System for performing context-sensitive decisions about ideal communication modalities considering information about channel reliability

• US 7,103,806 B1
• Filed: 10/28/2002
• Issued: 09/05/2006
• Est. Priority Date: 06/04/1999
• Status: Expired due to Fees

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Corporation
• Inventors: Horvitz, Eric J.
• Primary Examiner(s): Iqbal, Nadeem
• Application Number:
  US10/281,547
• Time in Patent Office: 1,408 Days
• Field of Search: 714/43, 714/44, 714/47, 714/48, 714/37, 714/49, 709/220, 709/223, 709/225, 709/228
• US Class Current: 714/43
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 1/20 using signal quality detector
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 69/24 Negotiation of communication capabilities

Abstract

A system and method for identifying ideal channels for communications based on an analysis of communication channel reliability, communicating party preferences, and communicating party contexts is provided. The system attempts to optimize the utility of a communication based on inferred or directly accessed channel reliability data, communicating party preferences and communicating party contexts. Such optimization can be achieved using reliabilities, preferences and policies concerning handling the attempted contact based on a deterministic specification or through inferring reliability, context, content and task under uncertainty by employing decision-theoretic inferences. The methods may consider channels currently available as well as channels available at later times. Thus, the service can include automated rescheduling of communications based on a consideration of forecasts of reliability and availability. The approach may include the use of forecasts about the time required for a communication and the likelihood that a connection will be dropped or will lose fidelity over this period of time. The methods may also include a consideration of metadata within a standard schema that is transmitted along with a communication attempt, the metadata representing information about attributes like the potential communication channels, the identity of the contactor, the task at hand, and the context of the communicating parties. The invocation of the communication service may be performed in a variety of ways, including single button invocations, and via a communication service that is more deeply integrated with other applications and functionalities.

Claims

1. A system for increasing the utility of a communication between communicating parties, the system comprising:

a reliability analyzer that accesses or computes the reliability of a communication channel that makes available reliability information used in decisions about an expected utility of the communication channel, the reliability analyzer further comprises a reliability predictor that predicts at least one of parameters indicating that a communication channel will experience a loss of fidelity and a loss of connection, the reliability predictor predicts a likelihood L (L being a number) that a communication channel will have a reliability R (R being a number), where the likelihood L and the reliability R are considered in predicting the communication channel reliability; and

a channel manager that analyzes at least one of communicating party preferences and context to determine a preference-based expected utility of the communication, the channel manager employing the reliability information to facilitate determining if the communication channel maximizes the utility of the communication between the communicating parties.

2. The system of claim 1, the reliability predictor predicts a loss of connection as a function of an expected duration of a communication.

3. The system of claim 1, the reliability analyzer further comprises a reliability predictor that predicts at least one of likelihoods indicating probabilities that a communication channel will experience a loss of fidelity or a loss of connection.

4. The system of claim 1, the reliability analyzer further comprises a reliability predictor that predicts at least one of likelihoods indicating probabilities that a communication channel will experience a loss of fidelity or a loss of connection as a function of an expected duration of the communication.

5. The system of claim 1, the reliability predictor produces a likelihood function Lf=f(reliability) that describes a relationship between a degree of reliability and a likelihood of achieving the degree of reliability.

6. The system of claim 5, the likelihood function Lf is computed according to a likelihood, p(reliability|E₁),

where E₁ is observed and/or inferred evidence concerning a communication channel.

7. The system of claim 5, the reliability is computed according to the probability of

p(reliability|E₁, E₂),

where E₁ is observed and/or inferred evidence concerning a communication channel and where E₂ is observed and/or inferred evidence concerning communicating parties.

8. The system of claim 1 employing a decision model comprising at least one of:

an expected value decision about communications between parties;

a time parameter relating to the communications; and

a control decision for communications between the parties based in part on the expected value decision, the time parameter, and at least one of a context of at least one of the parties and a parameter associated with a reliability determination.

9. The system of claim 8, the context of the parties influencing at least one of a cost of interruption and a cost of deferral at different future times.

10. The system of claim 9, further comprising determining a cost of the use of at least one communication channel.

11. The system of claim 10, further comprising at least one of determining a utility of different communication channels, and determining a time for communications.

12. The system of claim 9, the cost of deferral is influenced by at least one of an identity of a party and one or more stated or sensed communication goals.

13. The system of claim 12, the identity and goals further influence a cost associated with a fidelity of a communication channel.

14. The system of claim 13, further comprising determining an influence of a party'"'"'s initial channel of contact and the party'"'"'s preferred channel.

15. The system of claim 8, the reliability determination includes an influence of a random variable representing reliability of communication channels on other random variables representing the likelihood of significant degradation of the fidelity of the channel or the frank loss of the channel via disconnection during a communication.

