METHOD AND SOFTWARE FOR ENABLING N-WAY COLLABORATIVE WORK OVER A NETWORK OF COMPUTERS

• US 20170171262A1
• Filed: 02/27/2017
• Published: 06/15/2017
• Est. Priority Date: 04/22/2002
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: ZAMA Innovations LLC
• Original Assignee: Rosebud LMS, Inc.
• Inventors: Mohan, John J., Lejter, Moises, Greene, Stephen
• Granted Patent: US 10,326,807 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 40/166 Editing, e.g. inserting or deleting
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 40/169 Annotation, e.g. comment data or footnotes
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/542 Event management; Broadcasting; Multicasting; Notifications
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 63/0428 wherein the data content is protected, e.g. by encrypting or encapsulating the payload
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 65/4015 where at least one of the additional parallel sessions is real time or time sensitive, e.g. white board sharing, collaboration or spawning of a subconference
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 65/403 Arrangements for multi-party communication, e.g. for conferences data switching systems for conference H04L12/18; arrangements for connecting several subscribers to a common circuit, i.e. affording conference facilities H04M3/56; television conferencing systems H04N7/15
• 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 67/131 Protocols for games, networked simulations or virtual reality

Abstract

Method, software, and system for efficiently enabling n-way collaborative work using common software over a network of computers. In a preferred embodiment of the invention, each participant in a collaborative session starts up a common software application, which includes a collaboration component. This collaboration component is used to establish a common session that includes all interested parties. The collaboration component replicates operations performed on any one instance of said application to all other instances participating in the same session, so the effect is as if all members of the session were sharing a single instance of the application on a single computer. In one aspect, the collaboration component also supports broadcast of audio and video over a computer network, to enable session participants to see and/or hear each other, and further includes other features that support collaborative work.

Claims

1-20. -20. (canceled)

21. A method of collaboration over a computer network comprising a plurality of workstations, comprising:

at a first workstation of the plurality of workstations, receiving one or more notifications corresponding to a respective one or more application-level events that occurred within a first instance of an application operable to create and edit documents in response to user actions, wherein the one or more application-level events reflect user actions in connection with a native document file generated by the first instance of the application, wherein the user actions are selected from the group consisting of applying edits to the native document file, opening the native document file, closing the native document file, and navigating within the native document file;

transmitting a plurality of session data comprising the native document file and data regarding the one or more application-level events over the computer network, automatically, to a second instance of the application at a second workstation of the plurality of workstations; and

causing the second instance of the application to;

display a local copy of a document corresponding to the native document file,

receive the plurality of session data,

responsive to receiving the plurality of session data and without user intervention, mirror the user actions performed in the first instance by performing one or more operations equivalent to the one or more application-level events with respect to the local copy of the document, and

display the local copy of the document in accordance with one or more changes resulting from the one or more operations.

22. The method of claim 21, wherein the one or more application-level events include adding annotations to the document in response to the user actions.

23. The method of claim 22, wherein the annotation is displayed on the local copy of the document to designate user action.

24. The method of claim 21, wherein no events that have an effect outside the application are propagated.

25. The method of claim 21, wherein the second instance of the application is further configured to queue received event notifications.

26. The method of claim 25, wherein the second instance of the application controls retrieval of the queued event notifications from multiple participants and resolves conflicts between the events.

27. The method of claim 21, wherein the plurality of session data is transmitted to the second instance via a session manager, and in which conflict resolution between events from different sources is performed by the session manager.

28. The method of claim 21, wherein the application comprises a document viewer viewing a first copy of a native document file generated by the first instance of the application.

29. The method of claim 21, further comprising saving the local copy of the document as a file with changes corresponding to the user actions in connection with the native document file.

30. The method of claim 21, wherein the second instance of the application detects conflicts between the application level events and resolves detected conflicts between the application-level events without requiring user intervention.

31. The method of claim 21, wherein the native document file is a text document file, a presentation file, or a multimedia file.

32. The method of claim 21, wherein the session data further comprises audio and visual data.

33. The method of claim 32, wherein the audio data represents verbal communication of one or more users and the visual data depicts the one or more users.

34. A tangible, non-transitory computer-readable storage medium storing software for collaboration over a computer network comprising a plurality of workstations, comprising:

a first instance of an application operable to create and edit documents in response to user actions and to receive notifications of application-level events that occur within the first instance of the application, wherein the one or more application-level events reflect user actions that result in edits to a native document file generated by the first instance of the application;

wherein the first instance of the application is further operable to receive a plurality of session data regarding one or more application-level events that have been detected within one or more other separate instances of the application and that are transmitted over the computer network from the one or more other separate instances of the application, each instance located on a respective workstation of the computer network;

wherein the first instance of the application is further operable to use the received session data to mirror the user actions performed on the one or more other separate instances of the application by performing one or more operations equivalent to the one or more application-level events with respect to a local copy of the document corresponding to the native document file, and displaying the edits to the local copy of the document automatically, and without user intervention, and

wherein communications over the computer network that links the plurality of workstations in a session are encrypted to preserve privacy of a session and no events that have an effect outside the stand-alone application are propagated.

35. The tangible, non-transitory computer-readable storage medium of claim 34, wherein the session data regarding one or more application-level events is transmitted via a session manager.

36. The tangible, non-transitory computer-readable storage medium of claim 34, wherein the first instance of the application detects conflicts between the application-level events and resolves detected conflicts between the application-level events without requiring user intervention.

37. The tangible, non-transitory computer-readable storage medium of claim 34, wherein a session manager detects conflicts between the application-level events and resolves the detected conflicts without requiring user intervention.

38. The tangible, non-transitory computer-readable storage medium of claim 34, wherein the session data further comprises audio and visual data.

39. The tangible, non-transitory computer-readable storage medium of claim 38, wherein the audio data represents verbal communication of one or more users and the visual data depicts the one or more users.

40. tangible, non-transitory computer-readable storage medium of claim 38, wherein the first instance of the application is operable to play the audio and visual data.