Contact initialization based upon automatic profile sharing between computing devices

• US 8,346,863 B2
• Filed: 08/15/2006
• Issued: 01/01/2013
• Est. Priority Date: 08/15/2006
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Original Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Inventors: Cheng, Tsz Simon, Hassell, Daniel, Thomas, Mathews
• Primary Examiner(s): Moore, Ian N
• Assistant Examiner(s): TANG, KIET G
• Application Number:
  US11/464,728
• Publication Number:
  US 20080123683A1
• Time in Patent Office: 2,331 Days
• Field of Search: 709217-219, 709201-204
• US Class Current: 709/204
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/306 User profiles
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 2203/655 Combination of telephone service and social networking
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 7/0036 where the data service is an information service
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 7/0063 where the network is a peer-to-peer network
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 76/10 Connection setup
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 8/205 Transfer to or from user equipment or user record carrier

Abstract

A method of initiating contact based upon automatically shared profile data can include a step of automatically and wirelessly exchanging profile information between at least two computing devices. A determination can be made as to whether a contact opportunity exists by comparing received profile information with a set of previously established contact rules. A notification of a contract opportunity can be automatically presented upon one of the computing devices, depending upon whether the profile information favorably compares with the contact rules.

Claims

1. A method of initiating contact based upon automatically shared profile data comprising:

automatically wirelessly sending profile information from a sending computing device to a receiving computing device, wherein the sending device and the receiving device are collectively referred to as communication devices;

automatically determining, at the receiving device, whether a contact action should be initiated by comparing received profile information with a set of previously established contact rules;

upon a negative determination regarding initiating the at least one contact action, the receiving device taking no action, in which case the sending device receives no information from the receiving device responsive to the sending of the profile information, wherein when there is a negative determination regarding initiating the at least one content action, no profile information is ever sent from the receiving device to the sending computing device that is compared to information from the sending device; and

upon a positive determination regarding initiating the at least one contact action, the receiving device initiating an interpersonal communication that permits users of the communication devices to communicate with each other, wherein the interpersonal communication is a device assisted communication in which each of the users provides content directed to the other as input to their one of the communication devices, and in which each of the users receives content provided by the other as output from their one of the communication devices.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the interpersonal communication is a real-time communication between the users established via the communication devices.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein the interpersonal communication is an interactive gaming interaction, where each of the users participates in an electronic game in a session that includes the other user via their communication device.

4. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

the receiving device contacting a remotely located certification server via a network to selectively verify whether the profile information conveyed from the sending device is accurate using information sources independent of the sending device.

5. The method of claim 1, wherein the interpersonal communication involves the sending device, the receiving device, and a remotely located contact server, which are connected to each other via a network, wherein the remotely located contact server facilitates the interpersonal communication, and wherein the remotely located contact server is one of an email server, an instant messaging server, a chat server, and a telephony server.

6. The method of claim 1, wherein data exchanges between the sending device and the receiving device selectively occur over a plurality of different channels, which include an interrogation channel, a data exchange channel, and an interaction channel.

7. The method of claim 6, wherein at least one of the plurality of different channels is an open, unencrypted channel, wherein at least one of the plurality of different channels is a secure communication channel that only communicates using encrypted data, wherein the profile information is conveyed only over the secure communication channel.

8. The method of claim 1, wherein the profile information is configured to automatically expire after a duration established by the sending device, wherein when the duration occurs, the profile information from the sending device is removed from the receiving device.

9. The method of claim 1, wherein access rights to the profile information are restricted so that the receiving device is able to compare the profile information with the previously established rules by executing a profile agent on the receiving device, but where the profile information is inaccessible from other applications executing on the receiving device.

10. The method of claim 1, wherein the receiving device comprises a scheduling application that is integrated with the previously established rules so that initiation of contact actions is dependent upon a schedule of a user of the receiving device, said schedule being established via the scheduling application.

11. The method of claim 1, wherein the determining of whether the at least one contact action should be initiated further comprises:

classifying an importance level of a contact opportunity based on the profile information, wherein the previously established rule is more likely to result in a positive determination the higher the importance level of the contact opportunity.

