U.S. patent application number 12/801670 was filed with the patent office on 2010-10-14 for method and system for collecting, synchronizing, and reporting telecommunication call events and work flow related information.
Invention is credited to Dima Dorfman, Stephen G. Petilli, Angie Sheha, Michael A. Sheha.
Application Number | 20100261486 12/801670 |
Document ID | / |
Family ID | 34119137 |
Filed Date | 2010-10-14 |
United States Patent
Application |
20100261486 |
Kind Code |
A1 |
Sheha; Michael A. ; et
al. |
October 14, 2010 |
Method and system for collecting, synchronizing, and reporting
telecommunication call events and work flow related information
Abstract
The present invention is directed to a method and apparatus for
recording and generating additional information related to
telecommunication events using a mobile communication device, such
as a telephone call or a text messaging event using cellular phone
or a personal digital assistant. Specifically, the preferred
embodiments of the present invention records information such as
GPS coordinates that indicate a position of the mobile
communication device during the communication event, as well as a
location of a sender or receiver of data to or from the mobile
communication device, so as to facilitate a log entry of the
position of the mobile communication device as well as other useful
information that are associated with the communication events.
Inventors: |
Sheha; Michael A.; (Laguna
Niguel, CA) ; Sheha; Angie; (Laguna Niguel, CA)
; Petilli; Stephen G.; (Laguna Niguel, CA) ;
Dorfman; Dima; (Irvine, CA) |
Correspondence
Address: |
Manelli Denison & Selter PLLC;Attn: William H. Bollman
7th Floor, 2000 M Street, NW.
Washington
DC
20036
US
|
Family ID: |
34119137 |
Appl. No.: |
12/801670 |
Filed: |
June 21, 2010 |
Related U.S. Patent Documents
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Application
Number |
Filing Date |
Patent Number |
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10914933 |
Aug 9, 2004 |
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12801670 |
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60493704 |
Aug 8, 2003 |
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Current U.S.
Class: |
455/457 ;
455/456.1 |
Current CPC
Class: |
H04M 1/56 20130101; H04M
1/2746 20200101; H04M 2215/0188 20130101; H04W 8/16 20130101; H04M
15/44 20130101; H04M 2250/10 20130101; H04M 2250/60 20130101; H04M
2215/0104 20130101; H04W 4/029 20180201; H04W 4/20 20130101; H04M
2215/2026 20130101; H04W 4/24 20130101; H04W 8/14 20130101; H04M
1/72457 20210101; H04M 15/58 20130101; H04M 2215/32 20130101; H04M
1/575 20130101; H04W 4/02 20130101; H04W 4/027 20130101; H04M 3/42
20130101; H04W 88/02 20130101; H04M 1/72451 20210101 |
Class at
Publication: |
455/457 ;
455/456.1 |
International
Class: |
H04W 64/00 20090101
H04W064/00; H04W 24/00 20090101 H04W024/00 |
Claims
1-32. (canceled)
33. A method for generating a notification using a mobile
communication device, the method comprising: acquiring position
information, said position information indicating a real-time
position of a mobile communication device; generating a
communication event data on said mobile communication device, said
communication event data defining a communication event and
including said position information; transmitting said
communication event data from said mobile communication device to a
server, said server being operatively coupled to a wireless
communication network; associating, at said server, said
communication event data to a data base record; determining whether
said communication event data triggers a notification based upon at
least one predefined notification criterion; and if it is
determined that said communication event data triggers a
notification, transmitting a notification event from said server to
said mobile communication.
34. The method of claim 33, further comprising: transmitting said
notification event from said mobile communication device.
35. The method of claim 33, wherein: said position information is
acquired using a GPS receiver of said mobile communication
device.
36. The method of claim 33, wherein: said at least one predefined
notification criterion is based on a calendar of events.
37. The method of claim 33, wherein: said at least one predefined
notification criterion is based on one of geographic location,
geographic range, geographic area, and distance.
38. The method of claim 33, wherein: said at least one predefined
notification criterion is based on one of user status, user
presence, change in user status, and change in user presence.
39. The method of claim 33, wherein: said determination is
performed by said server.
40. A method for generating a notification using a mobile
communication device, the method comprising: storing a database
record, said database record including user profile information of
a mobile communication device, said user profile information
including at least one predefined notification criterion for
generating notification based on a communication event; acquiring
position information, said position information indicating a
real-time position of said mobile communication device; receiving,
from said mobile communication device, communication event data,
said communication event data including said position information,
and said communication event data being transmitted by said mobile
communication device over a wireless communications network;
determining whether said communication event triggers a
notification based upon said at least one predefined notification
criterion; and if it is determined that said communication event
data triggers a notification, transmitting a notification event
from said server to said mobile communication device.
