Notification platform architecture

• US 7,975,015 B2
• Filed: 05/16/2007
• Issued: 07/05/2011
• Est. Priority Date: 03/16/2001
• Status: Expired due to Fees

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Corporation
• Inventors: Jacobs, Andrew W., Kadie, Carl M., Hovel, David O., Horvitz, Eric J.
• Primary Examiner(s): Dollinger; Tonia L. M.
• Assistant Examiner(s): MIRZA, ADNAN M
• Application Number:
  US11/749,508
• Publication Number:
  US 20070214228A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,511 Days
• Field of Search: 709/203, 709/207, 709/219, 709/223, 709/224
• US Class Current: 709/207
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/107 Computer-aided management of electronic mailing [e-mailing]

Abstract

The present invention relates to a system and methodology to enable a variety of information associated with one or more notification sources to be directed to one or more notification sinks via a notification platform architecture. The architecture includes a context analyzer for determining a user'"'"'s state such as location and attentional focus, wherein the user'"'"'s state is employed by a notification manager to make decisions regarding what, when and how information generated by the notification sources should be forwarded to the notification sinks, for example. These decisions can include a cost benefit analysis wherein considerations are given as to whether the benefits of notifying the user are outweighed by the costs of disrupting the user. Decision-theoretic policies and/or somewhat less formal heuristic policies can be employed to enable the decision-making process within the notification manager.

Claims

1. A notification system, comprising:

a context analyzer to determine a context associated with an entity that utilizes a plurality of devices, wherein the determined context comprises accessibility to one or more of the plurality of devices; and

a notification manager configured to;

based on the determined context, determine which device of the plurality of devices is currently accessible to the entity and whether the entity is currently available to accept a notification of one or more notifications generated by at least one notification source for the entity based at least in part on the determined context at the determined device,

determine a value of the notification to the entity that is based on a degree of truncation and/or summarization of content of the notification when the notification is conveyed to the determined device, wherein the degree of truncation and/or summarization of the content of the notification is based at least in part on a type of the determined device; and

when it is determined that the entity is currently available to accept the notification at the determined device and based on the determined value of the notification to the entity, convey the notification to the determined device.

2. The system of claim 1,

wherein the context analyzer accesses and stores information regarding the context and the notification parameters.

3. The system of claim 2, wherein the entity comprises at least one of a user, an agent, a process, a server, a computer, a machine, a company, an organization, a business, a computer program, a service, and a thread.

4. The system of claim 2, wherein the context analyzer comprises a notification parameters store to store default notification preferences for the entity as a profile.

5. The system of claim 2, wherein the context analyzer determines a current context of a user, based on at least one context source.

6. The system of claim 5, wherein the at least one context source comprises one or more of:

visual information of the user, desktop information of the user, personal-information-manager (PIM) information of the user, current time and day, mobile device usage of the user, and location of the user.

7. The system of claim 5, wherein the context analyzer determines the current context based on the at least one context source by utilizing one or more of:

a statistical model, a profile, a direct access of user location, and a real-time user specification of user state.

8. The system of claim 2, wherein the notifications generated by the at least one notification source comprises one or more of:

e-mail, instant messaging, system messages, automated assistance, results from persistent, ongoing queries to one or more search facilities or services, updates to the number or content of documents available in a shared file system, updates about organizational information, information that comes available that is related to a specified content, document or topic, Internet-related information and news services, people availability, location, proximity, scheduling queries, proximities and locations of companies and organizations.

9. The system of claim 2, wherein the at least one notification source has one or more parameters associated with it representing a time criticality of the current notification generated by the notification source indicating time-dependent decay of the value of the information contained in the current notification.

10. The system of claim 2, wherein the at least one notification source is associated with at least one second parameter representing a novelty of the notification indicating a likelihood of whether an entity already knows information in the notification.

11. The system of claim 2, wherein the at least one notification source comprises at least one of:

a pull-type notification source, and a push-type notification source.

12. The system of claim 1, wherein the device comprises one or more of:

a desktop computer, a PDA, a cellular phone, a pager, and an automotive computerized device.

13. The system of claim 1, wherein the device has a parameter associated with it representing a device class of the device indicating a type of device.

14. The system of claim 1, wherein the notification manager performs a decision-theoretic analysis of the notifications from the at least one notification source based on the information stored by the context analyzer to determine which of the notifications from the at least one notification source should be conveyed to which of the plurality of devices.

15. The system of claim 1, wherein the notification manager performs a heuristic analysis of notifications from the at least one notification source based on the information stored by the context analyzer to determine which of the notifications from the at least one notification source should be conveyed to which of the plurality of devices.

19. The system of claim 1, wherein the context analyzer determines the context associated with the entity based on at least one current activity of the entity.

16. A notification system, comprising:

a context analyzer to store information regarding notification parameters, and comprising;

a user notification parameters store to store default notification preferences for a user that utilizes a plurality of notification sinks that provide notifications to the user, and

a user context module to determine a current context of the user, based on at least one context source comprising information on accessibility to the user of at least one of the plurality of notification sinks, wherein the current context comprises a current location of the user and a current attentional state of the user;

at least one notification source to generate at least one notification intended for the user wherein the at least one notification source is associated with the notification parameters; and

a notification manager to;

based on the determined current context of the user, determine which notification sink of the plurality of notification sinks is currently accessible to the user and whether the user is available to accept the at least one notification generated by the at least one notification source at the determined notification sink,

determine a value of the at least one notification to the user that is based on a degree of truncation and/or summarization of content of the at least one notification when the notification is conveyed to the determined notification sink, and

when it is determined that the user is at a location and in a current attentional state such that the user is available to accept the at least one notification at the determined notification sink and based on the determined value of the at least one notification to the user, provide the at least one notification to the determined notification sink, wherein the notification sink is determined based on the information stored in the context analyzer, and based on a device class of the notification sink.

18. The system of claim 16, wherein the at least one notification sink provides the notifications to the user and is having parameters associated with it representing:

a cost of communication of the notification sink indicating a communication cost incurred by the user when receiving information contained within a notification conveyed to the notification sink; and

a cost of disruption of the notification sink indicating a disruption cost incurred by the user when receiving information contained within a notification conveyed to the notification sink.

17. A notification system comprising:

a context analyzer to determine a context associated with an entity that utilizes a plurality of devices, wherein the determined context comprises accessibility to one or more of the plurality of devices; and

a notification manager configured to;

based on the determined context, determine which device of the plurality of devices is currently accessible to the entity and whether the entity is currently available to accept at least one notification of one or more notifications generated by at least one notification source for the entity based at least in part on the determined context at the determined device,

determine a value of the at least one notification to the entity that is based on a degree of truncation and/or summarization of content of the at least one notification when the notification is conveyed to the determined device,

determine a time criticality of the at least one notification generated by the at least one notification source indicating time-dependent decay of a value of information contained in the at least one notification to the user entity, and

when it is determined that the entity is currently available to accept the at least one notification at the determined device and based on the determined value of the at least one notification to the entity and on the time criticality of the at least one notification, convey the at least one notification to the determined device.