronic device with a touch screen display, comprising:

means for displaying a list of instant messaging conversations including a group conversation, wherein the group conversation includes a first multi-recipient identifier and a group conversation indicia;

means responsive to detecting a user selection of the group conversation, for displaying a set of outgoing messages from a user of the device to multiple recipients in a chronological order and a second multi-recipient identifier;

means for receiving a new outgoing message for the group conversation entered by the user of the device through the touch screen display; and

means responsive to detecting a user request to send the new outgoing message to the multiple recipients, sending the new outgoing message to the multiple recipients in the group conversation and appending the new outgoing message to the set of outgoing messages displayed on the touch screen display.