Enhanced collaboration services

• US 10,484,189 B2
• Filed: 11/13/2013
• Issued: 11/19/2019
• Est. Priority Date: 11/13/2013
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Inventors: Albrecht, Brian Thomas
• Primary Examiner(s): Kim, Edward
• Application Number:
  US14/078,841
• Publication Number:
  US 20150134737A1
• Time in Patent Office: 2,197 Days
• Field of Search: 709205, 709204, 715751
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 12/1818 Conference organisation arrangements, e.g. handling schedules, setting up parameters needed by nodes to attend a conference, booking network resources, notifying involved parties
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 12/1822 Conducting the conference, e.g. admission, detection, selection or grouping of participants, correlating users to one or more conference sessions, prioritising transmission
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 12/1827 Network arrangements for conference optimisation or adaptation
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 51/52 for supporting social networking services
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/14 Session management for real-time applications in data packet communications networks H04L65/1066
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/306 User profiles

Abstract

Systems, methods, and software are disclosed herein in which a collaboration service registers users as participants in a collaboration session. As session content is received from at least one instance of various instances of a collaboration application engaged by the users, the collaboration service shares the session content with at least one other instance of the collaboration application. In addition, the collaboration service shares session information descriptive of at least a portion of the session content with at least one social network application associated with at least one user registered as one of the participants.

Claims

1. A method of operating a collaboration service comprising:

registering a plurality of users as participants in a collaboration session, including by registering at least a subset of the plurality of users with a plurality of service identities associated with the collaboration service and registering at least one user with a social network identity associated with a social network service;

receiving session content from a first instance of a plurality of instances of a collaboration application associated with the plurality of users, wherein the session content is associated with one of the plurality of service identities associated with the collaboration service;

sharing the session content with a second instance of the plurality of instances, wherein the second instance is an instance of the collaboration application that is hosted within the social network service and associated with the at least one user; and

sharing, through a social network application hosted within the social network service and associated with the at least one user, session information descriptive of at least a portion of the session content.

2. The method of claim 1 wherein the social network service is external to the collaboration service.

3. The method of claim 2 wherein sharing the session information comprises sharing the session information through a feature of the social network service surfaced to the at least one user by the social network application, and wherein the method further comprises receiving additional session information associated with the at least one user and sharing the additional session information with the plurality of instances of the collaboration application.

4. The method of claim 1 wherein the sharing of the session content further comprises identifying that the session content is associated with social network identity.

5. The method of claim 1 wherein sharing the session information descriptive of the at least a portion of the session content comprises sharing the session content with a hosted instance of the plurality of instances of the collaboration application that is hosted in the social network service.

6. The method of claim 5 wherein the registering further comprises registering the social network identity of the at least one user via the hosted instance of the plurality of instances of the collaboration application.

7. The method of claim 1 wherein the session content comprises an update to a document, and wherein the session information comprises an alert that is descriptive of at least that the update to the document occurred.

8. A computing apparatus comprising:

one or more non-transitory computer readable storage media;

a processing system operatively coupled with the one or more computer readable storage media; and

program instructions stored on the one or more computer readable storage media for operating a collaboration service that, when executed by the processing system, direct the processing system to at least;

register a plurality of users as participants in a collaboration session, including by registering at least a subset of the plurality of users with a plurality of service identities associated with the collaboration service and registering at least one user with a social network identity associated with a social network service;

receive session content from a first instance of a plurality of instances of a collaboration application associated with the plurality of users, wherein the session content is associated with one of the plurality of service identities associated with the collaboration service;

share the session content with a second instance of the plurality of instances, wherein the second instance is an instance of the collaboration application that is hosted within the social network service and associated with the at least one user;

share, through a social network application hosted within the social network service and associated with the at least one user, session information descriptive of at least a portion of the session content.

9. The computing apparatus of claim 8 wherein the social network service is external to the collaboration service.

10. The computing apparatus of claim 9 wherein:

to share the session information, the program instructions direct the processing system to share the session information through a feature of the social network service surfaced to the at least one user by the social network application, receive additional session information associated with the at least one user, and share the additional session information with the plurality of instances of the collaboration application.

11. The computing apparatus of claim 8 wherein to share the session content, the program instructions further direct the processing system to identify that the session content is associated with the social network identity.

12. The computing apparatus of claim 8 wherein to share the session information descriptive of the at least a portion of the session content, the program instructions further direct the processing system to share the session content with a hosted instance of the plurality of instances of the collaboration application that is hosted in the social network service.

13. The computing apparatus of claim 12 wherein to register the plurality of users, the program instructions further direct the processing system to register the social network identity of the at least one user via the hosted instance of the plurality of instances of the collaboration application.

14. The computing apparatus of claim 8 wherein the session content comprises an update to a document, and wherein the session information comprises an alert that is descriptive of at least that the update to the document occurred.

15. One or more computer readable storage media having program instructions stored on the one or more computer readable storage media for operating a collaboration service that, when executed by a processing system, direct the processing system to at least:

register a plurality of users as participants in a collaboration session, including by registering at least a subset of the plurality of users with a plurality of service identities associated with the collaboration service and registering at least one user with a social network identity associated with a social network service;

receive session content from a first instance of a plurality of instances of a collaboration application associated with the plurality of users, wherein the session content is associated with one of the plurality of service identities associated with the collaboration service;

share the session content with a second instance of the plurality of instances, wherein the second instance is an instance of the collaboration application that is hosted within the social network service and associated with the at least one user;

sharing, through a social network application hosted within the social network service and associated with the at least one user, session information descriptive of at least a portion of the session content.

16. The one or more computer readable storage media of claim 15, wherein the social network service is external to the collaboration service.

17. The one or more computer readable storage media of claim 16, wherein to share the session information, the program instructions direct the processing system to share the session information through a feature of the social network service surfaced to the at least one user by the social network application, receive additional session information associated with the at least one user, and share the additional session information with the plurality of instances of the collaboration application.

18. The one or more computer readable storage media of claim 15, wherein to share the session content, the program instructions further direct the processing system to identify that the session content is associated with the social network identity.

19. The one or more computer readable storage media of claim 15, wherein the session content comprises an update to a document, and wherein the session information comprises an alert that is descriptive of at least that the update to the document occurred.

20. The one or more computer readable storage media of claim 15, wherein the to register, the program instructions further direct the processing system to register the social network identity of the at least one user via a hosted instance of the plurality of instances of the collaboration application.