Managing rich presence collections

• US 7,650,337 B2
• Filed: 03/31/2006
• Issued: 01/19/2010
• Est. Priority Date: 07/26/2005
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Corporation
• Inventors: Cox, Shaun D.
• Primary Examiner(s): Wong; Don
• Assistant Examiner(s): Brown; Sheree N
• Application Number:
  US11/278,364
• Publication Number:
  US 20070100831A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,390 Days
• Field of Search: 707/9, 370/352, 455/412.1, 455/41.2, 709225-227, 709/217
• US Class Current: 707/783
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/958 Organisation or management of web site content, e.g. publishing, maintaining pages or automatic linking
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/00 Administration; Management
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/107 Computer-aided management of electronic mailing [e-mailing]
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/54 Presence management, e.g. monitoring or registration for receipt of user log-on information, or the connection status of the users

Abstract

A method and system for increasing the computational and network efficiency of presence servers having collections of publications is provided. The presence system uses several techniques that enable a presence server to provide rich presence information without requiring expensive processing. First, the presence system accepts batches of publication updates in a single presence update request. Similarly, the presence system accepts batches of subscription requests. Next, the presence system supports new expiration types for publication update requests that eliminate the need for a publishing user to continually refresh presence information that has not changed. Finally, the presence system accepts access lists that contain membership groups rather than an individual list of users that are to have access to a particular presence collection.

Claims

1. A system of modifying access to presence information, the system including a processor and memory storing:

a plurality of stored containers, each stored container including a member list comprising members who have access to stored publications;

a receive membership update component that receives a request message via a Session Initiation Protocol (SIP) for Instant Messaging and Presence Leveraging Extensions (SIMPLE) to update the member list of one of the plurality of stored containers, the request message comprising;

a container section represented by extensible markup language (XML), the container section including;

a container identifier represented by XML, the container identifier identifying the one of the plurality of stored containers;

a container version number represented by XML, the container version number identifying a version number of the one of the plurality of stored containers; and

a member group represented by XML, the member group for which access to the publications stored in the one of the plurality of stored containers is to be granted, the member group comprising an attribute specifying a type of user group, wherein the types is selected from a plurality of predefined members group types;

a modify access component that in response to receiving the request modifies the member list of the one of the plurality of stored containers by adding the member group to the member list of the one of the plurality of stored containers.

2. The system of claim 1 wherein the member group specifies a domain.

3. The system of claim 1, wherein the member group specifies a contact list of an owner of the one of the plurality of stored containers.

4. The system of claim 1 wherein the member group specifies federated member servers.

5. The system of claim 1 wherein the member group specifies a member group defined by an entity external to the system.

6. The system of claim 1 wherein the request contains more than one member group for which access is to be modified.

7. The system of claim 1 wherein the request contains more than one container identifier for which access is to be modified.

8. The system of claim 7 wherein the publications belong to different publishing users.

9. The system of claim 1 further comprising a receive subscription request component that receives a request to subscribe to publications stored in the one of the plurality of stored containers.

10. The system of claim 9 wherein the stored containers and member lists create a hierarchy of presence information available to subscribing users having a level of detail that differs for different subscribing user.

11. The system of claim 1 wherein the request uses extensions to the SIP protocol.

12. The system of claim 1 wherein some components of the system are located at a presence server and other components are located at a presence client.

13. A method of modifying access to presence information, in the method comprising:

receiving a request message to update a member list of a container, the request message being sent via a Session Initiation Protocol (SIP) for Instant Messaging and Presence Leveraging Extensions (SIMPLE), the request message comprising;

a container section represented by extensible markup language (XML), the container section including;

a container identifier represented by XML that identifies the container whose member list is to be modified; and

a member group represented by XML for which access is to be modified, the member group including a type, the type selected from a predefined list of types, the types including;

a federated type, the federated type indicating lists of users provided by a plurality of federated membership servers,

a public cloud type, the public cloud type indicating a list of users provided by an external entity; and

a same enterprise type, the same enterprise type indicating all users within the same enterprise as a publishing user; and

in response to receiving the request, updating the member list of the container to modify access of the member group.

14. The method of claim 13 wherein the request contains more than one member group for which access is to be modified.

15. A computer-readable storage medium storing computer executable instructions that when executed perform a method for modifying access by members within a member list to presence information, the method comprising:

sending a request to publish presence information to a presence service, the request being sent via a Session Initiation Protocol (SIP) for Instant Messaging and Presence Leveraging Extensions (SIMPLE) and the request comprising;

a container section represented by extensible markup language (XML), the container section including;

a container identifier represented by XML that identifies a container whose member list is to be modified, the container storing presence information;

a container version number represented by XML that identifies a version of the container whose member list is to be modified; and

a member group represented by XML for which access is to be modified, the member group including an attribute indicating a type of group;

wherein the request instructs the presence service to modify access of users within the member group to the presence information.

16. The computer-readable storage medium of claim 15 wherein the member group specifies a container owner'"'"'s contact list.

17. The computer-readable storage medium of claim 15 wherein the request contains more than one container section identifying more than one container for which access is to be modified.