TECHNIQUES FOR GROUP MESSAGING ON A MOBILE COMPUTING DEVICE

• US 20090061825A1
• Filed: 08/31/2007
• Published: 03/05/2009
• Est. Priority Date: 08/31/2007
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Qualcomm, Inc.
• Original Assignee: Palm, Inc. (TCL Technology Group Corp.)
• Inventors: CHAMPLIN, David G., PAREKH, Manisha D., FRY, Peter, DONALD, Richard J., CASE, Ryan, CHEN, Lang S., BONINGUE, Benoit, NEELAKANTAN, Radha
• Granted Patent: US 9,544,180 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 455/412.100
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 51/48 Message addressing, e.g. address format or anonymous messages, aliases
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 51/58 Message adaptation for wireless communication
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 61/5069 for group communication, multicast communication or broadcast communication
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/08 User group management

Abstract

Techniques for group messaging on a mobile computing device are described. An apparatus may comprise a message server to communicate messages between multiple mobile computing devices. The message server may have a group message management module to establish a group messaging session between the multiple mobile computing devices. The group message management module may have a group generating module to receive a message with a group message indicator and identifying information for multiple mobile computing devices within the message. The group generating module may form a message group to communicate messages from any one of the mobile computing devices to all of the mobile computing devices for the group messaging session. Other embodiments are described and claimed.

Claims

1. An apparatus, comprising:

a message server to communicate messages between multiple mobile computing devices, the message server having a group message management module to establish a group messaging session between the multiple mobile computing devices, the group message management module having a group generating module to receive a message with a group message indicator and identifying information for multiple mobile computing devices within the message, and form a message group to communicate messages from any one of the mobile computing devices to all of the mobile computing devices for the group messaging session.

2. The apparatus of claim 1, the group generating module arranged to detect identifying information for the multiple mobile computing devices within the message, form the message group with the identifying information, generate a message group identifier for the message group, and send the message with the message group identifier to each mobile computing device in the message group for the group messaging session.

3. The apparatus of claim 1, the message server to communicate any messages received with the message group identifier to all of the mobile computing devices of the message group.

4. The apparatus of claim 1, the group generating module arranged to receive a message with the message group identifier, detect identifying information for a new mobile computing device within the message with the message group identifier, and add the new mobile computing device to the message group.

5. The apparatus of claim 1, the group message management module having a group control module arranged to store the message with the group message indicator and any messages received with the message group identifier to a message storage queue for the message group.

6. The apparatus of claim 1, the group message management module having a group control module arranged to send archive messages stored by a message storage queue for the message group to a mobile computing device within the message group.

7. The apparatus of claim 1, the group message management module having a group control module arranged to send archive messages stored by a message storage queue for the message group to a mobile computing device within the message group, with a number of archive messages determined by a message volume parameter.

8. The apparatus of claim 1, the group message management module having a group control module arranged to detect a new mobile computing device added to the message group, and send the message group identifier and messages stored by a message storage queue for the message group to a mobile computing device within the message group.

9. The apparatus of claim 1, the group message management module having a message conversion module arranged to convert a message with the message group identifier from a first message type to a second message type.

10. A method comprising:

receiving a message with a group message indicator and identifying information for multiple mobile computing devices within the message; and

forming a message group to communicate messages from any one of the mobile computing devices to all of the mobile computing devices for a group messaging session between the mobile computing devices.

11. The method of claim 10, comprising:

detecting the identifying information for the mobile computing devices;

forming the message group with the identifying information;

generating a message group identifier for the message group; and

sending the message with the message group identifier to each mobile computing device in the message group for the group messaging session.

12. The method of claim 10, comprising communicating any messages received with the message group identifier by the message server to all of the mobile computing devices of the message group.

13. The method of claim 10, comprising storing the message with the group message indicator and any messages received with the message group identifier to a message storage queue for the message group.

14. The method of claim 10, comprising:

receiving a message with the message group identifier;

detecting identifying information for a new mobile computing device within the message with the message group identifier; and

adding the new mobile computing device to the message group.

15. The method of claim 10, comprising sending the message group identifier and messages stored by a message storage queue for the message group to a mobile computing device within the message group.

16. A computer-readable storage medium comprising instructions that if executed enable a computing system to:

receive a message with a group message indicator and identifying information for multiple mobile computing devices within the message; and

form a message group to communicate messages from any one of the mobile computing devices to all of the mobile computing devices for a group messaging session between the mobile computing devices.

17. The storage medium of claim 16, further comprising instructions that if executed enable a computing system to:

detect the identifying information for the mobile computing devices;

form the message group with the identifying information;

generate a message group identifier for the message group; and

send the message with the message group identifier to each mobile computing device in the message group for the group messaging session.

18. The storage medium of claim 16, further comprising instructions that if executed enable a computing system to communicate any messages received with the message group identifier by the message server to all of the mobile computing devices of the message group.

19. The storage medium of claim 16, further comprising instructions that if executed enable a computing system to store the message with the group message indicator and any messages received with the message group identifier to a message storage queue for the message group.

20. The storage medium of claim 16, further comprising instructions that if executed enable a computing system to send messages stored by a message storage queue for the message group to a mobile computing device within the message group.

21. An apparatus, comprising:

a mobile computing device to support cellular voice communication, wireless data communication and computing capabilities, the mobile computing device including a mobile messaging application to communicate messages for a group messaging session, the mobile messaging application to send a message with a group message indicator and identifying information for multiple mobile computing devices within the message to a message server to initiate the group messaging session between the mobile computing devices.

22. The apparatus of claim 21, the mobile messaging application to send the message with identifying information for at least three mobile computing devices.

23. The apparatus of claim 21, the mobile messaging application to communicate messages for a many-to-many group messaging session.

24. The apparatus of claim 21, the mobile messaging application to receive messages from the multiple mobile computing devices from the message server, each message having a message group identifier for a message group including all of the mobile computing devices.

25. The apparatus of claim 21, the mobile computing device having a message user interface to generate a group chat view for the group messaging session.

26. The apparatus of claim 21, the mobile computing device having a message user interface to generate a short message service group chat view for the group messaging session.

27. The apparatus of claim 21, the mobile messaging application comprising a short message service application.

28. The apparatus of claim 21, the mobile messaging application comprising a multimedia message service application.

29. The apparatus of claim 21, the mobile messaging application comprising an electronic mail application.

30. The apparatus of claim 21, the mobile messaging application comprising an instant messaging application.