EXTENSIBLE MECHANISM FOR CONVEYING FEATURE CAPABILITIES IN CONVERSATION SYSTEMS

• US 20110154222A1
• Filed: 12/18/2009
• Published: 06/23/2011
• Est. Priority Date: 12/18/2009
• Status: Abandoned Application

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Corporation
• Inventors: Basu, Pradipta Kumar, Srinivasan, Srivatsa, Anantharaman, Sundar, Zhang, Gene
• Application Number:
  US12/641,689
• Publication Number:
  US 20110154222A1
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 715/753
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 12/1818 Conference organisation arrangements, e.g. handling schedules, setting up parameters needed by nodes to attend a conference, booking network resources, notifying involved parties
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 12/1827 Network arrangements for conference optimisation or adaptation
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 51/56 Unified messaging, e.g. interactions between e-mail, instant messaging or converged IP messaging [CPM]
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 65/1089 by adding media; by removing media
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 65/1104 Session initiation protocol [SIP]
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 65/403 Arrangements for multi-party communication, e.g. for conferences data switching systems for conference H04L12/18; arrangements for connecting several subscribers to a common circuit, i.e. affording conference facilities H04M3/56; television conferencing systems H04N7/15
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 65/65 Network streaming protocols, e.g. real-time transport protocol [RTP] or real-time control protocol [RTCP]
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 65/756 adapting media to device capabilities

Abstract

Feature capabilities of conversation clients are conveyed to participants in a conversation such that real time decisions can be made and a common set of capabilities are selected to be used in the conversation. User interfaces of participating clients are then adjusted to reflect those capabilities. Further decisions and adjustments may be performed during the conversation in response to changes in participating clients and their capabilities.

Claims

1. A method to be executed at least in part in a computing device for conveying feature capability in a conversation facilitated by an enhanced communication system, the method comprising:

determining feature capabilities associated with an endpoint;

providing the feature capabilities to at least one other endpoint to participate in the conversation;

selecting a common set of feature capabilities to be employed in the conversation;

adjusting user interfaces of the endpoints based on the selected feature capabilities; and

establishing the conversation using the selected feature capabilities.

2. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

determining a change in the feature capabilities associated with at least one of the endpoints participating in the conversation;

modifying the selected set of feature capabilities based on the change; and

adjusting the user interfaces of the participating endpoints while the conversation is being facilitated.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein the feature capabilities are associated with at least one from a set of:

an endpoint device, an endpoint application, a system capability, a system resource availability, an organization policy, and a user credential.

4. The method of claim 1, wherein the common set of feature capabilities is selected in a distributed manner by the participating endpoints.

5. The method of claim 1, wherein the common set of feature capabilities is selected in a central manner by a server managing the conversation.

6. The method of claim 5, wherein the server managing the conversation provides information about the selected feature capabilities to the participating endpoints such that each endpoint adjusts its respective user interface.

7. The method of claim 1, wherein a portion of the feature capabilities applicable to an entire conversation session are provided as session level capabilities and another portion of the feature capabilities applicable to distinct modalities of the conversation are provided as modality level capabilities for respective modalities employing a communication protocol.

8. The method of claim 7, wherein the communication protocol includes one of:

Session Initiation Protocol (SIP), Session Description Protocol (SDP), Real-time Transport Protocol (RTP), and Remote Desktop Protocol (RDP).

9. The method of claim 1, wherein adjusting the user interfaces includes at least one from a set of:

hiding a control;

rendering a control inoperable; and

adding a new control.

10. The method of claim 9, wherein the control includes one of:

a graphical element, a textual element, a new window, a pop-up window, and a hovering window.

11. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

saving at least one of selected feature capabilities and individual endpoint capabilities for use during the established conversation.

12. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

saving at least one of selected feature capabilities and individual endpoint capabilities for use in future conversations.

13. A communication system for facilitating multi-modal conversations with feature capability selection, the system comprising:

a plurality of endpoints configured to facilitate multi-modal communications employing Session Initiation Protocol (SIP), the endpoints performing actions including;

determine feature capabilities associated with each endpoint;

publish the feature capabilities to other endpoint invited to participate in the conversation;

select a common set of feature capabilities to be employed in the conversation;

adjust respective user interfaces based on the selected feature capabilities;

establish the conversation using the selected feature capabilities;

in response to a change associated with at least one of the endpoints participating in the conversation, determine the change in the feature capabilities;

modify the selected set of feature capabilities based on the change; and

adjust the respective user interfaces while the conversation is being facilitated.

14. The system of claim 13, further comprising a communication server configured to manage the conversation between the endpoints of the system, wherein the communication server controls the publishing of the feature capabilities and the selection of the common set of feature capabilities facilitating conveyance of feature capability information among the endpoints employing SIP.

15. The system of claim 13, wherein the feature capabilities are conveyed in SIP messages as a capability attribute and a value for the capability attribute, the value being selected among available options according to a predefined schema.

16. The system of claim 13, wherein the change in the feature capabilities is caused by at least one from a set of:

a participant activating a new endpoint, a participant deactivating an existing endpoint, a participant adding a peripheral, a participant removing an existing peripheral, a programming change, a network condition change, an organization policy change, and a permission status change.

17. A computer-readable storage medium with instructions stored thereon for conveying feature capability in a conversation facilitated by an enhanced communication system, the instructions comprising:

determining feature capabilities associated with each endpoint attempting to participate in the conversation;

conveying the determined feature capabilities to other endpoints attempting to participate in the conversation;

selecting a common set of feature capabilities to be employed in the conversation, wherein the common set of feature capabilities are selected based on at least one from a set of;

endpoint device characteristics, endpoint application characteristics, a system capability, a system resource availability, an organization policy, and a user credential;

adjusting user interfaces of the endpoints based on the selected feature capabilities;

establishing the conversation using the selected feature capabilities;

determining a change in the feature capabilities associated with at least one of the endpoints participating in the conversation;

modifying the selected set of feature capabilities based on the change; and

conveying the changed set of feature capabilities to participating endpoints such that respective user interfaces of the participating endpoints are adjusted while the conversation is being facilitated.

18. The computer-readable medium of claim 17, wherein the feature capabilities are conveyed employing a version identifier for respective endpoints.

19. The computer-readable medium of claim 18, wherein the endpoints are configured to determine the conveyed feature capabilities through one of:

preprogrammed information associated with the version identifier and retrieving feature capability information from a database based on the conveyed version identifier.

20. The computer-readable medium of claim 17, wherein the conversation is multi-modal and the modalities include at least one from a set of:

a voice communication, a video communication, a white-boarding session, a data sharing session, an application sharing session, a text messaging session, and an email exchange.