Managing real time meeting room status

• US 8,352,296 B2
• Filed: 04/18/2008
• Issued: 01/08/2013
• Est. Priority Date: 04/18/2008
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Corporation
• Inventors: Taneja, Puneet, Venkataraman, Murali, Sathananthan, Shiran, Sather, Eric, Ramamoorthy, Vivek, Kommineni, Anil, Egger, Paul
• Primary Examiner(s): Hayes, John
• Assistant Examiner(s): EPSTEIN, BRIAN M
• Application Number:
  US12/105,953
• Publication Number:
  US 20090265280A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,726 Days
• Field of Search: 705/5, 705/6, 705/8, 340/541, 715/751, 715/774
• US Class Current: 705/5
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/109 Time management, e.g. calendars, reminders, meetings or time accounting
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 50/188 Electronic negotiation

Abstract

Presence information within a meeting room is detected and published to users for managing room availability and real time status. Various means such as motion detectors, card readers, log-in mechanisms associated with in-room computers, and the like, are used to detect presence information. Different status indicators are assigned to each room and published through a communication application or hosted service providing useful and real time information to users.

Claims

1. A method to be executed at least in part in a computing device for managing real time meeting room status, comprising:

receiving, by a computer, in-room presence information for a meeting room, wherein the in-room presence information is received from a presence detector in response to an expiration of a predefined period;

retrieving, by the computer, room scheduling information for the meeting room;

continuously determining, by the computer, a real time status of the meeting room based on comparison of the in-room presence information and the room scheduling information, wherein a plurality of different status indicators are used to provide the real time status of the meeting room, the plurality of different status indicators comprising;

free, occupied but not scheduled, reserved but not occupied, scheduled and occupied; and

publishing, by the computer, the real time status of the meeting room to at least one remote client, wherein publishing the real time meeting room status to the at least one remote client comprises;

transmitting the real time meeting room status in association with a meeting room alias to a client scheduling application over a network, wherein the meeting room alias is similar to a subscriber of the client scheduling application;

finding, in a user interface, the meeting room alias;

resolving, in the user interface, the meeting room alias;

identifying, in a user interface header, the resolved meeting room alias as the meeting room and as one of a list of aliases; and

providing the real time meeting room status in response to receiving a selection of the identified resolved meeting room alias, wherein the real time meeting room status is pushed to the at least one remote client and, upon entry of the meeting room alias in the user interface by the subscriber, the real time meeting room status is displayed next to the meeting room alias in the user interface, wherein providing the real time meeting room status in response to receiving a selection of the identified resolved meeting room alias comprises;

hovering over the identified resolved meting room alias in the user interface in response to a user input; and

in response to hovering over the meeting room alias, displaying the real time meeting room status in a pop-up box in the user interface, the pop-up box being displayed overlaying a list of subscriptions displayed in the user interface, the list of subscriptions comprising a plurality of meeting room aliases subscribed to by a user of an application for generating the user interface.

2. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

obtaining in-room presence information based on in-room person detection through one of;

a motion detector and a heat sensor.

3. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

obtaining in-room presence information based on detection of an identity of a person detection through one of;

a magnetic access card reader, a barcode-based access card reader, a Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) based access card reader, and a log-in mechanism.

4. The method of claim 3, wherein the comparison of the in-room presence information and the room scheduling information includes comparison of a person reserving the meeting room for a meeting and a person currently occupying the meeting room.

5. A system for managing real time meeting room status, the system comprising:

a presence detector for detecting presence of at least one person in a meeting room;

a computer comprising a memory for storing executable program code and a processor, wherein the processor is functionally coupled to the memory, responsive to computer-executable instructions contained in the program code and operative to execute;

a calendaring application for facilitating reservation of the meeting room by users;

a status management application for receiving in-room presence information from the presence detector, the in-room presence information being collected periodically, retrieving room scheduling information from the calendaring application, continuously determining an availability status of the meeting room based on a comparison of the in-room presence information and the room scheduling information, and publishing one of a plurality of different availability status indicators for the meeting room wherein publishing the one of the plurality of different availability status indicators for the meeting room comprises transmitting the availability status in association with a meeting room alias, the plurality of different availability status indicators comprising;

