Relationship confirmation in an online social network

• US 9,785,716 B2
• Filed: 03/05/2014
• Issued: 10/10/2017
• Est. Priority Date: 05/26/2004
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Meta Platforms, Inc. (f/k/a Facebook, Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Meta Platforms, Inc. (f/k/a Facebook, Inc.)
• Inventors: Galbreath, Nicholas, Lunt, Christopher
• Primary Examiner(s): Ouellette, Jonathan
• Application Number:
  US14/198,444
• Publication Number:
  US 20140188944A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,315 Days
• Field of Search: 705 11-912
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/164 File meta data generation
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/21 Design, administration or maintenance of databases
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/288 Entity relationship models
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/951 Indexing; Web crawling techniques
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/9535 Search customisation based on user profiles and personalisation
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/9538 Presentation of query results
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/02 Marketing; Price estimation or determination; Fundraising
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0601 Electronic shopping [e-shopping]
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 50/01 Social networking
• 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 67/306 User profiles

Abstract

In particular embodiments, a method comprises maintaining a database of connections between a plurality of members of an online social network, creating a new entry for a new user in the database responsive to the new user joining the online social network, determining whether the new user joined the online social network in response to a request from an existing user of the online social network, and if the new user joined the online social network in response to a request from the existing user, then sending a prompt to the new user to confirm the relationship between the new user and the existing user.

Claims

1. A method comprising, by one or more processors associated with one or more computing devices:

maintaining, by a social graph server of an online social network, a relationship database of the social graph server, the relationship database storing a social graph structure comprising a plurality of nodes corresponding to a plurality of users of the online social network and a plurality of edges connecting the nodes, each edge establishing a degree of separation between two nodes;

receiving, at an application server of the online social network from a client device of a new user of the online social network, profile information and contact information of the new user joining the online social network;

creating, responsive to a new user joining the online social network, a new entry for the new user in a member database of the online social network;

determining, by the application server, whether the new user joined the online social network in response to a request from an existing user of the online social network;

if the new user joined the online social network in response to a request from the existing user, then sending, to the client device, a prompt to the new user to confirm the relationship between the new user and the existing user, the prompt comprising a user identifier of the existing user;

receiving, from the client device, a confirmation from the new user confirming the relationship between the new user and the exiting user; and

updating, by the social graph server responsive to the confirmation from the first user, the social graph structure to create an edge representing the relationship between nodes corresponding to the new user and the existing user.

2. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

sending, to the client device, instructions for presenting an interface to the new user allowing the new user to enter preference settings specifying a degree of separation, relative to the new user, that other users of the online social network must be within to access profile information or contact information associated with the first user.

3. The method of claim 2, wherein the profile information comprises one or more of family information, personal relationships, individual personal attributes, affiliations, employers, locations, age, personal interests, or any combination thereof.

4. The method of claim 2, wherein the contact information comprises one or more of an email address, text messaging, voicemail, instant messaging, chat, physical address, telephone number, or any combination thereof.

5. The method of claim 2, wherein preference settings comprise a visibility setting limiting who may view the new user'"'"'s full profile.

6. The method of claim 2, wherein the preference settings comprise a contactability setting limiting who may send messages to the new user.

7. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

sending, to the client device, a prompt to the new user to enter user identifiers associated with other users of the online social network the new user wishes to establish a relationship with;

receiving, from the client device, one or more user identifiers entered by the second user;

sending, to one or more other client devices of one or more other users, a prompt to each of the other users associated with the received user identifiers to confirm the other user'"'"'s relationship with the new user; and

updating, by the social graph server, responsive to each other user confirming the relationship between the other user and the new user, the social graph structure to create an edge representing the relationship between nodes corresponding to the new user and the other user that confirmed the relationship prompt.

8. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

receiving a request from the existing user to view the user profile of the new user; and

providing for display to the existing user the new user'"'"'s full profile.

9. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

generating, by the social graph server, a new node of the plurality of nodes responsive to the new user joining the online social network, the new node corresponding to the new user.

10. One or more machine-readable non-transitory storage media embodying software that is operable when executed by one or more processors associated with one or more computer systems to:

maintain, by a social graph server of an online social network, a relationship database of the social graph server, the relationship database storing a social graph structure comprising a plurality of nodes corresponding to a plurality of users of the online social network and a plurality of edges connecting the nodes, each edge establishing a degree of separation between two nodes;

receive, at an application server of the online social network from a client device of a new user of the online social network, profile information and contact information of the new user joining the online social network;

create, responsive to a new user joining the online social network, a new entry for the new user in a member database of the online social network;

determine, by the application server, whether the new user joined the online social network in response to a request from an existing user of the online social network;

if the new user joined the online social network in response to a request from the existing user, then send, to the client device, a prompt to the new user to confirm the relationship between the new user and the existing user, the prompt comprising a user identifier of the existing user;

receive, from the client device, a confirmation from the new user confirming the relationship between the new user and the exiting user; and

update, by the social graph server responsive to the confirmation from the first user, the social graph structure to create an edge representing the relationship between nodes corresponding to the new user and the existing user.

11. A system, comprising:

a processor; and

a non-transitory machine-readable medium configured with instructions to be executed by the processor to;

maintain, by a social graph server of an online social network, a relationship database of the social graph server, the relationship database storing a social graph structure comprising a plurality of nodes corresponding to a plurality of users of the online social network and a plurality of edges connecting the nodes, each edge establishing a degree of separation between two nodes;

receive, at an application server of the online social network from a client device of a new user of the online social network, profile information and contact information of the new user joining the online social network;

create, responsive to a new user joining the online social network, a new entry for the new user in a member database of the online social network;

determine, by the application server, whether the new user joined the online social network in response to a request from an existing user of the online social network;

if the new user joined the online social network in response to a request from the existing user, then send, to the client device, a prompt to the new user to confirm the relationship between the new user and the existing user, the prompt comprising a user identifier of the existing user;

receive, from the client device, a confirmation from the new user confirming the relationship between the new user and the exiting user; and

update, by the social graph server responsive to the confirmation from the first user, the social graph structure to create an edge representing the relationship between nodes corresponding to the new user and the existing user.