TECHNIQUES FOR VISUAL INTEGRATION OF MEETING SPACE IN CALENDAR SYSTEMS

• US 20100125478A1
• Filed: 11/14/2008
• Published: 05/20/2010
• Est. Priority Date: 11/14/2008
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Micro Focus Software, Inc. (Open Text Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Novell Incorporated (Open Text Corporation)
• Inventors: Bisht, Jitender
• Granted Patent: US 8,799,048 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 705/8
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/02 Reservations, e.g. for tickets, services or events
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/109 Time management, e.g. calendars, reminders, meetings or time accounting
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/1093 Calendar-based scheduling for persons or groups
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/1095 Meeting or appointment
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/021 Services related to particular areas, e.g. point of interest [POI] services, venue services or geofences
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/024 Guidance services
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/33 for indoor environments, e.g. buildings
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/60 Subscription-based services using application servers or record carriers, e.g. SIM application toolkits

Abstract

Techniques for visual integration of meeting spaces within a calendar system are presented. A meeting room can be viewed via a map and selected for scheduling a meeting. The map depicts the location of the meeting room within a facility of an enterprise. A meeting scheduler visually sees the meeting room within the map and can select the meeting room and acquire details about the meeting room.

Claims

1. A machine-implemented method, comprising:

presenting an interactive map of an enterprise when a meeting room is requested for a meeting, wherein the interactive map is presented within a calendar application of an email client;

depicting within the calendar application an availability of the meeting room that is selected by the user from the interactive map; and

scheduling the meeting with the meeting room for a time slot that includes the availability of the meeting room and other attendees to the meeting.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein presenting further includes providing physical dimensions of the meeting room and seating capacity of the meeting room within the calendar application when the user selects the meeting room.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein presenting further includes providing resources available in the meeting room within the calendar application when the user selects the meeting room.

4. The method of claim 1, wherein scheduling further includes sending email invitations to the other attendees when the meeting is scheduled via the email client.

5. The method of claim 4 further comprising, including a link within the email invitations that provide the interactive map.

6. The method of claim 4 further comprising, customizing each email invitation to a particular attendee, where each customized email invitation includes directions from a particular location of a particular attendee to the meeting room.

7. The method of claim 4 further comprising, presenting the interactive map within the email invitations with the location of the meeting room highlighted within the presented interactive map.

8. A machine-implemented method, comprising:

receiving, via an email, a meeting request for a time slot and at a meeting room; and

viewing, via the email, a map that was generated with the meeting request and generated by a calendar application, wherein the map visually depicts a physical location for the meeting room within an enterprise.

9. The method of claim 8, wherein viewing further includes providing text directions from a location of an attendee that is a recipient of the email to a meeting room location.

10. The method of claim 8, wherein viewing further includes providing the map as an attachment to the email or a link that when activated presents the map within a World-Wide Web (WWW) browser.

11. The method of claim 8, wherein viewing further includes providing the map as an interactive map that the recipient of the email can interact with to gather additional information for the meeting room.

12. The method of claim 11, wherein providing further includes presenting physical dimensions and seating capacity for the meeting room when an attendee that receives the email clicks the map on a location that designates the meeting room.

13. The method of claim 11, wherein providing further includes presenting resources available within the meeting room when an attendee that receives the email clicks the map on a location that designates the meeting room.

14. The method of claim 11, wherein providing further includes permitting an attendee to identify a present location for the attendee within the map and in response thereto the interactive map draws a path from the present location to a meeting room location that represents a position of the meeting room.

15. A machine-implemented system, comprising:

an interactive map implemented in a computer-readable storage medium and to process on a network; and

a calendar service implemented in a computer-readable storage medium and to process on the network;

wherein the interactive map is automatically activated within a calendar application of an email client by the calendar service to visually depict meeting rooms of a facility for an enterprise, and wherein the calendar service depicts within the interactive map availability of the meeting rooms and locations for the meeting rooms within the facility, and wherein a scheduler can select a particular meeting room for a particular meeting that the scheduler schedules within the calendar application by activating a link for the particular meeting room at a particular time slot depicted within the interactive map.

16. The system of claim 15, wherein calendar application and calendar service are integrated within an email system.

17. The system of claim 15, wherein the interactive map includes links to other interactive maps for other facilities of an enterprise.

18. The system of claim 15, wherein the interactive map includes at least one link to a video camera that provides a real-time feed to view the particular meeting room.

19. The system of claim 15, wherein the interactive map is included within emails sent to attendees of the particular meeting.

20. The system of claim 15, wherein the interactive map includes links and when the links are activated include information describing resources of each of the meeting rooms, seating capacities for each of the meeting rooms, and/or physical dimensions for each of the meeting rooms.

21. A machine-implemented system, comprising:

an email client implemented in a computer-readable storage medium and to process on a network; and

a calendar system implemented in a computer-readable storage medium and to process on the network;

wherein the email client integrates the calendar system, and wherein the calendar system permits a meeting room to be located, scheduled, and viewed via a map of a facility where the meeting room is located.

22. The system of claim 21, wherein the map is an interactive map that permits a user to view an availability of the meeting room, discover resources associated with the meeting room, schedule the meeting room to a meeting for a particular time slot, and acquire directions from a present location to the meeting room.

23. The system of claim 21, wherein the map is included with emails sent to attendees of a particular meeting that is scheduled via the calendar system for the meeting room.

24. The system of claim 23, wherein the emails include directions from locations of each of the attendees to a meeting room location for the meeting room and paths for the directions are highlighted within the map.

25. The system of claim 21, wherein calendar system includes a search service that permits a user to search the map for the meeting room by defining user-defined search criteria for seating capacity of the meeting room and/or equipment or resources available with the meeting room.

26. The system of claim 25, wherein search results from a user-search that utilizes the user-defined search criteria presents a link to the meeting room that is nearest in proximity to a location for the user, the link presented within the map and when activated presents an image of the meeting room to the user.