Automatically generated highlight view of electronic interactions

• US 8,316,315 B2
• Filed: 02/28/2005
• Issued: 11/20/2012
• Est. Priority Date: 02/28/2005
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Corporation
• Inventors: Portnoy, William L., Cheng, Lili, Counts, Scott J.
• Primary Examiner(s): Augustine, Nicholas
• Application Number:
  US11/069,443
• Publication Number:
  US 20060195785A1
• Time in Patent Office: 2,822 Days
• Field of Search: 715/751, 715763-764, 715/772, 715/789, 715/817, 715/825, 707/102
• US Class Current: 715/772
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/107 Computer-aided management of electronic mailing [e-mailing]

Abstract

A system and method for generating a highlight view of electronic interactions, such as, emails, instant messages, audio messages and/or video messages is provided. The highlight view can facilitate a user'"'"'s understanding of the electronic interactions.

The electronic interactions can comprise emails associated with conversation threads of a discussion list posted and/or received by a plurality of users. The highlight view system can include, for a given period of time, a list of participants in the discussion list, a list of conversation threads and/or a linear progression of one or more of the conversation threads. The linear progression of one or more conversation threads can include signal word(s), such as, “stated, “asked”, “responded”, “wrapped up”, “disagreed”, “agreed” etc. that facilitate a user'"'"'s comprehension of the individual e-mails which form the conversation thread.

An electronic interactions highlight system can include an input component that receives electronic interactions (e.g., emails associated with conversation thread(s) of a discussion list) and an analysis component that analyzes the electronic interactions and automatically generates a highlight view of the electronic interactions.

Claims

1. An electronic interactions highlight system recorded on computer-readable storage media and capable of execution by a computer, the electronic interactions highlight system comprising:

an input component configured to receive a plurality of electronic interactions;

an analysis component configured to monitor a user'"'"'s actions and employ observations to personalize a highlight view for a particular user or group of users by analyzing the plurality of electronic interactions and employing a collaborative filtering model and keyword extraction to automatically generate the highlight view, the highlight view organized based on a relevance of each of the plurality of electronic interactions, the relevance determined based on a quantity of electronic interactions associated with a particular discussion topic and a size of the electronic interactions associated with the particular discussion topic; and

an output component configured to send via email the highlight view to the particular user or the group of users, wherein;

the highlight view is organized based on relevance of a plurality of discussion topics determined via keywords extracted from all or a part of the plurality of electronic interactions,

extraneous information is identified by the analysis component and blocked from the user in the generated highlight view, and

a threshold time period is identified and evidence of the user'"'"'s preferences is gathered implicitly by monitoring content that the user has dwelled on for the threshold amount of time and monitoring items that the user has requested to be viewed.

2. The system of claim 1, the plurality of electronic interactions associated with a plurality of topics.

3. The system of claim 2, the analysis component generating the highlight view based, at least in part, upon a hierarchical organization of the plurality of topics.

4. The system of claim 1, the plurality of electronic interactions associated with a predetermined period of time.

5. The system of claim 1, the plurality of electronic interactions comprising at least one of a document, an email, an instant message, an audio message and a video message.

6. The system of claim 1, the analysis component employs logical inferences including analyzing the frequency of keywords in the plurality of electronic interactions and weighting such words as of being of potential interest to a given user.

7. The system of claim 1, the electronic interactions comprising comments related to conversation threads.

8. The system of claim 1, the highlight view comprising additional signal words between at least some of the electronic interactions, the additional signal words facilitating the user'"'"'s comprehension of the at least some of the electronic interactions which form at least one conversation thread.

9. The system of claim 1, extraneous information from at least some of the electronic interactions filtered by the analysis component prior to generation of the highlight view.

10. The system of claim 1, analysis by the analysis component is based, at least in part, upon user criteria.

11. The system of claim 10, the user criteria comprising at least one of a keyword, a topic, an electronic interaction originator, and information associated with an electronic interaction originator.

12. The system of claim 1, at least some of the plurality of electronic interactions automatically summarized by the analysis component, the automatically summarized electronic interactions included in the highlight view.

13. A method comprising:

under control of one or more processors configured with instructions executable by the one or more processors to perform acts comprising;

receiving a plurality of electronic interactions;

performing an analysis of the plurality of electronic interactions using a collaborative filtering model and keyword extraction, including identifying actions of a user in the plurality of electronic interactions, identifying content that the user has dwelled on for a threshold time period, and identifying items that the user has requested for viewing;

determining preferences associated with the user based on the analysis;

automatically generating a highlight view for the user, the highlight view blocking extraneous information from the user, the highlight view organized based on a relevance of each of the plurality of electronic interactions, the relevance determined based on;

a quantity of electronic interactions associated with a particular discussion topic,

a size of the electronic interactions associated with the particular discussion topic,

a relevance of a plurality of discussion topics determined via keywords extracted from at least a portion of the plurality of electronic interactions, and

the gathered preferences; and

sending, to the user, an electronic message that includes the highlight view.

14. The method of claim 13, wherein the highlight view is generated based, at least in part, upon a hierarchical organization of the electronic interactions.

15. The method of claim 13, wherein the plurality of electronic interactions gathered over a predetermined period of time.

16. The method of claim 13, wherein the plurality of electronic interactions comprise at least one of a document, an email, an instant message, an audio message and a video message.

17. A computer-readable memory device to store instructions executable by one or more processors to perform acts comprising:

receiving a plurality of electronic interactions;

performing an analysis of the plurality of electronic interactions using a collaborative filtering model and keyword extraction, including identifying actions of a user in the plurality of electronic interactions, identifying content that the user has dwelled on for a threshold time period, and identifying items that the user has requested for viewing;

determining preferences associated with the user based on the analysis;

automatically generating a highlight view for the user, the highlight view blocking extraneous information from the user, the highlight view organized based on a relevance of each of the plurality of electronic interactions, the relevance determined based on;

a quantity of electronic interactions associated with a particular discussion topic,

a size of the electronic interactions associated with the particular discussion topic,

a relevance of a plurality of discussion topics determined via keywords extracted from at least a portion of the plurality of electronic interactions, and

the gathered preferences; and

sending, to the user, an electronic message that includes the highlight view.

18. The computer-readable memory device of claim 17, wherein the highlight view includes additional signal words between at least some of the electronic interactions, the additional signal words facilitating the user'"'"'s comprehension of the at least some of the electronic interactions which form at least one conversation thread.

19. The computer-readable memory device of claim 18, wherein the analysis is based, at least in part, upon user criteria.

20. The computer-readable memory device of claim 19, wherein the user criteria comprising at least one of a keyword, a topic, an electronic interaction originator, and information associated with an electronic interaction originator.