Management system for a contact center

• US 8,645,828 B2
• Filed: 01/08/2002
• Issued: 02/04/2014
• Est. Priority Date: 01/08/2001
• Status: Expired due to Fees

• Current Assignee: Telstra Corporation Limited (Telstra Group Ltd.)
• Original Assignee: Telstra Corporation Limited (Telstra Group Ltd.)
• Inventors: Avery, Brett Andrew, Wong, Eldon Chun-Keung, Nakhla, Ihab
• Primary Examiner(s): Ahn, Sangwoo
• Application Number:
  US10/250,707
• Publication Number:
  US 20040088300A1
• Time in Patent Office: 4,410 Days
• Field of Search: 707/6, 707/100, 707/101, 707/102, 707/103.R, 707/104.1, 370/252, 370/346, 705/10
• US Class Current: 715/704
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/45512 Command shells
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/10 Office automation; Time management

Abstract

An application management system, including a learning robot/learning agent adapted to generate control data (eg automation script) by monitoring interactions (404,406) between a customer service application (CSA) and a user of the application and an execution robot for sending application data to the application on the basis of the control data, is described. A contact center management system whose components are configurable by a contact center administrator is also described. A relationship management system that manages a relationship between a business requiring a contact center and a customer service representative broker is also described.

Claims

1. An automation process executed by a computer system having data processing logic so as to at least partly automate execution of an interactive computer system application, including:

recording at a first time, using the data processing logic, a sequence of interactions between an initial execution of the computer system application and a user of the computer system application, the recorded sequence of interactions including outputs of the computer system application displayed to the user of the computer system application during the initial execution and application user inputs, provided by the user of the computer system application in response to the displayed outputs to initiate application functions during the initial execution of the computer system application, the application user inputs including at least one of;

one or more keystrokes selecting one or more options provided by the computer system application, the keystrokes being additional to entering alpha-numeric or symbolic data; and

selections of options using an input device other than a keyboard,

the application user inputs further representing first values for input parameters of the computer system application;

at a second time subsequent to the first time, displaying interaction data representing the recorded interactions, including (i) the recorded outputs of the computer system application displayed to the user of the computer system application during the initial execution of the computer system application, and (ii) the application user inputs provided by the user of the computer system application during the initial execution of the computer system application in response to the displayed outputs, the application user inputs being displayed at the second time interspersed within the recorded output of the computer system application at locations within the recorded interactions corresponding to the temporal sequence of the application user inputs relative to the corresponding computer system application outputs;

receiving parameter field data representing the locations of the application user inputs within the recorded interactions, the parameter field data being generated from user selections of those locations within the displayed interaction data;

accessing parameter label data representing respective labels for the input parameters of the computer system application;

generating association data representing respective user selected associations between the labels for the input parameters and the respective locations within the recorded interactions to provide second values for the input parameters;

storing the association data and at least the recorded application outputs on at least one computer-readable storage medium; and

automatically generating an ordered sequence of inputs at a third time subsequent to the second time based on the association data and at least the recorded application outputs to provide the ordered sequence of inputs to the interactive computer system application without user interaction.

2. An automation process as claimed in claim 1, wherein each of the locations within the recorded interactions is selected by the user of the computer system application during said recording and when the computer system application is ready to receive a value for the corresponding input parameter.

3. An automation process as claimed in claim 1, wherein each of the locations within the recorded interactions is selected by way of the user of the computer system application selecting a portion of the recorded application user inputs representing a user-provided value for the corresponding input parameter from a visual display of the recorded application user inputs to the computer system application.

4. An automation process as claimed in claim 1, wherein the labels include symbolic names for the input parameters.

5. An automation process as claimed in claim 4, wherein said association data represents a location for each input parameter by a corresponding symbolic name for that input parameter, each symbolic name being included at a corresponding location within said recorded application user inputs.

6. An automation process as claimed in claim 5, wherein generating said association data includes replacing one or more portions of said computer system application user inputs representing respective values of respective input parameters with respective symbolic names for said input parameters.

