CONVERSATION BUBBLES INCLUDING VISUAL CUES FOR THREADED MESSAGING APPLICATIONS

• US 20100162138A1
• Filed: 12/23/2008
• Published: 06/24/2010
• Est. Priority Date: 12/23/2008
• Status: Abandoned Application

• Current Assignee: RCS IP LLC
• Original Assignee: AT&T Mobility II LLC (AT&T, Inc.)
• Inventors: Bailey, Matthew, Klonsky, Andrew, Pascal, Kristin Marie
• Application Number:
  US12/343,402
• Publication Number:
  US 20100162138A1
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 715/758
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/107 Computer-aided management of electronic mailing [e-mailing]

Abstract

The claimed subject matter provides for systems, devices, and methods employing one or more visual cues to conversation bubbles in a threaded messaging environment. As used herein, a threaded messaging environment can include “texting” and other messaging protocols. The visual cues can include indexed conversation bubble tails, color drop-shadow effects, and dynamic adaptive conversation bubble footprints. These visual cues can facilitate rapid visual user comprehension of messages related to particular conversants, the extents of a message, or combinations thereof.

Claims

1. A system that presents visual cues to a user in a threaded messaging environment to facilitate correlating messages to particular conversants, comprising:

a message source designation component that provides access to information relating to the source of a message;

a communication bubble rendering component, that can at least in part facilitate rendering a communication bubble, further comprising at least one of;

a conversation bubble tail component facilitating adaptation of one or more conversation bubble tails based at least in part on the source of the message;

a conversation bubble drop-shadow component facilitating adaptation of one or more conversation bubble drop-shadows; and

a conversation bubble footprint component facilitating adaptation of one or more conversation bubble footprints; and

wherein at least one of a conversation bubble tail, a conversation bubble drop-shadow, an adapted conversation bubble footprint, or combination thereof is included in a rendered conversation bubble made accessible to at least one conversant by presentation on a display device.

2. The system of claim 1, further comprising a message content component that facilities access to information relating to message content, message content objects, or combinations thereof, such that said information can be accessed by the conversation bubble footprint component to at least in part facilitate adaptation of one or more conversation bubble footprint renderings to encompass the message content, content object, or combination thereof.

3. The system of claim 2, wherein adaptation of the one or more conversation bubble footprint renderings to encompass the message content, content object, or combination thereof is performed dynamically in response to fluctuations in the state of a related message content, content object, or combination thereof.

4. The system of claim 3, wherein the fluctuations in the state of the related message content, content object, or combination thereof is based at least in part on a change in the focus state of the user in the threaded messaging environment, a change in the content or content object related to the execution of computer based instructions related to the content or content object, or combinations thereof.

5. The system of claim 1, wherein the rendered conversation bubble includes an indexed conversation bubble tail, said index being related to a particular conversant of the threaded messaging environment, and wherein other messages in the threaded message environment having conversation bubbles with similar indexing are more likely to be attributable to the same conversant.

6. The system of claim 5, wherein the index is related to a horizontal indentation of the conversation bubble tail from at least one predetermined horizontal reference point of the display.

7. The system of claim 1, wherein the rendered conversation bubble includes a conversation bubble drop-shadow having at least one visually identifiable characteristic, said drop-shadow being related to a particular conversant of the threaded messaging environment, and wherein other messages in the threaded message environment having conversation bubbles with drop-shadows with similar identifiable characteristics are more likely to be attributable to the same conversant.

8. The system of claim 7, wherein the at least one visually identifiable characteristic includes at least one of drop-shadow size, drop-shadow perceived depth, drop-shadow opacity, drop-shadow color, or some combination thereof.

9. The system of claim 1, wherein:

the rendered conversation bubble includes at least a conversation bubble tail and a conversation bubble drop-shadow in a rendered conversation bubble;

the conversation bubble tail being indexed, said index being related to a particular conversant of the threaded messaging environment;

the conversation bubble drop-shadow includes at least one visually identifiable characteristic, and

the combination of drop-shadow characteristics and tail indexing is related to a particular conversant of the threaded messaging environment such that other messages in the threaded message environment having conversation bubbles with similar drop-shadowing characteristics and indexing are more likely to be attributable to the same conversant.

