Accessing Web Content Based on Mobile Contextual Data

• US 20120311465A1
• Filed: 05/31/2011
• Published: 12/06/2012
• Est. Priority Date: 05/31/2011
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Corporation
• Inventors: Nealer, Bryan W., Tedesco, Megan L., Whitaker, Jeremiah T.
• Granted Patent: US 9,021,364 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 715/760
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/9535 Search customisation based on user profiles and personalisation
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/9537 Spatial or temporal dependent retrieval, e.g. spatiotemporal queries
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 9/40 Network security protocols

Abstract

Available web content is filtered based on context data available on a mobile device. Access to the filtered web content is then made available through an infotainment user interface. Context data may be based on a variety of data including, but not limited to, location information, recent communications, scheduled appointments, social network interactions, user-specified favorites, and so on.

Claims

1. A method comprising:

identifying available web content that includes a plurality of available web stories;

determining a context associated with a user;

filtering the available web content based on the context to generate filtered web content that includes a subset of the plurality of available web stories; and

rendering through a user interface, representations of the individual web stories included in the filtered web content.

2. A method as recited in claim 1, wherein the context associated with the user is based on location information.

3. A method as recited in claim 1, wherein the context associated with the user is based on social network interactions.

4. A method as recited in claim 1, wherein the context associated with the user is based on calendar information.

5. A method as recited in claim 1, wherein the context associated with the user is based on any combination of two or more of:

user-specified favorite web pages;

user-specified keywords;

user-subscribed RSS feeds;

a current location associated with the user;

a previous location associated with the user;

a location of an appointment scheduled in a calendar;

a date or time of an appointment scheduled in a calendar;

email information;

information shared through social networking;

transaction data;

recent searches;

recent instant message information;

or

recent phone calls.

6. A method as recited in claim 1, further comprising:

determining relative relevance of the individual web stories in the filtered web content;

dynamically determining presentation features based on the relative relevance; and

rendering the representations of the individual web stories included in the filtered web content based, at least in part, on the presentation features that are determined.

7. A method as recited in claim 6, wherein the presentation features comprise at least one of:

a size of a particular representation;

or

a display location of a particular representation.

8. A method as recited in claim 1, further comprising:

receiving a user-submitted selection of a particular web story through the user interface; and

in response to the user-submitted selection through the user interface, launching a browser application and loading a web page that is associated with the particular web story.

9. A method as recited in claim 1, further comprising:

receiving user feedback regarding one or more of the individual web stories; and

modifying one or more filter attributes based on the user feedback.

10. A method as recited in claim 9, wherein the user feedback is implicit.

11. A method as recited in claim 9, wherein the user feedback is explicit.

12. A mobile computing device comprising:

a processor;

a memory communicatively coupled to the processor;

an infotainment access tool, at least partially stored in the memory and executable on the processor, the infotainment access tool including;

a web content interface to identify available web content;

a context interface to identify current context information;

a contextual filter to filter the available web content based on the current context information, generating filtered web content; and

a user interface module to render a user interface that includes representations of individual web stories of the filtered web content.

13. A mobile computing device as recited in claim 12, wherein the current context information is derived from one or more information sources on the mobile computing device.

14. A mobile computing device as recited in claim 13, wherein the one or more information sources on the mobile computing device include a global positioning system module.

15. A mobile computing device as recited in claim 13, wherein the one or more information sources on the mobile computing device include at least one of:

a calendar application;

or

an email application.

16. A mobile computing device as recited in claim 12, the infotainment access tool further including:

a relative relevance module to associate with a particular web story of the filtered web content, an indication of the particular web story'"'"'s contextual relevance, relative to a contextual relevance of each other web story of the filtered web content;

wherein the user interface module renders the user interface to include representations of the individual web stories of the filtered web content such that a presentation characteristic of a particular representation is based, at least in part, on the contextual relevance of the web story associated with the particular representation, relative to the contextual relevance of other web stories.

17. A mobile computing device as recited in claim 12, the infotainment access tool further including:

a learning module configured to;

generate user selection data by monitoring user selection of representations of individual web stories through the user interface; and

use the user selection data to modify functionality of the contextual filter.

18. A mobile computing device as recited in claim 12, further comprising a browser application to provide access to a particular web story that is part of the filtered web content, the browser application being launched in response to a user selection of a representation of the particular web story through the user interface module of the infotainment access tool.

19. One or more computer readable media encoded with instructions that, when executed, direct a computing device to perform operations comprising:

identifying contextually relevant web content based on current context information associated with the computing device, the contextually relevant web content including a plurality of web stories;

presenting representations of the plurality of web stories through a user interface, separate from a browser application;

receiving, through the user interface, a user-submitted selection of a representation of a particular web story; and

in response to receiving the user-submitted selection, launching the browser application and loading a web page associated with the particular web story into a user interface associated with the browser application.

20. One or more computer readable media as recited in claim 19, wherein the current context information is available through any number of one or more applications that may be executed on the computing device including:

the browser application;

a global positioning system module;

an email application;

a transaction module;

a calendar application; and

a social networking application.