Interruptibility management via scheduling application

• US 9,697,501 B2
• Filed: 09/25/2007
• Issued: 07/04/2017
• Est. Priority Date: 09/25/2007
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Inventors: Ramanathan, Rajesh
• Primary Examiner(s): LOFTIS, JOHNNA RONEE
• Application Number:
  US11/860,857
• Publication Number:
  US 20090083742A1
• Time in Patent Office: 3,570 Days
• Field of Search: 705 718, 705 719
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/10 Office automation; Time management
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/109 Time management, e.g. calendars, reminders, meetings or time accounting
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/1093 Calendar-based scheduling for persons or groups
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/1095 Meeting or appointment

Abstract

A system and methodology that facilitates management of user accessibility via a scheduling application is provided. A user can link or map interruptability levels to schedule entries, such as calendar entries or tasks thereby facilitating automatic communication management. Essentially, interruptability rules (and corresponding categories) can be associated to calendar entries and tasks thereby automating implementation of interruptability rules to manage communications received during calendar entries, tasks, meeting, appointments, etc.

Claims

1. A system comprising:

at least one processor; and

at least one computer-readable storage medium storing instructions executable by the at least one processor to implement;

a scheduling application defining at least one calendar appointment entry having a start time and a finish time,

a communication management component defining an interruptibility rule separately from the at least one calendar appointment entry, and correlating the interruptibility rule to the at least one calendar appointment entry, and

a communication routing component configured to;

save, to a network server component, the at least one calendar appointment entry with the correlated interruptibility rule,

publish, via the network server component, the at least one calendar appointment entry and the correlated interruptibility rule to at least one participant of the at least one calendar appointment entry,

in response to a participant of the at least one participant accepting the published at least one calendar entry;

associate the published at least one calendar appointment entry and the correlated interruptibility rule to the participant, and

impose, during a period of time associated with a start time and a finish time of the published calendar appointment entry, the correlated interruptibility rule with respect to handling incoming communication for any of the at least one participant that accepted a published calendar appointment entry, and

route, according to the correlated interruptibility rule, the incoming communication of the participant that accepted the published calendar appointment entry during the period of time.

2. The system of claim 1, wherein the communication management component enables association of the interruptibility rule to a category, and wherein the category being available to associate the interruptibility rule to additional calendar appointment entries within the scheduling application.

3. The system of claim 2, the scheduling application being configured to enable access of the category by the at least one participant of the at least one calendar appointment entry such that the category is displayed to the at least one participant of the at least one calendar appointment entry with respect to the at least one calendar appointment entry.

4. The system of claim 1, the communication management component being configured to enable definition of the interruptibility rule.

5. The system of claim 1, the communication management component being configured to employ one of rules-based or inference-based logic to automatically define the interruptibility rule.

6. The system of claim 1, wherein the computer-readable storage medium has further instructions stored thereon to provide a graphical user interface (GUI) configured to facilitate one of creation and modification of the interruptibility rule.

7. The system of claim 1, the communication management component comprising:

an analysis component configured to evaluate one of context and content of the incoming communication; and

a category determination component configured to establish a category based upon the analysis, the category to be employed to route the incoming communication based on the associated interruptibility rule.

8. The system of claim 7, further comprising an association logic component configured to map the category to the interruptibility rule.

9. The system of claim 8, the association logic component further comprising a machine learning &

reasoning (MLR) component configured to employ at least one of a probabilistic and a statistical-based analysis configured to infer call routing based at least in part upon calendar appointment event type or associated category.

10. A computer-implemented method comprising:

defining an interruptibility rule including at least one routing rule;

defining at least one calendar appointment entry including a start time and a finish time in a scheduling application;

associating the interruptibility rule to the at least one calendar appointment entry in the scheduling application;

saving to a network server component, the at least one calendar appointment entry with the associated interruptibility rule;

publishing, via the network server component, the at least one calendar appointment entry and the associated interruptibility rule to at least one participant of the at least one calendar appointment entry;

in response to a participant of the at least one participant accepting the published at least one calendar entry;

associating the published at least one calendar appointment entry and the associated interruptibility rule to the participant; and

imposing, during a period of time associated with a start time and a finish time of the published calendar appointment entry, the associated interruptibility rule with respect to handling incoming communication for any of the at least one participant that accepted a published calendar appointment entry; and

routing, according to the associated interruptability rule, the incoming communication of the participant that accepted the published calendar appointment entry during the period of time.

11. The method of claim 10, further comprising:

based on the interruptibility rule, redirecting the incoming communication from a first device to a second device different from the first device.

12. The method of claim 10, further comprising:

analyzing the incoming communication; and

applying the analysis as a function of the interruptibility rule.

13. A computer-readable storage medium storing instructions, the instructions configured to:

define, within a scheduling application, a calendar appointment entry including a time period having a start time and a finish time;

define an interruptibility rule separately defined from the calendar appointment entry;

associate the interruptibility rule with the calendar appointment entry;

save, to a network server component, the calendar appointment entry with the associated interruptibility rule;

publish, via the network server component, the calendar appointment entry and the associated interruptibility rule to at least one participant of the calendar appointment entry;

in response to a participant of the at least one participant accepting the published at least one calendar entry;

associate the published at least one calendar appointment entry and the associated interruptibility rule to the participant; and

impose, during a period of time associated with a start time and a finish time of the published calendar appointment entry, the associated interruptibility rule with respect to handling incoming communication for any of the at least one participant that accepted a published calendar appointment entry; and

route, according to the associated interruptability rule, the incoming communication of the participant that accepted the published calendar appointment entry during the period of time.

14. The computer-readable storage medium of claim 13, the instructions further configured to:

define a category that classifies the interruptibility rule;

associate the category to the calendar appointment entry; and

render the association of the category to the calendar appointment entry.

15. The computer-readable storage medium of claim 14, the instructions further configured to:

associate the category to a plurality of disparate calendar appointment entries within the scheduling application; and

via the category, map the interruptibility rule to each of the plurality of disparate calendar appointment entries.

16. The computer-readable storage medium of claim 14, the instructions further configured to define or infer the interruptibility rule.