Organizing search history into collections

• US 9,684,724 B2
• Filed: 06/21/2013
• Issued: 06/20/2017
• Est. Priority Date: 06/29/2011
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Inventors: Connell, Derrick, Soin, Ravi, Shuman, Andrew, Latuskiewicz, Marek, Vlcek, Kim, Wong, Sandy, Yin, Jun, Yao, Yinghua
• Primary Examiner(s): Beausoliel, Jr., Robert
• Assistant Examiner(s): Khakhar, Nirav K
• Application Number:
  US13/924,236
• Publication Number:
  US 20130282688A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,460 Days
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/9535 Search customisation based on user profiles and personalisation
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/9538 Presentation of query results

Abstract

Computer-storage media, methods, and systems for improving the ability of a user to accomplish a task that is pending during a search session are provided. When a user invokes the pending task, a collection of elements that are associated with the pending task are dynamically organized into a sharable content page that may be shared with a user'"'"'s contacts via a social network. The user'"'"'s contacts may comment on or provide feedback related to the pending task. The feedback may be published to the sharable content page and presented to the user on a user interface.

Claims

1. One or more hardware computer-storage media having computer-executable instructions embodied thereon that, when executed, perform a method of sharing a collection of elements that are related to at least one relevant task, the method comprising:

detecting a user-initiated selection directed toward a representation of the at least one relevant task presented on a user interface;

incident to receiving the user-initiated selection,

A) automatically identifying, within a web search history, one or more elements that are related to the at least one relevant task, wherein the one or more elements are obtained from the web search history,

B) dynamically generating the collection of elements from the one or more elements that are related to the at least one relevant task, and

C) dynamically preparing a sharable content page that includes the collection of elements that are related to the at least one relevant task;

automatically presenting the sharable content page to the user, wherein the sharable content page includes a control that facilitates posting a link of the sharable content page to one or more contacts via a social network;

detecting a user-initiated selection of the control; and

incident to detecting the user-initiated selection of the control, posting the link to the one or more contacts via the social network.

2. The media of claim 1, wherein the elements include navigation events comprising at least one of queries, clicked-through links, or websites that have been visited.

3. The media of claim 2, wherein the navigation events are drawn from the web search history stored in a log associated with the user.

4. The media of claim 2, wherein the navigation events are drawn from general searching behavior stored in a log associated with various users that are demographically situated with the user.

5. The media of claim 1, wherein the link is posted to a personal profile page of each of the one or more contacts.

6. The media of claim 1, wherein the link is posted in association with a message to view and generate feedback related to the at least one relevant task.

7. The media of claim 6, further comprising:

detecting that at least one contact of the one or more contacts has invoked the posted link and generated one or more instances of feedback related to the at least one relevant task; and

publishing the one or more instances of feedback on the sharable content page.

8. The media of claim 1, wherein the user grants permission to the one or more contacts to publish comments to the sharable content page.

9. The media of claim 1, wherein the user is prompted to post the link of the sharable content page to one or more contacts.

10. A computerized method, carried out by a processing unit, for receiving feedback related to a user'"'"'s pending task, the method comprising:

detecting a user-initiated selection of a control that facilitates posting a link of a sharable content page to one or more contacts via a social network, wherein the sharable content page is associated with a relevant task;

grouping navigation events within a log of the user'"'"'s web search history into collections of elements, wherein for each collection of elements, the elements share a respective semantically common concept;

incident to detecting the user-initiated selection,

A) identifying a collection of elements that shares a semantically common concept with the relevant task, wherein the collection of elements is obtained from the web search history associated with the user,

B) automatically composing the sharable content page associated with the relevant task, wherein the sharable content page includes the collection of elements that shares the semantically common concept with the relevant task, and

C) posting the link of the sharable content page to the one or more contacts via the social network;

detecting that at least one contact of the one or more contacts has invoked the link and generated one or more instances of feedback related to the relevant task; and

publishing the one or more instances of feedback on the sharable content page.

11. The method of claim 10, further comprising:

identifying the relevant task of the user by analyzing a log of the user'"'"'s search history, wherein the relevant task represents a semantic concept that is abstracted from at least one navigation event within the search-history log; and

rendering the sharable content page for presentation on a user interface.

12. The method of claim 11, wherein the sharable content page comprises one or more links to suggested web pages that share the semantically common concept.

13. The method of claim 10, wherein the link is posted to a personal profile page associated with each of the one or more contacts.

14. The method of claim 13, wherein the link is posted in association with a message to view and generate feedback related to the relevant task.

15. The method of claim 13, wherein the link is posted in association with a description of the relevant task.

16. The method of claim 10, wherein the one or more instances of feedback are published on the sharable content page as part of a thread.

17. A computer system for allowing a user to collaborate on a pending task with one or more contacts, the computer system comprising a processing unit coupled to a computer storage medium, the computer storage medium having stored thereon a plurality of computer software components executable by the processing unit, the computer software components comprising:

a data store that stores a web search history associated with the user and/or one or more other users, wherein navigation events within the web search history are grouped into collections of elements that share a semantically common concept;

a collections component for selecting a task that is relevant to a user and for composing a sharable content page that relates to the relevant task, wherein composing the sharable content page includes

A) identifying a collection of elements within the web search history that share a semantically common concept with the relevant task, wherein the elements are obtained from the web search history associated with the user and/or one or more other users, and

B) including within the sharable content page the collection of elements that share the semantically common concept with the relevant task;

a user experience layer for rendering a representation of the sharable content page, wherein the representation of the sharable content page includes a control that, when selected, facilitates posting a link of the sharable content page to the one or more contacts via a social network; and

a sharing component for interfacing the collections component and the social network via a process comprising;

A) posting the link of the sharable content page to the one or more contacts via the social network; and

B) receiving one or more instances of feedback associated with the relevant task from at least one contact of the one or more contacts.

18. The computer system of claim 17, wherein the collections component publishes the one or more instances of feedback to the sharable content page, and wherein the user experience layer renders a representation of the sharable content page that includes the one or more instances of feedback.