10. The system of claim 1, wherein the conversation bubble tail component further comprises at least one of:

a time component to facilitate inclusion of a time indicator in a rendered conversation bubble; and

a name component to facilitate inclusion of a name indicator in a rendered conversation bubble.

11. The system of claim 10, wherein a rendered time indicator, if any, indicates time received, time sent, date, day, time since last message from the same conversant, or some combination thereof, and wherein a rendered name indicator, if any, indicates the relevant conversant'"'"'s first name, last name, nickname, phone number, identification number, symbol, image, caricature, or some combination thereof.

12. A method for presenting visual cues to a user in a threaded messaging environment to facilitate correlating messages to particular conversants, comprising:

determining a message source designation to facilitate accessing information related at least in part to a particular conversant;

applying a conversation bubble tail based at least in part on information relating to the source designation of the message;

applying a conversation bubble drop-shadow based at least in part on information relating to the source designation of the message;

rendering a conversation bubble including the applied conversation bubble tail and conversation bubble drop-shadow; and

making the rendered conversation bubble accessible to at least one conversant by presentation on a display device.

13. The method of claim 12, wherein the conversation bubble tail is indexed, said index being related to a particular conversant of the threaded messaging environment, and wherein other messages in the threaded message environment having conversation bubbles with similar indexing are more likely to be attributable to the same conversant.

14. The method of claim 13, wherein the conversation bubble tail index is based on a percentage of the width of a display area of the display device in the normal reading direction of the displayed message.

15. The method of claim 12, wherein the conversation bubble drop-shadow has at least one visually identifiable characteristic, said drop-shadow being related to a particular conversant of the threaded messaging environment, and wherein other messages in the threaded message environment having conversation bubbles with drop-shadows with similar identifiable characteristics are more likely to be attributable to the same conversant.

16. The method of claim 15, wherein the at least one visually identifiable characteristic includes at least one of drop-shadow size, drop-shadow perceived depth, drop-shadow opacity, drop-shadow color, or some combination thereof.

17. The method of claim 12 further comprising:

determining the content of a message;

determining if the content will be resized to accommodate available display area of the display device;

adapting the conversation bubble footprint to encompass the message content to facilitate visual distinction of the contents of the message from other messages in the threaded messaging environment and thereby better relating the content of the message to a particular conversant.

18. The method of claim 17, wherein adapting of the conversation bubble footprint is dynamic with regard to fluctuations in the state of message content.

19. The method of claim 18, wherein the fluctuations in the state of the message content is based at least in part on a change in the focus state of the user in the threaded messaging environment, a change in the content related to the execution of computer based instructions related to the content, or combinations thereof.

20. A computer based system embodied in a mobile device, that presents visual cues to a user participating in a group threaded messaging conversation, to facilitate the user in attributing messages with similar visual cues to particular conversants of the group threaded messaging conversation, comprising:

a conversant identification component that associates a particular conversant with a message received for the group threaded messaging conversation;

a communication bubble rendering component, that can at least in part facilitate rendering a communication bubble, further comprising;

a conversation bubble indexed tail component facilitating adaptation of one or more conversation bubble tails based to include indexing related at least in part to the identification of the conversant associated with the message;

a conversation bubble color drop-shadow component facilitating adaptation of one or more conversation bubble drop-shadows to include color related at least in part to the identification of the conversant associated with the message; and

a dynamic conversation bubble footprint component facilitating dynamic adaptation of one or more conversation bubble footprints of the group threaded messaging conversation to encompass the contents of the message as the state of the contents of a message fluctuate, wherein the fluctuations in the state of the message content is based at least in part on a change in the determined focus state of the user in the threaded messaging conversation, a change in the content related to the execution of computer based instructions related to the content, or combinations thereof, and

wherein an adapted conversation bubble is rendered and made accessible to at least one conversant by presentation on a display device.