16. The system of claim 15, the other random variables in turn influence an overall expected value of employing that channel.

17. The system of claim 16, further comprising a random variable representing time expected to be required for a communication as a function of an identity and goals of the communication.

18. The system of claim 17, the random variable influences a probability distribution over the time of the communication.

19. The system of claim 18, further comprising at least one of the following variables that influence an expected utility of a communication channel decision:

a channel reliability variable;

a loss of fidelity variable;

a dropped connection variable;

a cost of loss of fidelity variable; and

a cost of dropped connection variable.

20. The system of claim 1, the reliability predictor predicts a reliability R according to the formula

R(channel)=f(CH_type, CM_length, CH_history, Context_sender,

Context_receiver),

where CH_type is the channel type, CM_length is the communication length, CH_history is the channel history, Context_sender is the context of the sender and Context_receiver is the context of the receiver.

21. The system of claim 1, the reliability predictor predicts a likelihood L according to the formula

L(R)=p(R(channel)|E₃),

where E₃ is observed and/or inferred evidence concerning the communication channel where the reliability predictor predicts a likelihood L according to the formula

L(R)=p(R(channel)|E₃,E₄),

where E₃ is observed and/or inferred evidence concerning the communication channel, and where E₄ is observed and/or inferred evidence concerning the communicating parties.

22. The system of claim 1, where in analyzing the reliability of a communication channel, the reliability analyzer considers a communication channel data comprising at least one of:

a reliability history of the communication channel, a reliability history of a current communication, a communication length, a communication type, a mean time between failure of the communication channel, an average failure duration of the communication channel, an average percent degradation of the communication channel, an atmospheric condition, a scheduled communication channel maintenance, a scheduled communication channel downtime and a context of the communicating parties.

23. The system of claim 1, the channel manager analyzes;

a communication channel data set,

a first communicator data set associated with a first communicating party, and

a second communicator data set associated with a second communicating party,

where the channel manager selects a subset of potential communication channels that are predicted to optimize the utility of a communication between the first communicating party and the second communicating party based on the analysis of the communication channel data set, the first communicator data set and the second communicator data set.

24. The system of claim 23, the potential communication channels comprise at least one of:

telephone channels, facsimile channels, computer channels, paging channels, radio channels, television channels and personal channels.

25. The system of claim 23, the channel manager performs at least one of:

scheduling a communication, calendaring a communication, presenting information concerning a potential communication, canceling a communication and initiating a communication.

26. The system of claim 23, the first communicator data set comprises:

a contactor context data, and

a contactor preference data.

27. The system of claim 23, the second communicator data set comprises:

a contactee context data, and

a contactee preference data.

28. The system of claim 1, the channel manager further comprises;

a preference resolver that analyzes at least two of a contactee preference data, a contactor preference data and an organizational preference data to produce a resolved preference data, where the resolved preference data accords different weights to at least one of the contactee preference data, the contactor preference data and the organizational preference data based on one or more relationships between a contactee, a contactor and an organization;

a context analyzer that analyzes a contactee context data and a contactor context data to produce an analyzed context data;

a channel analyzer that analyzes a communication channel data set, and produces an analyzed communication channel data set; and

a communication channel selector that selects a subset of communication channels between the contactor and the contactee based on the resolved preference data, the analyzed context data, the analyzed communication channel data set and an input from the channel analyzer and/or reliability prediction integrator.

29. The system of claim 28, where a likelihood L and/or a reliability R are employed to modify the subset of communication channels.

30. The system of claim 1, further comprises at least one of:

a hardware reliability history data, a hardware capacity data, a hardware bandwidth data, a hardware availability data, a hardware status data, a hardware cost data, a hardware revision data, a hardware metadata, a software reliability history data, a software capacity data, a software version data, a software cost data, a software capability data, a time of day data, a current activity data, a current task data, a calendar data, a location data, a contactor to contactee history data, an attentional status data, a contactor class data, and an environment data.

31. A method for identifying a communication channel that facilitates optimizing the utility of a communication between communicating parties, the method comprising:

identifying a potential communication channel for the communication; and

determining an expected utility associated with the communication based on analyzing communication channel reliability, communicating party preferences, and communicating party context, where data associated with the communication channel reliability is stored in a communication channel data comprising;

deterministic data associated with the communication channel; and

inference data associated with the communication channel.

32. The method of claim 31, where analyzing the communication channel reliability comprises analyzing predicted communication channel reliability.