7. An automation process as claimed in claim 5, wherein each of said one or more symbolic names is tagged.

8. An automation process as claimed in claim 1, including:

accessing the second values representing one or more labels and respective first values for respective ones of said input parameters;

automatically generating the sequence of inputs for the computer system application by merging the recorded application outputs and the second values for said input parameters, wherein each second value for an input parameter is included at a corresponding location within the sequence of inputs in accordance with the label for that value and the association data; and

automatically sending the generated sequence of inputs to said computer system application to at least partly automate said computer system application.

9. An automation process as claimed in claim 1, wherein said sequence of inputs includes recording application user input events generated in response to application user activity.

10. An automation process as claimed in claim 9, including transmitting to said computer system a learning component adapted to monitor said events.

11. An automation process as claimed in claim 1, including receiving at a server interface access data for establishing a communications session with said computer system over a communications network.

12. An automation process as claimed in claim 1, including processing the recorded application outputs to generate return data for sending to said computer system application to return said computer system application to a predetermined state.

13. An automation process as claimed in claim 1, including:

receiving output data representing output generated by said computer system application, said output data including output parameter value data representing one or more first values for respective output parameters of said computer system application;

accessing output association data representing associations between said one or more output parameters and respective locations of said output parameters within said recorded interactions; and

processing said output data and said output association data to determine said one or more second values of said one or more output parameters.

14. An automation process as claimed in claim 8 including:

receiving recorded interactions representing output generated by a second computer system application, said output data including output parameter value data representing one or more first values for respective output parameters of said second computer system application;

accessing output association data representing associations between said one or more output parameters and respective locations of said one or more output parameters within said recorded interactions; and

processing said recorded interactions and said output association data to determine said one or more second values for said one or more output parameters;

wherein the determined one or more second values for said one or more output parameters of said second computer system application are used as said one or more values for said input parameters of said computer system application.

15. An automation process as claimed in claim 8, including:

receiving output data representing output generated by said computer system application, said output data including output parameter value data representing one or more first values for respective output parameters of said computer system application;

accessing output association data representing associations between said one or more output parameters and respective locations within said recorded interactions of said output parameters; and

processing said output data and said output association data to determine said one or more values for said one or more output parameters.

16. An automation process as claimed in claim 1, including:

receiving output parameter label data representing one or more labels for respective output parameters of said computer system application;

receiving output data representing output generated by said computer system application for display to the user of said computer system application, said output data including output parameter value data representing one or more values for said one or more output parameters;

receiving output parameter field data identifying one or more locations of the of respective application outputs within the recorded interactions, the output parameter field data being generated from user selections of the displayed interaction data; and

generating output association data representing one or more associations between said locations within said recorded interactions and said labels for said output parameters for use in determining corresponding second values for said output parameters from subsequent output of said computer system application.

17. An automation process as claimed in claim 16, including:

receiving output data representing output generated by said computer system application, said output data including output parameter value data representing one or more values for respective output parameters of said computer system application; and

processing said output data and said output association data to determine said one or more second values for said one or more output parameters.

18. An automation process as claimed in claim 1, including establishing a network connection to access said computer system application.

19. An automation process as claimed in claim 1, including displaying instructions to assist in configuring said computer system application.

20. An automation process as claimed in claim 19, wherein said instructions include instructions to assist in configuring network access to said computer system application.

21. An automation process as claimed in claim 1, wherein said recording includes recording user interface events generated in response to application user activity.

22. An automation process as claimed in claim 21, wherein said events include operating system events associated with at least one input device of said application user.

23. An automation process as claimed in claim 22, wherein said at least one input device includes a keyboard.

24. An automation process as claimed in claim 23, wherein said at least one input device includes a cursor pointing device.

25. An automation process as claimed in claim 1, including configuring network access to said computer system.

26. An automation process as claimed in claim 1, wherein said one or more input parameters include one or more parameters for a call received at a contact center.

27. An automation process as claimed in claim 1, wherein said computer system application is a database application for use in a call center.

