Designs, interfaces, and policies for systems that enhance communication and minimize disruption by encoding preferences and situations
First Claim
1. A system that facilitates information exchange between a contactor and a contactee, comprising:
- an input component that receives a communication transmitted from the contactor to the contactee; and
a communication service that routes the communication based on a cost associated with interrupting the contactee and at least one contactee preference.
3 Assignments
0 Petitions
Accused Products
Abstract
The present invention relates to utilizing identity and context-sensitive decision-making for handling communications, including, channel selection, routing, and rescheduling operations. The systems and methods provide a service that allows users to assess preferences regarding real-time call handling and performs dynamic decision-making about the best timing and channel for interpersonal communication. This service can be based on various cost-benefit analyses (e.g., basic and extended) that consider cost of interruption and preferences of contactors and contactees to guide communications, and/or on decision-making under uncertainty. Statistical models that are learned from data are joined with user preferences to generate expected costs of interruption for office activity and over time, based on a user'"'"'s activities, locations, calendar information and preference assessments. In addition, statistical forecasting provides presence and availability predictions. The foregoing can provide an enhanced interpersonal communication system that can maximize the value and minimize the cost of communication among people.
211 Citations
72 Claims
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1. A system that facilitates information exchange between a contactor and a contactee, comprising:
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an input component that receives a communication transmitted from the contactor to the contactee; and
a communication service that routes the communication based on a cost associated with interrupting the contactee and at least one contactee preference. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 38, 39)
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17. A system that handles communication between parties, comprising:
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a system manager that is coupled to a communication exchange service; and
a communication mediator that interacts with the system manager and a plurality of state machines in order to automatically handle incoming signals to the communication exchange service by routing the signals to respective state machines based on a cost of interrupting the recipient and a preference. - View Dependent Claims (18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29)
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30. An architecture for constructing an interpersonal communication service, comprising:
a communication manager that receives schema related to a communication between parties, the schema includes data related to at least one of a contactor, a contactee, and a context of the communication, the communications manager determines an optimal manner to facilitate the communication based on the schema. - View Dependent Claims (31, 32, 33)
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34. A user interface that facilitates communications comprising:
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a first display component that allows a user to generate groups of users, a second display component that forms relationships amongst the groups, and associate activities in an interpersonal communication service. - View Dependent Claims (35, 36)
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37. A method that facilitates interpersonal communication, comprising:
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receiving information associated with an intended communication between a contactor and contactee;
forecasting availability of the contactee;
inferring how utility of scheduling the communication varies over time; and
scheduling the communication based in part on the inference.
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40. A system that facilitates communication, comprising:
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means for receiving a communication from a contactor; and
means for determining routing characteristics for the communication; and
means for handling the communication.
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41. A system that enhances interpersonal communication, comprising:
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a component that receives a communication from a caller; and
an interpersonal communication service that routes the communication based at least on a cost of interruption. - View Dependent Claims (42, 43, 44, 45, 46, 47, 48, 49, 50, 51, 52, 53, 54, 55, 56, 57, 58, 59, 60, 61, 62, 63, 64, 65, 66, 67, 68, 69, 70, 71, 72)
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Specification