Tracking data usage under a schematized data plan

• US 8,977,231 B2
• Filed: 12/20/2012
• Issued: 03/10/2015
• Est. Priority Date: 01/27/2012
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Inventors: Zalmanovitch, Gil, Scott, Gregory James, Guday, Shai, Kwok, Alec Garvin, Jiang, Yue, Ma, Kenneth Vincent
• Primary Examiner(s): Nguyen, David Q
• Application Number:
  US13/721,053
• Publication Number:
  US 20130196618A1
• Time in Patent Office: 810 Days
• Field of Search: 455/405, 455/406, 455/466, 455/414.1
• US Class Current: 455/405
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 12/1435 volume-based
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 43/04 Processing captured monitoring data, e.g. for logfile generation
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 43/045 for graphical visualisation of monitoring data
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 43/062 related to network traffic
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 43/0876 Network utilisation, e.g. volume of load or congestion level
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 1/72403 with means for local support of applications that increase the functionality
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 15/41 Billing record details, i.e. parameters, identifiers, structure of call data record [CDR]
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 15/58 based on statistics of usage or network monitoring
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 15/60 based on actual use of network resources
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 15/765 Linked or grouped accounts, e.g. of users or devices
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 15/7652 shared by users
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 15/775 Account specifications on parallel communications
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 15/80 Rating or billing plans; Tariff determination aspects
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 15/8044 Least cost routing
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 15/83 Notification aspects
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 15/84 Types of notifications
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 15/846 optical, e.g. icon
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 15/85 characterised by the type of condition triggering a notification
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 15/853 Calculate maximum communication time or volume
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 15/854 Available credit
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 15/856 : Unsuccessful event
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 15/86 : Recipients of the notification
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 24/02 : Arrangements for optimising operational condition
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/24 : Accounting or billing
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/60 : Subscription-based services using application servers or record carriers, e.g. SIM application toolkits
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/70 : Services for machine-to-machine communication [M2M] or machine type communication [MTC]
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 8/18 : Processing of user or subscriber data, e.g. subscribed services, user preferences or user profiles; Transfer of user or subscriber data
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 8/186 : Processing of subscriber group data
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 88/06 : adapted for operation in multiple networks or having at least two operational modes, e.g. multi-mode terminals

Abstract

Embodiments provide a schema for representing data usage plans and data usage statistics. The data usage plan describes threshold values associated with network connections of computing devices of the user. A web service dynamically generates data usage statistics for the computing devices to represent data consumed by the computing devices under the data usage plan. The schema is updated with the data usage statistics and distributed to the computing devices for presentation to the user.

Claims

1. A system comprising:

a memory area associated with a mobile computing device, said memory area storing a schema representing a data usage plan associated with a user, the data usage plan describing threshold values associated with network connections of one or more computing devices of the user, the network connections being categorized based on types of network traffic data; and

a processor programmed to;

dynamically generate data usage statistics for the user, the data usage statistics representing network data consumed under the data usage plan by a mobile computing device, the data usage statistics being dynamically generated, at the mobile computing device, by collecting the network data consumed by a plurality of components of the mobile computing device;

populate the schema stored in the memory area with the dynamically generated data usage statistics; and

provide at least a portion of the populated schema to a web service for distribution to other computing devices of the user.

2. The system of claim 1, further comprising a user interface, and wherein the processor is further programmed to present the dynamically generated data usage statistics to the user in the user interface.

3. The system of claim 1, wherein the processor is programmed to dynamically generate the data usage statistics by attributing the network data consumed to the corresponding network connections.

4. The system of claim 1, wherein the threshold values correspond to maximum data consumption allotted under the data usage plan for the network connections, wherein the types of network traffic data for the network connections categorization are selected from a group consisting of voice, text, and data.

5. The system of claim 1, wherein the processor is further programmed to upload only a portion of the schema stored in the memory area to the web service at a particular time.

6. The system of claim 1, wherein the processor is further programmed to download only a portion of the schema from the web service at a particular time.

7. The system of claim 1, wherein the schema comprises an extensible markup language schema.

8. The system of claim 1, wherein each of the threshold values correspond to one of a plurality of fields.

9. The system of claim 1, wherein the schema includes a plurality of fields each comprising one or more of the following:

peak times, off-peak times, peak time data consumption quota, off-peak time data consumption quota, peak time data consumption remaining, off-peak time data consumption remaining, a roaming rate, a mobile operator name, a billing cycle type, and a network connection type.

10. The system of claim 1, further comprising means for defining the schema to describe individual portions of the data usage plan.

11. A method comprising:

dynamically generating data usage statistics for a user, the data usage statistics representing network data consumed under a data usage plan by a mobile computing device, the data usage statistics being dynamically generated, at the mobile computing device, by collecting the network data consumed by a plurality of components of the mobile computing device, the data usage plan being associated with the user and describing threshold values associated with network connections of one or more computing devices of the user, the network connections being categorized based on types of network traffic data;

populating a schema representing the data usage plan with the dynamically generated data usage statistics; and

providing at least a portion of the populated schema to a web service for distribution to other computing devices of the user.

12. The method of claim 11, further comprising downloading only a portion of the schema from the web service at a particular time.

13. The method of claim 11, further comprising uploading only a portion of the schema to the web service at a particular time.

14. The method of claim 11, wherein the data usage statistics are dynamically generated by attributing the network data consumed to the corresponding network connections.

15. The method of claim 11, wherein the threshold values correspond to maximum data consumption allotted under the data usage plan for the network connections, wherein the types of network traffic data for the network connections categorization are selected from a group consisting of voice, text, and data.

16. The method of claim 11, wherein the schema comprises an extensible markup language schema.

17. One or more computer storage media embodying computer-executable components, said components comprising:

a collection component that when executed causes at least one processor to dynamically generate data usage statistics for a user, the data usage statistics representing network data consumed under a data usage plan associated with the user by a mobile computing device, the data usage statistics being dynamically generated, at the mobile computing device, by collecting the network data consumed by a plurality of components of the mobile computing device;

a data structure component that when executed causes at least one processor to populate a schema representing the data usage plan with the data usage statistics dynamically generated by the collection component, the data usage plan describing threshold values associated with network connections of the one or more computing devices of the user, the network connections being categorized based on types of network traffic data; and

a communications interface component that when executed causes at least one processor to provide at least a portion of the schema populated by the data structure component to a web service for distribution to other computing devices of the user.

18. The computer storage media of claim 17, wherein the schema includes a plurality of fields each comprising one or more of the following:

peak times, off-peak times, peak time data consumption quota, off-peak time data consumption quota, peak time data consumption remaining, off-peak time data consumption remaining, a roaming rate, a mobile operator name, a billing cycle type, and a network connection type.

19. The computer storage media of claim 17, further comprising a user interface component that when executed causes at least one processor to present the data usage statistics dynamically generated by the collection component to the user.

20. The computer storage media of claim 17, wherein each of the threshold values correspond to one of a plurality of fields.