Shared space for communicating information

• US 7,698,660 B2
• Filed: 11/13/2006
• Issued: 04/13/2010
• Est. Priority Date: 11/13/2006
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Corporation
• Inventors: Ohta, Seiya, Sanchez, Russell, Colando, Christian
• Primary Examiner(s): Lo; Weilun
• Assistant Examiner(s): Chuong; Truc T
• Application Number:
  US11/599,599
• Publication Number:
  US 20080114844A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,247 Days
• Field of Search: 715/750, 715/751, 715753-761, 715/773
• US Class Current: 715/863
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/0482 Interaction with lists of selectable items, e.g. menus
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/04842 Selection of displayed objects or displayed text elements G06F3/0482 takes precedence
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/451 Execution arrangements for user interfaces
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/543 User-generated data transfer, e.g. clipboards, dynamic data exchange [DDE], object linking and embedding [OLE]
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/10 Office automation; Time management
• 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 67/104 Peer-to-peer [P2P] networks
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/1046 Joining mechanisms
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/1068 Discovery involving direct consultation or announcement among potential requesting and potential source peers
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/1078 Resource delivery mechanisms
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/1095 Replication or mirroring of data, e.g. scheduling or transport for data synchronisation between network nodes
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/14 Session management for real-time applications in data packet communications networks H04L65/1066
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/148 Migration or transfer of sessions
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/75 Indicating network or usage conditions on the user display

Abstract

Embodiments provide a shared space for communicating information. In an embodiment a number of users associated with a computing environment can use a shared space to communicate information with one another. Each computing device of the computing environment can include a shared space application. The shared space application includes a number of interactive tools that can be used to persist various communications between associated computing devices of a computing environment.

Claims

1. A computer readable storage medium including executable instructions which, when executed, share data by:

creating a shared space, wherein the shared space includes a space canvas and a number of tools;

associating participants of the shared space;

using one of the number of tools to interact with the space canvas including interacting using an expression which includes a digital image, digital text, and digital ink, wherein the participants use the number of tools to add and modify participant expressions within the space canvas as part of offline and online participant interactions with the shared space;

maintaining a history of the shared space and retrieving previous ink strokes, segments, and other expressions based in part on context information including time, segment location, segment size, and ink parameters; and

,

persisting the participant expressions in the shared space including automatically updating the space canvas with changes made to the space canvas which includes using an aggregate of offline changes made by the participants to update the space canvas with the offline changes.

2. The computer-readable storage medium of claim 1, wherein the instructions, when executed, share data by using one of the number of tools to interact with the space canvas using handwritten, video, and audio expressions, wherein a handwritten expression includes digital ink strokes.

3. The computer-readable storage medium of claim 1, wherein the instructions, when executed, share data by providing a live connection to enable communicating participants to interact using video and audio.

4. The computer-readable storage medium of claim 1, wherein the instructions, when executed, share data by updating the shared space to expose the participant expressions to each communicating participant.

5. The computer-readable storage medium of claim 4, wherein the instructions, when executed, share data by updating the shared space to expose the participant expressions to each communicating participant, wherein the participant expressions are synchronized with shared space data of each online participant.

6. The computer-readable storage medium of claim 4, wherein the instructions, when executed, share data by using a master file to update the shared space with the participant expressions.

7. The computer-readable storage medium of claim 1, wherein the instructions, when executed, share data by storing select ones of the participant expressions to a scrapbook.

8. A user interface to share data comprising:

a space canvas to display a number of expressions;

a number of tools to interact with a shared space that is shared by a number of associated users, wherein the number of tools enable a user to include an expression including digital ink, digital text, and digital image expressions on the space canvas, wherein the number of tools are used to add and modify user expressions within the space canvas as part of offline and online user interactions with the shared space;

a history of the shared space wherein previous ink strokes, segments, and other expressions can be retrieved based in part on context information including time, segment location, segment size, and ink parameters; and

an indicator to indicate a participant associated with the shared space, wherein the indicator is to also indicate a current status of the participant, wherein the user interface is displayed on a computing device display and the space canvas is automatically updated with changes made to the space canvas including using an aggregate of offline changes made by associated users to update the space canvas with the offline changes.

9. The user interface of claim 8, wherein the number of tools can be used to create, modify, and save one or more expressions to the space canvas and to retrieve previous inking strokes, segments, and other expressions based in part on associated context information.

10. The user interface of claim 8, wherein the number of tools include a toolset tray button, a toolset button, a tool button, and a palette button.

11. The user interface of claim 8, wherein the space canvas can receive input from a stylus, keyboard, and a finger.

12. The user interface of claim 8, wherein the indicator is configured to establish a live connection with another participant.

13. The user interface of claim 8, wherein the space canvas is configured to expose one or more expressions made by a remote participant.

14. The user interface of claim 8, wherein the user interface includes magnification and focusing functionality to interact with user expressions including magnifying a select participant expression of the space canvas.

15. A method of sharing data comprising:

associating a number of users with a shared space, wherein the shared space includes a canvas;

interacting with the shared space by adding an expression to the canvas, wherein the expression includes a digital image, digital text, and digital ink and the canvas includes user expressions made as part of offline and online user interactions with the shared space;

communicating the shared space so that the canvas of each user includes an added expression;

maintaining a history of the shared space and retrieving previous ink strokes, segments, and other expressions based in part on context information including time, segment location, segment size, and ink parameters; and

displaying the canvas using a computing device including automatically updating the canvas with changes made to the canvas including using an aggregate of offline changes made by associated users to update the canvas with the offline changes.

16. The method of claim 15, further comprising updating the shared space to expose other expressions added by a remote user.

17. The method of claim 16, further comprising communicating the shared space over a network.

18. The method of claim 15, further comprising storing the added expression to local storage.

19. The method of claim 18, further comprising communicating the shared space using a peer-to-peer communication service.