free, occupied but not scheduled, reserved but not occupied, scheduled and occupied, wherein the meeting room alias is similar to a subscriber of the calendaring application; and

a communication application for receiving the published availability status indicator and presenting the availability status indicator to a user, wherein the communication application further;

finds, in a user interface, the meeting room alias;

resolves, in the user interface, the meeting room alias;

identifies, in a user interface header, the resolved meeting room alias as the meeting room and as one of a list of aliases; and

presents the availability status indicator in response to receiving a selection of the identified resolved meeting room alias, wherein the availability status indicator of the meeting room is pushed to the communication application by the status management application and, upon entry of the meeting room alias in the user interface by the user, the availability status indicator is displayed next to the meeting room alias in the user interface, wherein the communication application receives a user input to hover over the identified resolved meeting alias and displays the availability status indicator in a pop-up box in the user interface in response to receiving the user input, the pop-up box being displayed overlaying a list of subscriptions displayed in the user interface, the list of subscriptions comprising a plurality of meeting room aliases subscribed to by a user of the communication application.

6. The system of claim 5, wherein the presence detector includes one from a set of:

at least one motion detector, a magnetic access card reader, a barcode-based access card reader, an RFID based access card reader, and a log-in mechanism.

7. The system of claim 6, further comprising:

a controller for receiving detected presence information from the presence detector and making it available for the status management application.

8. The system of claim 5, wherein the status management application is executed in one of:

a server coupled through a network to the presence detector and an in-room PC.

9. The system of claim 5, wherein the presence detector is an integral part of an in-room PC.

10. One or more computer-readable storage media, wherein the one or more computer-readable storage media do not consist of a propagated data signal, the one or more computer-readable storage media having stored thereon computer executable instructions which when executed perform a method for managing real time status of a meeting room, the method comprising:

receiving a subscription from a user to a presence of the meeting room;

determining a meeting room occupation status by detecting one of presence and absence of person in the meeting room, the one of the presence and the absence being detected by a status management application collecting presence information periodically;

providing the meeting occupation status to the status management application;

retrieving meeting room reservation status from a calendaring application;

continuously determining the real time status of the meeting room based on comparing the meeting occupation status with the meeting room reservation status, wherein a plurality of different status indicators are used to provide the real time status of the meeting room, the plurality of different status indicators comprising;

free, occupied but not scheduled, reserved but not occupied, scheduled and occupied; and

publishing the real time status of the meeting room to the subscribing user through one of a communication application user interface and a collaboration application user interface, wherein publishing the real time status of the meeting room to the subscribing user comprises;

transmitting the real time status of the meeting room to the subscribing user, in association with a meeting room alias, to a scheduling application, wherein the meeting room alias is similar to the subscribing user;

finding, in the at least one of the communication application user interface and the collaboration application user interface, the meeting room alias;

resolving, in at least one of the communication application user interface and the collaboration application user interface, the meeting room alias;

identifying, in a user interface header, the resolved meeting room alias as the meeting room and as one of a list of aliases; and

providing the real time status of the meeting room to the subscribing user in response to receiving a selection of the identified resolved meeting room alias, wherein the real time status of the meeting room is pushed to a communication application by the status management application and, upon entry of the meeting room alias in the communication application user interface by the subscribing user, the real time status of the meeting room is displayed next to the meeting room alias in the communication application user interface, wherein providing the real time status of the meeting room to the subscribing user in response to receiving a selection of the identified resolved meeting room alias comprises;

hovering over the identified resolved meting room alias in the user interface in response to a user input; and

in response to hovering over the meeting room alias, displaying the real time status of the meeting room in a pop-up box in the user interface the pop-up box being displayed overlaying a list of subscriptions displayed in the communication application user interface, the list of subscriptions comprising a plurality of meeting room aliases subscribed to by the subscribing user.