Selective information sharing across team spaces

• US 9,350,560 B2
• Filed: 05/31/2006
• Issued: 05/24/2016
• Est. Priority Date: 05/31/2006
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Ginegar LLC (K.Mizra LLC)
• Original Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Inventors: Hupfer, Susanne, Ross, Steven, Patterson, John, Cheng, Li-Te, Wilcox, Eric M.
• Primary Examiner(s): Strange, Aaron
• Application Number:
  US11/421,232
• Publication Number:
  US 20070283278A1
• Time in Patent Office: 3,646 Days
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/542 Event management; Broadcasting; Multicasting; Notifications
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/10 Office automation; Time management
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 12/1813 for computer conferences, e.g. chat rooms instant messaging H04L51/04; protocols for multimedia communication H04L65/1101; arrangements for multi-party communication H04L65/403; telephonic conference arrangements H04M3/56; television conference systems H04N7/15
• 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

Abstract

A publication-and-subscription mechanism for team rooms, referred to as team room “channels”, through which teams are able to selectively share resources from their team rooms with non-members, and that allows selective contributions, modifications, and discussions from non-members. The team room channels operate as bidirectional information pipelines to other team rooms. The team room channels may either be broadcast to all known teams, or be published selectively to one or more designated “target” teams. The receiving team rooms may then subscribe to specific published channels as appropriate. Information items from a team'"'"'s team room, such as documents, tasks, representations of team members, and/or other resources, may be added to one or more of a team'"'"'s published channels. Teams can associate specific permissions with each channel, including Read, Contribute, Modify, and/or Discuss. These permissions apply to all items associated with the channel. Teams can subscribe to those channels published to them, to receive synchronous notifications of changes to the channel items.

Claims

1. A method, embodied in at least one computer system, for selective sharing of information across team spaces, comprising:

enabling a member of a source team room to define a synchronous channel for said source team room;

enabling said member of said source team room to select at least one selected information item from resources contained in said source team room, wherein said at least one selected information item is a subset of all resources contained in said source team room;

enabling said member of said source team room to associate said selected information item with said synchronous channel;

enabling said member of said source team room to publish said synchronous channel to at least one target team room;

enabling a member of said target team room to subscribe said target team room to said synchronous channel;

automatically providing a synchronous notification through said synchronous channel to said target team room responsive to said selected information item being modified;

enabling said member of said target team room to modify said selected information item through said synchronous channel;

adding, to said synchronous channel by said member of said source team room, subsequent to said member of said source team room publishing said synchronous channel to said target team room, a document that is contained in said source team room;

permitting said member of said target team room to modify said document in response to detecting i) that said synchronous channel was published from said source team room to said target team room and ii) that said document was added to said synchronous channel subsequent to said synchronous channel being published to said target team room, and iii) a modify permission associated with said synchronous channel; and

wherein said member of said target team room is not a member of said source team room.

2. The method of claim 1, further comprising automatically providing a synchronous notification through said synchronous channel to said target team room responsive to another information item being associated with said synchronous channel.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein said enabling said member of said source team room to publish said synchronous channel to said at least one target team room further comprises broadcasting availability of said synchronous channel to all other known team rooms.

4. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

enabling said member of said source team to select said at least one target team room; and

wherein said enabling said member of said source team room to publish said synchronous channel to said at least one target team room comprises publishing said synchronous channel to only said at least one target team room selected by said member of said source team.

5. The method of claim 1, wherein said enabling said member of said source team room to associate said selected information item with said synchronous channel comprises creating a link to an original copy of said selected information item contained in the source team room.

6. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

enabling a member of said source team room to select at least one synchronous channel permission from the set of permissions consisting of a read permission, a contribute permission, a modify permission, and a discuss permission;

enabling said member of said source team room to associate said synchronous channel permission with said synchronous channel;

wherein said read permission allows all members of said target team room to read all information items associated with said synchronous channel;

wherein said contribute permission allows all members of said target team room to associate new information items with said synchronous channel;

wherein said modify permission allows all members of said target team room to modify all information items associated with the synchronous channel;

wherein said discuss permission allows all members of said target team room to contribute to online discussions regarding information items associated with the synchronous channel; and

wherein said selected permission is applied to all information items associated with said synchronous channel.

7. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

enabling said member of said source team room to select at least one communication session between members of said source team room;

enabling said member of said source team room to associate said selected communication session with said synchronous channel; and

permitting said member of said target team room to join said communication session in response to i) said member of said source team room associating said communication session with said synchronous channel, and ii) a discuss permission associated with said synchronous channel.