41. The method of claim 40, further comprising: transmitting said
notification event to a remote computing device.
42. The method of claim 40, wherein: said position information is
acquired using a GPS receiver of said mobile communication
device.
43. The method of claim 40, wherein: said at least one predefined
notification criterion is based on a calendar of events.
44. The method of claim 40, wherein: said at least one predefined
notification criterion is based on one of geographic location,
geographic range, geographic area, and distance.
45. The method of claim 40, wherein: said at least one predefined
notification criterion is based on one of user status, user
presence, change in user status, and change in user presence.
46. A system for generating a notification using a mobile
communication device, the method of comprising: a memory for
storing a database record, said database record including user
profile information of a mobile communication device, said user
profile information including at least one predefined notification
criterion for generating notification based on a communication
event; a position determination device to acquire position
information, said position information indicating a real-time
position of said mobile communication device; a receiver to
receive, from said mobile communication device, a communication
event data, said communication event data including said position
information, said communication event data triggering a
notification based upon said at least one predefined notification
criterion; and a transmitter for, if it is determined that said
communication event triggers a notification, transmitting a
notification event from said server to said mobile communication
device.
47. The system of claim 46, wherein: said position information is
acquired using a GPS receiver of said mobile communication
device.
48. The system of claim 46, wherein: said at least one predefined
notification criterion is based on a calendar of events.
49. The system of claim 46, wherein: said at least one predefined
notification criterion is based on one of geographic location,
geographic range, geographic area, and distance.
50. The system of claim 46, wherein: said at least one predefined
notification criterion is based on one of user status, user
presence, change in user status, and change in user presence.
51. A mobile communication device for generating a notification
using stored user profile information, said mobile communication
device comprising: a memory; a display; a GPS device to acquire
position information, said position information indicating a
real-time position of a mobile communication device; a receiver to
receive communication event data on said mobile communication
device; a programmed processor that performs the steps of:
accessing said stored user profile information, said user profile
information including at least one predefined notification
criterion, determining whether said communication event data
triggers a notification based upon said acquired position
information and said at least one predefined notification
criterion, and if it is determined that said communication event
data triggers a notification, displaying said notification on said
display.
52. The mobile communication device of claim 51, wherein said
programmed processor further performs: transmitting said
notification to a remote computing device.
53. The mobile communication device of claim 51, wherein: said user
profile information is stored on a server, said server being
operatively coupled to said mobile communication device over a
wireless communications network.
54. The method of claim 33, wherein: said communication event data
is generated from a voice or data communication event.
55. The system of claim 46, wherein: said communication event data
is generated from a communication event, said communication event
being one of a voice communication event and a data communication
event.
Description
[0001] This application claims priority from Provisional
Application No. 60/493,704, titled "Method and System for
Collecting, Synchronizing, and Reporting Telecommunication Call
Events and Work Flow Related Information," filed on Aug. 8, 2003.
the contents of which are incorporated herein by reference.
BACKGROUND
[0002] 1. Field of Invention
[0003] This present invention relates to the capturing, processing,
mapping, reporting, and displaying of telecommunication call events
that occur on either landline or wireless telecommunication devices
(i.e., POTS telephones, cellular telephones, 3G-based wireless
data/telephones, etc.), where the information content of the
telecommunication call events can be presented locally on the
device or remotely on a desktop or laptop computer using a computer
application or a web browser that can interface to an online
networked server.
[0004] 2. Description of the Related Art
[0005] Telecommunication devices, specifically wireless telephones,
are achieving widespread use today. Such telecommunication devices
are commonly used to establish communication between other
telecommunication devices. Recently telecommunication devices are
becoming more than just communication devices, but also a computing
platform for executing applications similar to the early days of
the personal computer era, where devices had limited memory and
processing resources. The difference is that these new
telecommunication devices, while currently provide a limited
computing platform, also enable wireless data access to the
Internet and expose the telephone's telephony functionality. These
new telecommunication devices are well known to people that are
skilled in the art.
[0006] Prior art systems, such as customer premises equipment (CPE)
enable the storage capability of caller identification (Caller ID)
information of incoming calls, assuming that said Caller ID
information is not blocked. For example, Lucent Technologies
produces a model ISDN 8520T CPE that keeps a log of unanswered
incoming, answered incoming, and outgoing telephone calls. Each
call has a time stamp associated with it so that unanswered calls
can be distinguished from available calls that have Caller ID
information. When the CPE is used with a switch, such as an ISDN
PBX switch, the CPE will provide each caller's name if it is stored
in the switch's database. As individuals that pay telephone bills
know, all of this caller information is also preferably included in
a customer's telephone bills for the purpose of billing information
and is well known to people that are skilled in the art.