33. The method of claim 32, where the communication channel reliability is based upon at least one of:

a reliability history of the communication channel, a reliability history of a current communication, a communication length, a communication type, a mean time between failure of the communication channel, an average failure duration of the communication channel, an average percent degradation of the communication channel, an atmospheric condition associated with the communication channel, a scheduled communication channel maintenance and a scheduled communication channel downtime.

34. The method of claim 31, where the communicating party preferences comprise at least one of:

a contactor preference data and a contactee preference data.

35. The method of claim 34, where the communicating party context comprises at least one of:

a contactor context data and a contactee context data.

36. The method of claim 35, where determining the expected utility comprises:

analyzing the contactor preference data, the contactor context data, the contactee preference data and/or the contactee context data to determine one or more relationships;

selecting one or more rules based, at least in part, on the relationships;

applying the one or more rules to determine a conditional expected utility;

determining an expected reliability of the communication channel based on at least one of the communication channel data and the relationships; and

updating the conditional expected utility based on the expected reliability of the communication channel.

37. The method of claim 35, where determining the expected utility comprises:

analyzing the communication channel reliability, the contactor preference data, the contactor context data, the contactee preference data and the contactee context data to determine one or more relationships;

selecting one or more rules based, at least in part, on the relationships;

determining an expected reliability of the communication channel based on at least one of;

the communication channel data and the relationships; and

applying the one or more rules to determine an expected utility.

38. The method of claim 31, the communicating party preferences comprising:

deterministic data associated with known preferences; and

prediction data associated with unknown preferences.

39. The method of claim 31, the communicating party context comprising:

deterministic data associated with known context; and

prediction data associated with unknown context.

40. The method of claim 31, where determining an expected utility comprises:

analyzing the communication channel reliability, the communicating party preferences and the communicating party context to identify available data values;

analyzing the communication channel reliability, the communicating party preferences and the communicating party context to identify one or more missing data values;

inferring a value for the one or more missing data values; and

determining an expected reliability of the communication channel based on the available and inferred data values.

41. The method of claim 40, where the value for the one or more missing data values is inferred by decision-theoretic formulae.

42. A method for identifying an optimal communication between one or more communicating parties, comprising:

determining one or more current expected utilities associated with the communication based, at least in part, on a current communication channel data, on a current contactor data, and a current contactee data, where the current communication channel data comprises a reliability data, where the reliability data comprises deterministic data associated with the current communication channel and inference data associated with the current communication channel, where the current contactee data comprises a current state data and where the current contactor data comprises a current state data;

determining one or more predicted expected utilities associated with the communication based, at least in part, on a predicted communication channel data, a predicted contactor data and a predicted contactee data, where the predicted communication channel data comprises a predicted reliability data, where the predicted contactee data comprises a predicted state data and the predicted contactor data comprises a predicted state data;

comparing one or more current expected utilities to one or more predicted expected utilities; and

ranking the current expected utilities with the predicted expedited utilities, where the ranking of the predicted expected utilities is weighted by one or more costs associated with delaying the communication to a point in time associated with the predicted expected utility.

43. A system for optimizing one or more contacts between one or more parties, comprising:

means for determining one or more expected utilities associated with the contact based, at least in part, on data associated with one or more contactors, data associated with one or more contactees and data associated with one or more communication channels, where the data associated with the communication channels comprises at least reliability data, where the reliability data comprises deterministic data associated with the one or more communication channels and inference data associated with the one or more communication channels; and

means for identifying the contact.

44. The system of claim 43, comprising:

means for applying one or more inference formulae to infer probabilities associated with;

one or more pieces of data associated with a contactor, one or more pieces of data associated with a contactee, and one or more pieces of data associated with a communication channel.

45. A computer readable medium storing computer executable components for a system that facilitates increasing the utility of a communication between entities, the system comprising:

an identifying computer component that identifies a plurality of communication channels that facilitate communication between at least two entities, and

an analyzing component that analyzes a communication channel data set, a first communication data set associated with a first entity, and a second communication data set associated with a second entity, the analyzing component identifying a subset of the plurality of channels that will increase the utility of the communication based at least in part on analysis of the communication channel data set, the first communication data set and the second communication data set, where the communication channel data set comprises at least reliability data, where the reliability data in the communication channel data set comprises;

deterministic data associated with the communication channel;

inference data associated with the communication channel.

46. A computer readable medium containing computer executable instructions for performing a process for identifying one or more communication channels that will maximize the utility of one or more communications between one or more communicating parties, the process comprising:

identifying one or more candidate communication channels between the communicating parties; and

determining one or more expected utilities associated with a communication between the communicating parties based, at least in part, on contactor data, contactee data and communication channel data, where the communication channel data comprises at least reliability data, where the reliability data in the communication channel data comprises;

deterministic data associated with the one or more candidate communication channels;

inference data associated with the one or more candidate communication channels.