8. The method of claim 7, wherein said communication session comprises an instant messaging session between members of said source team room;

and

wherein a contents of said instant messaging session is related to said document.

9. The method of claim 7, wherein said communication session comprises an online discussion between members of said source team room;

and

wherein a contents of said instant messaging session is related to said document.

10. A system including at least one processor and a computer readable memory, said computer readable memory having program code stored thereon for, when executed by said at least one processor, selectively sharing information across team spaces, said program code comprising:

program code for enabling a member of a source team room to define a synchronous channel for said source team room;

program code for enabling said member of said source team room to select at least one selected information item from resources contained in said source team room, wherein said at least one selected information item is a subset of all resources contained in said source team room;

program code for enabling said member of said source team room to associate said selected information item with said synchronous channel;

program code for enabling said member of said source team room to publish said synchronous channel to at least one target team room;

program code for enabling a member of said target team room to subscribe said target team room to said synchronous channel;

program code for automatically providing a synchronous notification through said synchronous channel to said target team room responsive to said selected information item being modified; and

program code for enabling said member of said target team room to modify said selected information item through said synchronous channel;

program code for adding, to said synchronous channel, responsive to said member of said source team room, subsequent to said member of said source team room publishing said synchronous channel to said target team room, a document that is contained in said source team room;

program code for permitting said member of said target team room to modify said document in response to detecting i) that said synchronous channel was published from said source team room to said target team room and ii) that said document was added to said synchronous channel subsequent to said synchronous channel being published to said target team room, and iii) a modify permission associated with said synchronous channel; and

wherein said member of said target team room is not a member of said source team room.

11. The system of claim 10, wherein said program code further comprises program code for automatically providing a synchronous notification through said synchronous channel to said target team room responsive to another information item being associated with said synchronous channel.

12. The system of claim 10, wherein said program code for enabling said member of said source team room to publish said synchronous channel to said at least one target team room further comprises program code for broadcasting availability of said synchronous channel to all other known team rooms.

13. The system of claim 10, wherein said program code further comprises:

program code for enabling said member of said source team to select said at least one target team room; and

wherein said program code for enabling said member of said source team room to publish said synchronous channel to said at least one target team room comprises program code for publishing said synchronous channel to only said at least one target team room selected by said member of said source team.

14. The system of claim 10, wherein said program code for enabling said member of said source team room to associate said selected information item with said synchronous channel comprises program code for creating a link to an original copy of said selected information item contained in the source team room.

15. The system of claim 10, wherein said program code further comprises:

program code for enabling a member of said source team room to select at least one synchronous channel permission from the set of permissions consisting of a read permission, a contribute permission, a modify permission, and a discuss permission;

program code enabling said member of said source team room to associate said synchronous channel permission with said synchronous channel;

wherein said read permission allows all members of said target team room to read all information items associated with said synchronous channel;

wherein said contribute permission allows all members of said target team room to associate new information items with said synchronous channel;

wherein said modify permission allows all members of said target team room to modify all information items associated with the synchronous channel;

wherein said discuss permission allows all members of said target team room to contribute to online discussions regarding information items associated with the synchronous channel; and

wherein said selected permission is applied to all information items associated with said synchronous channel.

16. A computer program product including a non-transitory computer readable storage medium, said non-transitory computer readable storage medium having program code stored thereon for selectively sharing information across team spaces, said program code comprising:

program code for enabling a member of a source team room to define a synchronous channel for said source team room;

program code for enabling said member of said source team room to select at least one selected information item from resources contained in said source team room, wherein said at least one selected information item is a subset of all resources contained in said source team room;

program code for enabling said member of said source team room to associate said selected information item with said synchronous channel;

program code for enabling said member of said source team room to publish said synchronous channel to at least one target team room;

program code for enabling a member of said target team room to subscribe said target team room to said synchronous channel;

program code for automatically providing a synchronous notification through said synchronous channel to said target team room responsive to said selected information item being modified;

program code for enabling said member of said target team room to modify said selected information item through said synchronous channel;

program code for adding, to said synchronous channel, responsive to said member of said source team room, subsequent to said member of said source team room publishing said synchronous channel to said target team room, a document that is contained in said source team room;

program code for permitting said member of said target team room to modify said document in response to detecting i) that said synchronous channel was published from said source team room to said target team room and ii) that said document was added to said synchronous channel subsequent to said synchronous channel being published to said target team room, and iii) a modify permission associated with said synchronous channel; and

wherein said member of said target team room is not a member of said source team room.