[0007] Customer Relationship Management (CRM) prior art
applications provide a solution to understand customer related
pipelines, such as sales or support team's pipelines. For sales, it
is important to keep track of a company's Contacts, Accounts, and
Opportunities. Every Account has a Contact or group of Contacts
that are associated with the Account. Every Opportunity has one or
many Accounts that are associated with the Opportunity and
indirectly have Contacts that are associated with the Opportunity
through a common Account or Accounts. Contacts, Accounts, and
Opportunities have activities, such as telephone calls, that are
associated with one or more of the Account, Opportunity, or Contact
categories (i.e., a telephone call can be associated with a Contact
that also has associations with an Account and an Opportunity).
Prior art CRM systems are well known to people skilled in the
art.
[0008] A problem with existing prior art CPE and switch systems is
that they only provide a mechanism for capturing call logs at the
switch that the telecommunication device interfaces with. This is
not practical with wireless telecommunication devices, since
acquiring access to a switch at a base station is not reasonable
due to the large number of base stations necessary to create a
cellular wireless network. Also, accessing the call logs directly
from different wireless or landline carriers introduces interface
and connection issues, since carriers use different standards that
are not compatible with other carriers.
[0009] Another problem with accessing the call logs directly from a
wireless or landline carrier is that each telecommunication
carrier, which may be grouped in a local area or across an entire
continent, would have to provide access to, or expose, call log
information for their entire user-base on their networks. This
introduces a significant privacy problem, in addition to requiring
significant bandwidth to transport all of the users' call logs,
since not all users on said networks will subscribe to this
advanced service that integrates and associates call logs with
database records.
[0010] Yet another problem is that call logging by the wireless or
landline carrier only provides call logs specifically for billing
purposes, and the advanced Telecommunication Call Events that the
telecommunication device can provide are not provided. For example,
this invention provides a Telecommunication Call Event to include
the GPS position of the telecommunication device at the time the
device received, missed, or initiated a telephone call, or during
the entire duration of the telephone call.
[0011] An additional problem with existing call logging systems,
such as the CPE, is that the centralized logging solution does not
always have the capability of being disabled or turned off.
Specifically, this is the case for carrier specific switches whose
main function is to record calls for billing purposes. By handling
the Telecommunication Call Event recording (i.e., call logging)
functions on the telecommunication devices, the authorized user can
have the ability to disable the call logging functionality simply
and effectively.
[0012] It is yet another problem with the prior art system when a
user owns or makes calls from multiple telecommunication devices
(i.e., a landline telephone, a wireless telephone, etc.),
specifically when the telecommunication devices are operated on
different carrier networks, since interfacing with each call
logging switch amongst all of the carriers that the
telecommunication device connects with is a very difficult and
daunting task. This problem is further exaggerated if the user owns
a wireless telecommunication device with roaming capability and
"roams" into a different wireless carrier network. With prior art
systems, access to all possible roaming networks would be required
to provide a continuous call logging solution.
[0013] Another problem with existing database applications, such as
CRM applications, is that the user is required to manually enter
the Telecommunication Call Event associations (i.e., such as
telephone number associations) into database records, such as
Contact data (i.e., vCARD), Accounts, or the like. Providing a
system that autonomously updates the call history information would
provide better real-time forecasting and reporting information. As
people that are skilled in the art will agree, this significantly
improves the effectiveness of such systems.
[0014] Until now, an adequate solution to these problems has eluded
those skilled in the art. Thus, there exists a need to provide a
solution that enables Telecommunication Devices to capture
Telecommunication Call Events for enabling the association of
Telecommunication Call Events with database records, which may
include without limitation Contacts, Accounts, Opportunities,
Forecasts, Leads, Tasks, Documents, Cases, other Events, or the
like. This invention provides many important benefits for
Telecommunication Devices which are an important and integral part
of improving Work Flow-related processes.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
[0015] It is an object of the present invention to provide a method
and system for enabling the Telecommunication Device to capture all
telephony-related events, denoted hereinafter as Telecommunication
Call Events (TCE). In the preferred embodiment, the
Telecommunication Call Events can include the telephony-related
events without limitation as follows:
[0016] Telecommunication Call Events (Example): [0017]
Telecommunication Device's Local Telephone Number and/or Unique
Identifier (i.e., the telecommunication device's Electronic Serial
Number (ESN), or the like). [0018] Incoming Call's Telephone Number
and Related Caller-ID Information [0019] Related Caller-ID
Information Includes: [0020] Blocked or Not Blocked Caller-ID
Information (i.e., indicating if the Caller-ID information is
hidden or visible). [0021] Telephone Number's Registered Name
[0022] The Registered Name may be either a personal or business
name. If it is a personal name, the Registered Name may include
only the First Name, Surname, Middle Name, or any combination
thereof. If the Registered Name is a Business, then the Business
Name (i.e., DBA--"Doing Business As" Name) is typically provided.
