METHOD AND APPARATUS FOR PROVIDING REFERENCE CONTENT

• US 20140058840A1
• Filed: 08/24/2012
• Published: 02/27/2014
• Est. Priority Date: 08/24/2012
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Cellco Partnership, Inc. (Verizon Communications Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Cellco Partnership, Inc. (Verizon Communications Inc.)
• Inventors: CHAKRABARTY, Madhavi M., Bowie, Fraser G., Thomas, Nathaniel C.
• Granted Patent: US 9,075,499 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 705/14.55
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/951 Indexing; Web crawling techniques
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/0481 based on specific properties of the displayed interaction object or a metaphor-based environment, e.g. interaction with desktop elements like windows or icons, or assisted by a cursor's changing behaviour or appearance
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/01 Customer relationship services
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0281 Customer communication at a business location, e.g. providing product or service information, consulting

Abstract

An interactive grid display presented on a communications device offers a frontline representative of an enterprise or other user at a work site access to information for addressing a client'"'"'s request. Available information is sorted and selected via the interactive grid based on a number of primary categories that are identified along one dimension of the grid and a number of subcategories identified along another dimension of the grid. Information is presented in the interactive grid directly, for example, typically without requiring the user to conduct a search for the information. In response to a user selecting a point on the grid for the category and sub-category that best matches the information desired by the representative, based on grid intersection for appropriate primary and secondary categories, the device interface drills down to obtain more specific information for presentation to the user.

Claims

1. A method comprising:

at a communications device, obtaining frequently requested information pertaining to products or services offered at a work site of an enterprise from a database that stores the information; and

providing the frequently requested information to a user of the communications device via an interactive multi-dimensional grid display of the communications device, the interactive multi-dimensional grid display including a plurality of panes arranged in multiple dimensions to form the grid display, a selectable pane among the plurality of panes, a content tab, and a property tab, wherein;

the content tab identifies a primary category of subject matter,

the property tab identifies a sub-category of the subject matter identified by the content tab, and

the frequently requested information is provided to the user in the selectable pane at a grid location associated with the content tab and the property tab.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein a plurality of content tabs are located on a first side and in a first dimension of the interactive multi-dimensional grid display, and a plurality of property tabs are located on a second side and in a second dimension of the interactive multi-dimensional grid display.

3. The method of claim 1, further including providing the frequently requested information to the user of the communications device in response to receiving, from the user, a selection of the selectable pane of the interactive multi-dimensional grid display, the selected selectable pane belonging to and including frequently requested information relating to one of the primary categories and one of the secondary categories.

5. The method of claim 1, further including updating the frequently requested information in response to updates made to the database.

6. The method of claim 5, further including notifying the user of the communications device of the updates made to the database.

7. The method of claim 1, further including receiving information relating to promotions pertaining to the products or services offered at the work from the database and presenting the promotions, to the user of the communications device, in the interactive multi-dimensional grid display.

8. The method of claim 1, wherein providing the user of the communications device with direct access to the frequently requested information includes providing access to the information without requiring the user to search the database.

4. (canceled)

9. A computer program product comprising a non-transitory computer readable medium having computer readable code stored thereon, which, when executed by a processor of a communications device, configures the communications device to:

obtain frequently requested information pertaining to products or services offered at a worksite of an enterprise from a database that stores the information; and

provide the frequently requested information to a user of the communications device in an interactive multi-dimensional grid display, the interactive multi-dimensional grid display including a plurality of panes arranged in multiple directions to form the grid display, a selectable pane among the plurality of panes, a content tab, and a property tab, wherein;

the content tab identifies a primary category of subject matter,

the property tab identifies a sub-category of the subject matter identified by the content tab, and

the frequently requested information is provided to the user in the selectable pane at a grid location associated with the content tab and the property tab.

10. The computer program product of claim 9, wherein execution of the computer readable code by the processor further configures the communications device to arrange a plurality of content tabs on a first side and in a first dimension of the interactive multi-dimensional grid display, and arrange a plurality of property tabs on a second side and in a second dimension of the interactive multi-dimensional grid display.

11. The computer program product of claim 9, wherein execution of the computer readable code by the processor further configures the communications device to provide the frequently requested information to the user of the communications device in response to receiving, from the user, a selection of the selectable pane included in the interactive multi-dimensional grid display, the selected selectable pane belonging to and including frequently requested information relating to one of the primary categories and one of the secondary categories.

12. The computer program product of claim 9, wherein execution of the computer readable code by the processor further configures the communications device to access the database through a communications network that provides the communications device with network connectivity and obtain the frequently requested information from the database.

13. The computer program product of claim 9, wherein execution of the computer readable code by the processor further configures the communications device to update the frequently requested information in response to updates made to the database.

14. The computer program product of claim 13, wherein execution of the computer readable code by the processor further configures the communications device to notify the user of the communications device of the updates made to the database.

15. The computer program product of claim 9, wherein execution of the computer readable code by the processor further configures the communications device to receive information relating to promotions pertaining to the products or services offered at the work site from the database and present the promotions, to the user of the communications device, in the interactive multi-dimensional grid display.

16. The computer program product of claim 9, wherein execution of the computer readable code by the processor further configures the communications device to provide the user of the communications device with direct access to the frequently requested information by providing access to the information without requiring the user to search the database.

17. A communications device, comprising:

a user input element;

a display;

a processor coupled to the at least one user input element and the display;

a memory accessible by the processor; and

an assistance application program stored in the memory, wherein execution of the assistance application by the processor configures the communications device to provide a user interface via the display and responsive to operation of the user input element, the user interface of the assistance application comprising;

a grid display of selectable panes;

content tabs displayed in position in a first dimension of the grid display and identifying primary categories of subject matter of a database of assistance information accessible via the interface;

property tabs displayed in position in a second dimension of the grid display and identifying sub-categories of the subject matter of the database categories of subject matter identified by the primary content tabs;

frequently requested information displayed in at least a respective one of the selectable panes at a grid location corresponding to one of the content tabs and to one of the property tabs.

18. The communications device of claim 17, wherein:

the user interface further comprises priority tabs,

the information presented in the at least one pane is filtered based on a user selection corresponding to one of the priority tabs, and

the more detailed information is filtered based on the user selection corresponding to the one of the priority tabs.

19. The communications device of claim 17, wherein:

the user interface further comprises feature tabs identifying additional categories of subject matter of the database, and

the grid further comprises a pane corresponding to each respective one of the feature tabs for selective display of information from the category corresponding to the respective feature tab.

20. The communications device of claim 17, wherein:

the user interface further comprises screen tabs identifying additional assistance services available through the interface on the communications device, and

a presentation for output via the display regarding an additional service corresponding to each of the screen tabs.

21. The communications device of claim 17, wherein:

the user interface further comprises a screen display of additional more detailed information presented on the screen display in response to user input of a selection of the respective pane from the grid display, and

the more detailed information comprises further information from the database category identified by the one content tab and corresponding to the one sub-category identified by the one property tab.