28. An automation process executed by a computer system having data processing logic so as to at least partly automate a computer system application, including:

accessing parameter field data generated from a user selecting locations of application user inputs within recorded interactions, the recorded interactions including a sequence of interactions between an initial execution of the computer system application and a user of the computer system application, the recorded sequence of interactions including outputs of the computer system application displayed to a user of the computer system application during the initial execution and application user inputs, provided by the user of the computer system application in response to the displayed outputs to initiate application functions during the initial execution of the computer system application, the application user inputs including at least one of;

one or more keystrokes selecting one or more options provided by the computer system application, the keystrokes being additional to entering alpha-numeric or symbolic data; and

selections of options using an input device other than a keyboard,

the application user inputs further representing first values for input parameters of the computer system application;

accessing second values for the input parameters generated from association data representing respective user selected associations between labels for the input parameters and the respective locations within recorded interactions, the recorded interactions including (i) the recorded outputs of the computer system application displayed to the user of the computer system application during the initial execution of the computer system application, and (ii) the application user inputs provided by the user of the computer system application during the initial execution of the computer system application in response to the displayed outputs, the application user inputs being interspersed within the recorded output of the computer system application at locations within the recorded interactions corresponding to the temporal sequence of the application user inputs relative to the corresponding computer system application outputs;

automatically generating, using data processing logic of the computer system, a sequence of inputs for said computer system application by merging the recorded application outputs and the second values for said input parameters, wherein each second value for an input parameter is included at a corresponding location within the sequence of inputs in accordance with the label for that value and the association data; and

automatically sending, using data processing logic of the computer system, said generated sequence of inputs to said computer system application, at least partly automating said computer system application.

29. An automation process as claimed in claim 28, including:

receiving output parameter label data representing one or more labels for respective output parameters of said computer system application;

receiving output data representing output generated by said computer system application for display to said user of said computer system application, said output data including output parameter value data representing one or more values for said one or more output parameters;

receiving output parameter field data identifying one or more locations of respective ones of said one or more output parameters within said recorded interactions; and

generating output association data representing one or more associations between said locations within said recorded interactions and said labels for said output parameters for use in determining corresponding second values for said output parameters from subsequent output of said computer system application.

30. An automation process as claimed in claim 28, including using at least one of said one or more values for said input parameters to evaluate one or more conditional statements defining control flow for the automation process.

31. An automation process as claimed in claim 28, including:

receiving output data representing output generated by said computer system application, said output data including output parameter value data representing one or more values for respective output parameters of said computer system application;

accessing output association data representing associations between said one or more output parameters and respective locations of values of said output parameters within said recorded interactions; and

processing said output data and said output association data to determine said one or more values for said one or more output parameters.

32. An automation process as claimed in claim 28, including:

receiving recorded interactions representing output generated by a second computer system application, said output data including output parameter value data representing one or more first values for respective output parameters of said second computer system application;

accessing output association data representing associations between said one or more output parameters and respective locations of said one or more output parameters within said recorded interactions; and

processing said recorded interactions and said output association data to determine said one or more second values for said one or more output parameters;

wherein the determined one or more second values for said one or more output parameters of said second computer application are used as said one or more values for said input parameters for said computer system application.

33. An automation process executed by a computer system, including:

receiving output data representing output generated by a computer system application, said output data including parameter value data representing one or more values for respective output parameters of said computer system application created by a sequence of interactions between an initial execution of the computer system application and a user of the computer system application, the sequence of interactions including outputs of the computer system application displayed to the user of the computer system application during the initial execution and application user inputs, provided by the user of the computer system application in response to the displayed outputs to initiate application functions during the initial execution of the computer system application, the application user inputs including at least one of;

one or more keystrokes selecting one or more options provided by the computer system application, the keystrokes being additional to entering alpha-numeric or symbolic data; and

selections of options using an input device other than a keyboard;

receiving output parameter label data representing respective labels for the output parameters for said computer system application;

receiving output parameter field data representing locations of the outputs of the computer system application within the sequence of interactions including (i) the outputs of the computer system application displayed to the user of the computer system application during the initial execution of the computer system application, and (ii) the application user inputs provided by the user of the computer system application during the initial execution of the computer system application in response to the displayed outputs, the application user inputs being interspersed within the outputs of the computer system application at locations within the output data corresponding to the temporal sequence of the application user inputs relative to the corresponding computer system application outputs, the output parameter field data being generated from user selections of those locations within the displayed interaction data;

generating, using data processing logic of the computer system, association data representing respective user selected associations between said locations within said output data and said labels for respective output parameters; and

determining, using data processing logic of the computer system, second values for respective output parameters based on said output data and said association data.

