Aggregated presence over user federated devices

• US 9,258,376 B2
• Filed: 08/04/2009
• Issued: 02/09/2016
• Est. Priority Date: 08/04/2009
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: AT&T Intellectual Property I LP (AT&T, Inc.)
• Original Assignee: AT&T Intellectual Property I LP (AT&T, Inc.)
• Inventors: Jensen, Patrick John
• Primary Examiner(s): Fan, Hua
• Application Number:
  US12/535,062
• Publication Number:
  US 20110035443A1
• Time in Patent Office: 2,380 Days
• Field of Search: 709/204
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 51/043 using or handling presence information
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 51/222 using geographical location information, e.g. messages transmitted or received in proximity of a certain spot or area
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/02 based on web technology, e.g. hypertext transfer protocol [HTTP]
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/10 in which an application is distributed across nodes in the network software deployment G06F8/60; multiprogramming arrangements G06F9/46
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/54 Presence management, e.g. monitoring or registration for receipt of user log-on information, or the connection status of the users
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/02 Services making use of location information
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/029 Location-based management or tracking services
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/20 Services signaling; Auxiliary data signalling, i.e. transmitting data via a non-traffic channel

Abstract

One embodiment of a system for aggregating and distributing presence information comprises a hosted presence aggregator server. The hosted presence aggregator server receives an update of presence information from a user device and relays the presence information update to another user device, wherein the user devices are part of a federation of user devices controlled by a single user which relay updates in presence status of the single user to one another via the hosted presence aggregator server.

Claims

1. A system for aggregating and distributing presence information comprising:

a hosted presence aggregator server comprising;

a processor; and

a memory to store computer program instructions, the computer program instructions when executed on the processor cause the processor to perform operations comprising;

receiving an update of presence status from a user device of a single user and relaying the update of presence status to all other user devices of the single user to change their presence status to correspond to the update of presence status of the single user;

specifying a first policy designating a desired act-on behavior to be implemented by devices in a federation for a particular presence state, the act-on behavior based on the particular presence state, an identification of a user attempting to communicate with the single user, and a priority of a communication from the user attempting to communicate with the single user; and

specifying a second policy describing how supplemental presence information should be distributed to devices in the federation, the supplemental presence information comprising a current location of the single user, the current location designated by the single user via a device separate from the devices in the federation,

wherein the user devices are part of the federation of user devices controlled by the single user which relay updates in presence status of the single user to one another via the hosted presence aggregator server so that a presence status of the respective user devices can be updated to correspond to the presence status of the single user, and

wherein a user device in the federation which receives the supplemental presence information provides the supplemental presence information along with presence status information to a user device of another user who is monitoring the single user.

2. The system of claim 1 further comprising:

an aggregator presence agent installed at a user device which is part of the federation of user devices, wherein an update in presence status of the single user made to the user device installed with the aggregator presence agent is detected by the aggregator presence agent and transmitted to the hosted presence aggregator server.

3. The system of claim 1, wherein updates in presence information to the hosted presence aggregator server are communicated using Hypertext Transfer Protocol from the user device of the single user.

4. A method for aggregating and distributing presence information comprising:

receiving an update of presence status from a user device of a single user;

relaying the update of presence status to all other user devices of the single user to change their presence status to correspond to the update of presence status of the single user;

specifying a first policy designating desired act-on behavior to be implemented by devices in a federation for a particular presence state, the act-on behavior based on the particular presence state, an identification of a user attempting to communicate with the single user, and a priority of a communication from the user attempting to communicate with the single user; and

specifying a second policy describing how supplemental presence information should be distributed to devices in the federation, the supplemental presence information comprising a current location of the single user, the current location designated by the single user via a device separate from the devices in the federation,

wherein the user devices are part of the federation of user devices controlled by the single user which relay updates in presence status of the single user to one another so that the presence status of the respective user devices can be updated to correspond to the presence status of the single user, and

wherein a user device in the federation which receives the supplemental presence information provides the supplemental presence information along with presence status information to a user device of another user who is monitoring the single user.

5. The method of claim 4, wherein updates in presence status of the single user are communicated using Hypertext Transfer Protocol from the user device of the single user.

6. The method of claim 4 further comprising:

transmitting the first policy to each of the user devices in the federation so that each of the user devices may behave in response to presence status information of the single user in accordance with the first policy.

7. A non-transitory computer readable medium storing computer program instructions for aggregating and distributing presence information, the computer program instructions when executed on a processor, cause the processor to perform operations comprising:

receiving an update of presence status from a user device of a single user;

relaying the update of presence status to all other user devices of the single user to change their presence status to correspond to the update of presence status of the single user;

specifying a first policy designating desired act-on behavior to be implemented by devices in the federation for a particular presence state, the act-on behavior based on the particular presence state, an identification of a user attempting to communicate with the single user, and a priority of a communication from the user attempting to communicate with the single user; and

specifying a second policy describing how supplemental presence information should be distributed to devices in the federation, the supplemental presence information comprising a current location of the single user, the current location designated by the single user via a device separate from the devices in the federation,

wherein the user devices are part of a federation of user devices controlled by the single user which relay updates in presence status of the single user to one another so that the presence status of the respective user devices can be updated to correspond to the presence status of the single user, and

wherein a user device in the federation which receives the supplemental presence information provides the supplemental presence information along with presence status information to a user device of another user who is monitoring the single user.

8. The computer readable medium of claim 7, wherein updates in presence status of the single user are communicated using Hypertext Transfer Protocol from the user device of the single user.

9. The computer readable medium of claim 7, the operations further comprising:

transmitting the first policy to each of the user devices in the federation so that each of the user devices may behave in response to presence status information of the single user in accordance with the first policy.