Instant messaging interoperability between disparate service providers

• US 20070083675A1
• Filed: 09/27/2006
• Published: 04/12/2007
• Est. Priority Date: 10/07/2005
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Salesforce.com, Inc.
• Original Assignee: Yahoo! Inc. (Apollo Global Management, Inc.)
• Inventors: Lu, Ming, Kota, Jayarama, Vemulapelli, Rajanikanth
• Granted Patent: US 9,053,461 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 709/246
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/107 Computer-aided management of electronic mailing [e-mailing]
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 51/04 Real-time or near real-time messaging, e.g. instant messaging [IM]
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 51/046 Interoperability with other network applications or services
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 51/066 Format adaptation, e.g. format conversion or compression
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 51/56 Unified messaging, e.g. interactions between e-mail, instant messaging or converged IP messaging [CPM]
• 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 69/08 Protocols for interworking; Protocol conversion

Abstract

An apparatus for facilitating instant messaging communications between clients of different instant messaging service provider networks is provided. The apparatus includes translation logic for translating received communications related to an instant messaging service, the received communications associated with an external instant messaging service provider network and formatted according to a secondary protocol. The translation logic translates the received communication from the secondary protocol to a primary protocol, the primary protocol native to a receiving service provider network. The communication may then be routed to a client of the primary network according to the native, primary protocol.

Claims

1. An apparatus for facilitating instant messaging communications between clients of different instant messaging service provider networks, the system comprising:

interface logic for receiving a communication related to an instant messaging service of an external instant messaging service provider network; and

translation logic for translating the received communication from a secondary protocol to a primary protocol, the primary protocol native to a receiving service provider network.

2. The apparatus of claim 1, wherein the received communication is received from the external instant messaging service provider network.

3. The apparatus of claim 1, wherein the received communication originates from a client of the external instant messaging service provider network, and the received communication is routed through the external instant messaging service provider network to the interface logic.

4. The apparatus of claim 1, wherein the received communication comprises at least one communication from the group consisting of a subscribe request, an invite request, and an unsubscribe request.

5. The apparatus of claim 1, the interface logic further for sending a communication to the external instant messaging service provider, and the translation logic further for translating the communication from the primary protocol to the secondary protocol.

6. The apparatus of claim 5, wherein the sent communication comprises at least one of the group consisting of a notification to watchers, a subscribe request, an invite request, and an unsubscribe request.

7. The apparatus of claim 1, wherein the interface logic and translation logic are included with a gateway event server.

8. The apparatus of claim 1, further comprising a session manager operable to store the run-time dialog state associated with the received communication.

9. The apparatus of claim 1, further comprising a connection manager for processing the received communication, wherein the connection manager includes an end point present dialog manager.

10. The apparatus of claim 1, wherein the secondary protocol comprises SIP/SIMPLE protocol.

11. An apparatus for facilitating instant messaging communications between clients of different instant messaging service provider networks, the system comprising:

translation logic for translating a received instant messaging communication to a primary protocol associated with a primary instant messaging service provider network, wherein the received communication is related to an external instant messaging service provider network.

12. The apparatus of claim 11, wherein the communication is directed to a client of the primary instant messaging service provider network.

13. The apparatus of claim 11, wherein the primary protocol is different than a protocol of the external instant messaging service provider network.

14. The apparatus of claim 11, wherein the communication is received by the translation logic as SIP/SIMPLE protocol.

15. A method for facilitating instant messaging communications between clients of different instant messaging service provider networks, the method comprising the acts of:

receiving a communication related to an instant messaging service from an external instant messaging service provider network, wherein the received communication is formatted according to a secondary protocol; and

translating the received communication from the secondary protocol to a primary protocol.

16. The method of claim 15, wherein the received communication is received from the external instant messaging service provider network.

17. The method of claim 15, wherein the received communication originates from a client of the external instant messaging service provider network, and the received communication is routed through the external instant messaging service provider network.

18. The method of claim 15, wherein the received communication comprises at least one of the group consisting of a subscribe request, an invite request, and an unsubscribe request.

19. The method of claim 15, further comprising sending a communication related to the instant messaging service to the external instant messaging service provider network, wherein the communication is sent according to the secondary protocol.

20. The method of claim 15, further comprising routing the translated communication to a client of a primary network according to the primary protocol.

21. The method of claim 15, further comprising storing a run-time dialog state associated with a received communication.

22. The method of claim 15, further comprising processing the received communication with an end point present dialog manager.

23. A computer-readable medium comprising instructions for facilitating instant messaging communications over different service provider networks, the instructions for causing the performance of the method comprising:

translating a communication related to an instant messaging service and directed to a primary instant messaging service provider network, the received communication associated with an external instant messaging service provider network, wherein;

the communication is translated from a received secondary protocol to a primary protocol, the primary protocol native to the primary instant messaging service provider network.

24. The computer-readable medium of claim 23, wherein the communication is received from the external instant messaging service provider.

25. The computer-readable medium of claim 23, wherein the communication originates from a client of the external instant messaging service provider network, and the received communication is routed through the external instant messaging service provider network to the primary instant messaging service provider network.

26. The computer-readable medium of claim 23, wherein the received communication comprises at least one of the group consisting of a subscribe request, an invite request, and an unsubscribe request.

27. The computer-readable medium of claim 23, the instructions further causing the performance of sending a communication related to the instant messaging service, wherein the communication is sent according to the secondary protocol.

28. The computer-readable medium of claim 23, the instructions further causing the performance of routing the translated communication to a client of the primary instant messaging service provider network.

29. The computer-readable medium of claim 23, the instructions further causing the performance of storing a run-time dialog state associated with a received communication.

30. The computer-readable medium of claim 23, the instructions further causing the performance of processing the received communication with an end point present dialog manager.