34. A process as claimed in claim 33, wherein using data processing logic of the computer system to process said output data and said association data includes matching portions of said output data with corresponding portions of stored second output of said computer system application to identify said values.

35. A process as claimed in claim 34, wherein said matching includes regular expression matching.

36. A process as claimed in claim 33, including sending at least one of said one or more values to a second computer system application to at least partly automate said second computer system application.

37. A process as claimed in claim 36, wherein said sending is based on second association data representing one or more associations between one or more input parameters for said second computer system application and respective locations within a second sequence of interactions representing use of said second computer system application by a user of the second computer system application.

38. An automation process executed by a computer system, including:

receiving output parameter label data representing one or more labels for respective output parameters of a computer system application;

receiving output data representing output generated by said computer system application for display to a user of said computer system application, said output data including output parameter value data representing one or more values for said one or more output parameters created by a sequence of interactions between an initial execution of the computer system application and the user of the computer system application, the recorded sequence of interactions including outputs of the computer system application displayed to the user of the computer system application during the initial execution and application user inputs, provided by the user of the computer system application in response to the displayed outputs to initiate application functions during the initial execution of the computer system application, the application user inputs including at least one of;

one or more keystrokes selecting one or more options provided by the computer system application, the keystrokes being additional to entering alpha-numeric or symbolic data; and

selections of options using an input device other than a keyboard;

receiving output parameter field data representing locations of the outputs of the computer system application within recorded interactions including (i) the recorded outputs of the computer system application displayed to the user of the computer system application during the initial execution of the computer system application, and (ii) the application user inputs provided by the user of the computer system application during the initial execution of the computer system application in response to the displayed outputs, the application user inputs being interspersed within the outputs of the computer system application at locations within the output data corresponding to the temporal sequence of the application user inputs relative to the corresponding computer system application outputs, the output parameter field data being generated from user selections of those locations within the displayed interaction data;

generating, using data processing logic of the computer system, association data representing respective user selected associations between said locations within said output data and said labels for said output parameters; and

determining, based on the association data, corresponding second values for said output parameters from subsequent output of said computer system application.

39. An automation computer system, comprising a training component having a data processing device configured to:

record, at a first time, a sequence of interactions between an initial execution of a computer system application and a user of the computer system application, the recorded sequence of interactions including outputs of the computer system application displayed to the user of the computer system application during the initial execution and application user inputs provided by the user of the computer system application in response to the displayed outputs to initiate application functions during the initial execution of the computer system application, the application user inputs including at least one of;

one or more keystrokes selecting one or more options provided by the computer system application, the keystrokes being additional to entering alpha-numeric or symbolic data; and

selections of options using an input device other than a keyboard,

the application user inputs further representing first values for input parameters of the computer system application;

at a second time subsequent to the first time, display interaction data representing the recorded interactions, including (i) the recorded outputs of the computer system application displayed to the user of the computer system application during the initial execution of the computer system application, and (ii) the application user inputs provided by the user of the computer system application during the initial execution of the computer system application in response to the displayed outputs, the application user inputs being displayed at the second time interspersed within the recorded output of the computer system application at locations within the recorded interactions corresponding to the temporal sequence of the application user inputs relative to the corresponding computer system application outputs;

receive parameter field data representing the locations of the application user inputs within the recorded interactions, the parameter field data being generated from user selections of those locations within the displayed interaction data;

access parameter label data representing respective labels for the input parameters of the computer system application;

generate association data representing respective user selected associations between the labels for the input parameters and the respective locations within the recorded interactions to provide second values for the input parameters;

store the association data and at least the recorded application outputs on at least one computer-readable storage medium;

automatically generate an ordered sequence of inputs at a third time subsequent to the second time based on the association data and at least the recorded application outputs to provide the ordered sequence of inputs to the interactive computer system application without user interaction.

40. An automation computer system as claimed in claim 39, wherein the training component is further configured to:

receive output parameter label data representing one or more labels for respective output parameters of said computer system application;

receive output data representing output generated by said computer system application for display to the user of said computer system application, said output data including output parameter value data representing one or more values for said one or more output parameters;

receive output parameter field data identifying one or more locations of the of respective application outputs with the recorded interactions, the output parameter field data being generated from user selections of the displayed interaction data; and

generate output association data representing one or more associations between said locations within said recorded interactions and said labels for said output parameters for use in determining corresponding second values for said output parameters from subsequent output of said computer system application.

