Roaming bandwidth guidance for mobile computing devices

• US 8,924,546 B1
• Filed: 03/21/2012
• Issued: 12/30/2014
• Est. Priority Date: 03/21/2012
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Trend Micro Inc.
• Original Assignee: Trend Micro Inc.
• Inventors: Pu, Peng-Shih, Su, Shr-An, Liao, Shu-Ying
• Primary Examiner(s): Ashraf, Waseem
• Application Number:
  US13/425,638
• Time in Patent Office: 1,014 Days
• Field of Search: 709223-224
• US Class Current: 709/224
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 12/1435 volume-based
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/02 based on web technology, e.g. hypertext transfer protocol [HTTP]
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/564 Enhancement of application control based on intercepted application data
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 15/8038 Roaming or handoff
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 15/8214 Data or packet based
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 15/83 Notification aspects
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 15/835 Time or frequency of notifications, e.g. Advice of Charge [AoC]
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 15/8351 before establishing a communication
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 15/844 Message, e.g. SMS
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 15/846 optical, e.g. icon
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 15/852 Low balance or limit reached
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 15/853 Calculate maximum communication time or volume
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 15/88 Provision for limiting connection, or expenditure
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/18 Information format or content conversion, e.g. adaptation by the network of the transmitted or received information for the purpose of wireless delivery to users or terminals

Abstract

A mobile computing device includes a roaming bandwidth advisor for determining size information of web data (e.g., webpage, streaming media) before the web data is received in the mobile computing device. The mobile computing device may cooperatively work with a cloud computing system to obtain size information of the web data. Roaming fee information (e.g., the size of the web data and/or associated roaming fee) for receiving the web data is displayed on the mobile computing device before a request for the web data is sent out of the mobile computing device.

Claims

1. A computer-implemented method, the method comprising:

intercepting and holding a uniform resource identifier (URI) request for target web data sent by an application program in a mobile computing device operating in roaming mode, the URI request including a target URI that identifies the target web data available over a computer network;

determining a classification of the application program that sent the URI request;

after intercepting and holding the URI request but before sending the URI request out of the mobile computing device, determining network bandwidth consumption associated with receiving the target web data in the mobile computing device based on the classification of the application program that sent the URI request; and

before sending the URI request out of the mobile computing device, displaying on a screen of the mobile computing device roaming fee information for receiving the target web data into the mobile computing device based on the network bandwidth consumption associated with receiving the target web data.

2. The method of claim 1 wherein the roaming fee information comprises a size of the target web data.

3. The method of claim 1 wherein the roaming fee information comprises a roaming fee to be incurred by receiving the target web data into the mobile computing device.

4. The method of claim 1 further comprising:

calculating a statistic of a previous usage history of the application program that sent the URI request.

5. The method of claim 1 further comprising:

after displaying on the screen of the mobile computing device the roaming fee information for receiving the target web data into the mobile computing device, receiving an indication to proceed with the URI request; and

in response to receiving the indication to proceed with the URI request, sending the URI request out of the mobile computing device.

6. The method of claim 1 wherein determining the network bandwidth consumption associated with receiving the target web data in the mobile computing device comprises:

consulting a local cache locally available in the mobile computing device for information on size of the target web data.

7. The method of claim 1 wherein determining the network bandwidth consumption associated with receiving the target web data in the mobile computing device comprises:

consulting a cloud cache remotely located from the mobile computing device for information on size of the target web data.

8. The method of claim 1 wherein determining the network bandwidth consumption associated with receiving the target web data in the mobile computing device comprises:

retrieving the target web data into a computer separate from the mobile computing device;

determining the size of the retrieved target web data; and

receiving the size of the retrieved target web data in the mobile computing device.

9. The method of claim 1 wherein the target web data comprises a webpage.

10. The method of claim 1 wherein the URI comprises a uniform resource locator (URL).

11. The method of claim 1 wherein the roaming fee information comprises a size of the target web data, and the size of the target web data is received by the mobile computing device from a computer separate from the mobile computing device.

12. A computer-implemented method, the method comprising:

intercepting and holding a request for a webpage sent by an application program in a mobile computing device;

determining whether the application program that sent the request for the webpage is classified as an expected size program that downloads data of an expected data size or classified as a variable size program that downloads data of varying sizes depending on usage;

in response to receiving the request for the webpage and finding that the application program that sent the request for the webpage is classified as an expected size program, determining a size of the webpage; and

before sending the request for the webpage out of the mobile computing device, displaying on a screen of the mobile computing device information relating to a fee for receiving the webpage in the mobile computing device, the information relating to the fee being based on the size of the webpage.

13. The method of claim 12 wherein determining the size of the webpage comprises:

sending an in-the-cloud size query from the mobile computing device to a cloud computing system; and

receiving a result of the in-the-cloud size query in the mobile computing device, the result indicating the size of the webpage.

14. The method of claim 12 wherein determining the size of the webpage comprises:

consulting a local cache for the size of the webpage.

15. The method of claim 12 wherein determining the size of the webpage comprises:

consulting a remotely located cache for the size of the webpage.

16. The method of claim 12 wherein determining the size of the webpage comprises:

retrieving the webpage into a computer separate from the mobile computing device;

calculating a size of the webpage retrieved by the computer; and

providing the size of the webpage retrieved by the computer to the mobile computing device.