13. The method of claim 1, wherein the determining of whether the at least one contact action should be initiated further comprises:

determining a status of the user of the receiving device based on how busy the user of the receiving device is believed to be, wherein the previously established rule is more likely to result in a positive determination the less busy the user of the receiving device is believed to be by the determined status.

12. A non-transitory machine-readable storage having stored thereon, a profile handling agent having a plurality of code sections, said profile handling agent comprising:

a broadcasting module configured to broadcast profile information over an automatically established wireless personal area network, wherein the profile information includes a set of user configurable, user-specific information, which is stored locally upon a mobile computing device within which the profiling handling agent executes;

a receiver module configured to receive responses to the broadcasted profile information over the personal area network, wherein the mobile computing device automatically presents a notification whenever a received response indicates that a contact opportunity exists, where the contact opportunity is based at least in part upon the profile information; and

computer program product operable to;

compare profile information received from a sending device via the receiver module against previously established rules;

take no action, upon a negative determination regarding initiating the at least one contact action, in which case the broadcasting module transmits no responsive information to the sending device, wherein when there is a negative determination regarding initiating the at least one content action, no profile information is ever sent from the receiver module to the sending device that is compared to information from the sending device; and

initiating, upon a positive determination regarding initiating the at least one contact action, an interpersonal communication between the device containing the profile agent and the sending device, where these two devices are collectively referred to as communication devices, wherein the interpersonal communication is a device assisted communication in which users of the communication devices provide content directed to the other as input to their one of the communication devices, and in which each of the users receives content provided by the other as output from their one of the communication devices.

14. The non-transitory machine-readable storage of claim 12, wherein the receiver module is further configured to receive profile information sent from a different computing device over the personal area network, said profile handling agent further comprising:

a contact rules module configured to compare received profile information against a set of previously established and user configurable contact rules, wherein when the contact rules indicate a favorable comparison, the mobile computing device sends an interpersonal contact request to a device that sent the received profile information, and wherein said profile handling agent further comprises;

an administration module configured to manage a plurality of stored profiles for the mobile computing device and to selectively active different ones of the stored profiles depending on occurrences of a set of user configured conditions, wherein the broadcasted profile information is dependent upon which of the stored profiles are active.

15. The non-transitory machine-readable storage of claim 12, said profile handling agent further comprising:

a security module configured to secure the profile agent against receiving malicious code and configured to prevent unauthorized individuals from accessing the broadcasted profile information.

16. A computing device comprising:

a machine-readable storage having stored thereon, a profile handling agent, wherein said profiling agent causes the computing device to automatically receive profile information from a sending computing device to wherein the sending device and the computing device are collectively referred to as communication devices;

automatically determine, whether at least one contact action should be initiated by comparing the profile information received by the receiving device with a set of previously established contact rules;

upon a negative determination regarding initiating the at least one contact action, take no action, in which case the sending device receives no information from the receiving device responsive to the sending of the profile information wherein when there is a negative determination regarding initiating the at least one content action, no profile information is ever sent from the receiving device to the sending computing device that is compared to information from the sending device; and

upon a positive determination regarding initiating the at least one contact action, initiate an interpersonal communication that permits users of the communication devices to communicate with each other, wherein the interpersonal communication is a device assisted communication in which each of the users provides content directed to the other as input to their one of the communication devices, and in which each of the users receives content provided by the other as output from their one of the communication devices.

17. The computing device of claim 16, wherein the computing device is a mobile computing device selected from a group of devices consisting of a mobile telephone, a personal data assistant, a wearable computer, a handheld media player, and a handheld entertainment device.

18. The computing device of claim 16, further comprising:

a transceiver configured to establish a wireless personal area network over which the profiling information is conveyed over a peer-to-peer communication channel.

19. The computing device of claim 18, further comprising:

a different transceiver configured to establish an interactive, bidirectional, real-time communication with other computing devices, wherein said computing device configured to automatically establish the real-time communication with the different device based upon a user selectable option, which has been selected responsive to the notification.