41. An automation computer system as claimed in claim 39, including an execution component configured to:

access the association data and recorded application outputs;

automatically generate an ordered sequence of inputs for the computer system application by merging the recorded interactions and the second values for said input parameters, wherein each second value for at least some of the input parameters provided in response to receipt of respective ones of the outputs of the computer system application; and

automatically send the generated ordered sequence of inputs to said computer system application to at least partly automate said computer system application.

42. An automation computer system as claimed in claim 41, wherein the execution component is further configured to:

receive output data representing output generated by said computer system application, said output data including output parameter value data representing one or more first values for respective output parameters of said computer system application;

access output association data representing associations between said one or more output parameters and respective locations of said output parameters within said recorded interactions; and

process said output data and said output association data to determine said one or more second values for said one or more output parameters.

43. A non-transitory computer-readable storage medium having stored thereon programming instructions configured to cause at least one programmable processor to:

record, at a first time, a sequence of interactions between an initial execution of a computer system application and a user of the computer system application, the recorded sequence of interactions including outputs of the computer system application displayed to the user of the computer system application during the initial execution and application user inputs provided by the user of the computer system application in response to the displayed outputs to initiate application functions during the initial execution of the computer system application, the application user inputs including at least one of;

one or more keystrokes selecting one or more options provided by the computer system application, the keystrokes being additional to entering alpha-numeric or symbolic data; and

selections of options using an input device other than a keyboard,

the application user inputs further representing first values for input parameters of the computer system application;

at a second time subsequent to the first time, display interaction data representing the recorded interactions, including (i) the recorded outputs of the computer system application displayed to the user of the computer system application during the initial execution of the computer system application, and (ii) the application user inputs provided by the user of the computer system application during the initial execution of the computer system application in response to the displayed outputs, the application user inputs being displayed at the second time interspersed within the recorded output of the computer system application at locations within the recorded interactions corresponding to the temporal sequence of the application user inputs relative to the corresponding computer system application outputs;

receive parameter field data representing the locations of the application user inputs within the recorded interactions, the parameter field data being generated from user selections of those locations within the displayed interaction data;

access parameter label data representing respective labels for the input parameters of the computer system application;

generate association data representing respective user selected associations between the labels for the input parameters and the respective locations within the recorded interactions to provide second values for the input parameters;

store the association data and at least the recorded application outputs on at least one computer-readable storage medium;

automatically generate an ordered sequence of inputs at a third time subsequent to the second time based on the association data and at least the recorded application outputs to provide the ordered sequence of inputs to the interactive computer system application without user interaction.

44. A non-transitory computer-readable storage medium as claimed in claim 43, including further programming instructions configured to cause at least one programmable processor to:

receive output parameter label data representing one or more labels for respective output parameters of said computer system application;

receive output data representing output generated by said computer system application for display to the user of said computer system application, said output data including output parameter value data representing one or more values for said one or more output parameters;

receive output parameter field data identifying one or more locations of the of respective application outputs within the recorded interactions, the output parameter field data being generated from user selections of the displayed interaction data; and

generate output association data representing one or more associations between said locations within said recorded interactions and said labels for said output parameters for use in determining corresponding second values for said output parameters from subsequent output of said application.

45. A non-transitory computer-readable storage medium as claimed in claim 43, including further programming instructions configured to cause at least one programmable processor to:

access the association data and recorded application outputs;

automatically generate an ordered sequence of inputs for the computer system application by merging the recorded interactions and the second values for said input parameters, wherein each second value for at least some of the input parameters provided in response to receipt of respective ones of the outputs of the computer system application; and

automatically send the generated ordered sequence of inputs to said computer system application to at least partly automate said computer system application.

46. A non-transitory computer-readable storage medium as claimed in claim 45, including further programming instructions configured to cause at least one programmable processor to:

receive output data representing output generated by said computer system application, said output data including output parameter value data representing one or more first values for respective output parameters of said computer system application;

access output association data representing associations between said one or more output parameters and respective locations of said output parameters within said recorded interactions; and

process said output data and said output association data to determine said one or more second values for said one or more output parameters.