Social network for travelers with layovers

• US 8,751,509 B1
• Filed: 11/26/2012
• Issued: 06/10/2014
• Est. Priority Date: 09/19/2007
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Intercept Incorporated (Fidelity National Financial Incorporated)
• Original Assignee: Intercept Incorporated (Fidelity National Financial Incorporated)
• Inventors: Abercrombie, Charles Clinton III, Cassano, Allen D.
• Primary Examiner(s): Rostami, Mohammad S
• Application Number:
  US13/684,649
• Time in Patent Office: 561 Days
• Field of Search: None
• US Class Current: 707/748
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/109 Time management, e.g. calendars, reminders, meetings or time accounting
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/02 Marketing; Price estimation or determination; Fundraising

Abstract

A computer system that provides a social network for traveling people includes software that maintains a list of members and buddies of the members. Each member has at least one association to a unique person identifier. The software downloads schedule(s) from pre-determined schedule system(s). Each schedule has records with a person identifier, at least one date/time, and a location. The software searches the schedule(s) and extracts a subset of records in which the person identifier corresponds with the unique person identifier of any member and the software creates layover entries from the subset. The software searches the layover entries for overlapping layovers, determined by a first member having a layover that overlaps with a layover of a buddy member (e.g. having the same or similar location). For each overlapping layover, the software notifies either the member and/or the buddy who have the overlapping layover.

Claims

1. A computer system providing a social network for traveling people, the computer system comprising:

a server computer;

software executing on the server computer maintains a list of members and, for each member in the list of members, the software maintains a list of buddies of the each member, the buddies also being in the list of members, each member having at least one association to a unique person identifier;

the software downloads at least one schedule from one or more pre-determined schedule systems, each of the at least one schedule created by the one or more schedule systems without direct input from the each member, each schedule comprising a plurality of records, each of the records comprising a person identifier, at least one date/time, and at least one location, the person identifier uniquely identifies a person associated with the each record;

the software searches each of the at least one schedule for a subset of the records in which the person identifier corresponds with the unique person identifier of any member of the list of members and the software creates layover entries from the subset of the records, each of the layover entries comprise the member, a layover location, and a layover date/time;

the software searches the layover entries for overlapping layovers, the overlapping layover determined by a first member of the list of members having a layover that overlaps with a layover of a buddy of the first member; and

for each overlapping layover, the software notifies a person selected from the group consisting of the first member and the buddy who have the overlapping layover.

2. The computer system of claim 1, wherein after the software notifies, the software saves the each overlapping layovers in a database, and the software consults the database prior to any notification and suppresses the notification if a prior notification was made for that overlapping layover.

3. The computer system of claim 1, wherein the at least one schedule is stored within the social network after downloading.

4. The computer system of claim 1, wherein the at least one schedule is stored external to the social network and the at least one schedule is downloaded to the social network.

5. The computer system of claim 1, wherein at least one of the one or more pre-determined schedule systems is a scheduling system for flight crews.

6. The computer system of claim 1, wherein at least one of the one or more pre-determined schedule systems is an online travel scheduling system.

7. The computer system of claim 1, wherein at least one of the one or more pre-determined schedule systems is a scheduling system for truck drivers.

8. The computer system of claim 1, wherein the social network software further implements a location thesaurus for mapping multiple geographic locations into a geographic area.

9. The computer system of claim 1, wherein the software notifies a person selected from the group consisting of the first member and the buddy who have the overlapping layover by sending a notification selected from the group consisting of an email, a text message, a voice message, and a page.

10. A method of notifying members of a social network of upcoming overlapping layovers comprising:

(a) maintaining a list of members and, for each member, maintaining a list of buddies of the each member, each member having at least one association to at least one unique identifier;

(b) downloading at least one schedule from at least one pre-determined schedule system, each of the at least one schedule created at a corresponding one of the at least one schedule systems without direct input from any member of the list of members, each record of the at least one schedule comprising a person identifier, a date, and a location, wherein the person identifiers uniquely identify one person;

(c) for each record, if the person identifier matches the unique identifier of a member, saving a layover data record including the member, the date, and the location; and

(d) for each of the layover data records, searching the layover data records for a buddy having an overlapping layover data record, and if the searching finds an overlapping layover data record, automatically notifying the member of the overlapping layover.

11. The method of claim 10, wherein the overlapping layover is declared when the member and the buddy are within a same location for a period of time.

12. The method of claim 10, further comprising storing the schedule(s) within the social network after downloading.

13. The method of claim 10, wherein the searching the layover data records for the buddy having an overlapping layover data record includes looking up the location of the buddy and the location of the member in a location thesaurus to determine a layover overlap.

14. The method of claim 10, wherein the step of notifying the member includes sending one or more messages selected from the group consisting of sending an email, sending a text message, sending a voice message, and sending a page.

15. Program instructions tangibly embodied in a non-transitory storage medium for notifying of upcoming overlapping layovers, wherein the at least one instruction comprises:

(a) computer readable instructions maintain a list of members and, for each member, maintain a list of buddies of the each member, each member having at least one association to at least one unique identifier;

(b) computer readable instructions download at least one schedule, each of the at least one schedule created on a pre-determined schedule system without direct input from any member in the list of members, each of the at least one schedules comprising a plurality of records, each of the records comprising a person identifier, at least one date, and at least one location;

(c) computer readable instructions extract layover data from the records in which the person identifier in the record corresponds with the unique identifier of any member of the list of members, the layover data comprises the any member, a layover location, and a layover time period, wherein the person identifier assists in uniquely identifying a correspondence between the records in the schedules and the any member of the list of members;

(d) computer readable instructions search the layover data for a set of overlapping layovers in which a layover of the member and a layover of a buddy of the member have the same location;

(e) for each overlapping layover in the set of overlapping layovers, computer readable instructions notify the member and/or the buddy of the overlapping layover;

(f) periodically repeating steps (b) and (e).

16. The program instructions tangibly embodied in the non-transitory storage medium of claim 15, wherein the computer readable instructions that search the layover data for a set of overlapping layovers search a thesaurus to map surrounding locations to the same location.

17. The program instructions tangibly embodied in the non-transitory storage medium of claim 15, wherein the schedule includes scheduling information for pilots.

18. The program instructions tangibly embodied in the non-transitory storage medium of claim 15, wherein the schedule includes scheduling information for flight attendants.

19. The program instructions tangibly embodied in the non-transitory storage medium of claim 15, wherein the schedule includes scheduling information from an online travel reservation system.

20. The program instructions tangibly embodied in the non-transitory storage medium of claim 15, wherein the computer readable instructions that notify the member and/or the buddy of the overlapping layover include computer readable instructions for sending one or more messages selected from the group consisting of sending an email, sending a text message, sending a voice message, and sending a page.