[0023] Telephone Number's Registered Address [0024] Telephone
Number is registered to either a Landline or Wireless Telephone
[0025] Missed Call's Telephone Number and Related Caller-ID
Information [0026] Related Caller-ID Information Includes: [0027]
Blocked or Not Blocked Caller-ID Information (i.e., indicating if
the Caller-ID information is hidden or visible). [0028] Telephone
Number's Registered Name [0029] The Registered Name may be either a
personal or business name. If it is a personal name, the Registered
Name may include only the First Name, Surname, Middle Name, or any
combination thereof. If the Registered Name is a Business, then the
Business Name (i.e., DBA--"Doing Business As" Name) is typically
provided. [0030] Telephone Number's Registered Address [0031]
Telephone Number is registered to either a Landline or Wireless
Telephone [0032] Outgoing Call's Telephone Number [0033] Call
Duration for either Incoming or Outgoing Telephone Calls [0034]
Roaming or Non-Roaming Call Indicators for either Incoming or
Outgoing Telephone Calls [0035] Local or International Call
Indicators for either Incoming or Outgoing Telephone Calls [0036]
Telephone Call Start Event and the Time associated with said Event
[0037] Telephone Call End Event and the Time associated with said
Event [0038] Completed or Incompleted Telephone Calls [0039]
Forwarded or Redirected Telephone Call Event and the Time
associated with Said Event [0040] Spatial Coordinates on the Earth
(i.e., GPS coordinates or the like as well known to those skilled
in the art) representing the location of the Telecommunication
Device at the Start of the Call [0041] Spatial Coordinates on the
Earth (i.e., GPS coordinates or the like as well known to those
skilled in the art) representing the location of the
Telecommunication Device during the Entire or Partial Duration of
the Call [0042] In this invention, the Spatial Coordinates can be
captured in real-time at varying position sample periods or
triggered based on the distance traveled or the like as known to
those skilled in the art. [0043] Spatial Coordinates on the Earth
(i.e., GPS coordinates or the like as well known to those skilled
in the art) representing the location of the Telecommunication
Device at the End of the Call [0044] Spatial Coordinates on the
Earth (i.e., GPS coordinates or the like as well known to those
skilled in the art) representing the location of the
Telecommunication Device's Wireless Base Station(s) or Central
Office at the Start of the Call [0045] Spatial Coordinates on the
Earth (i.e., GPS coordinates or the like as well known to those
skilled in the art) representing the location of the
Telecommunication Device's Wireless Base Station(s) or Central
Office during the Entire or Duration of the Call [0046] With a
typical wireless Telecommunication Device, it is possible for the
telecommunication device connection to be transferred from one
wireless base station to another during a telephone call (i.e., for
either voice or data calls). In this invention, the
Telecommunication Device will store the Spatial Coordinates on the
Earth (i.e., GPS coordinates or the like as well know to those
skilled in the art) representing the location of each wireless base
station the telecommunication device connection was transferred to
and the associated time of the transfer or "hand-off" time. [0047]
Spatial Coordinates on the Earth (i.e., GPS coordinates or the like
as well know to those skilled in the art) representing the location
of the Telecommunication Device's Connected Wireless Base
Station(s) or Central Office at the End of the Call [0048] Distress
Call (i.e., if the call is a 911 or E-911 call or the like) [0049]
Information Call (i.e., if the call is a 411 call or the like)
[0050] Operated Assisted Call (i.e., if the call is a 611 call or
the like) [0051] Voice Mail Call (i.e., such as *86 on most
wireless carriers in the United States) [0052] Data or Voice Call
[0053] Digital or Analog Call [0054] Dormancy State (i.e., if the
call is temporarily quiescent, but capable of being activated)
[0055] Phone Power-On Event and the Time associated with said Event
[0056] Phone Power-Off Event and the Time associated with said
Event [0057] Low Battery Event and the Time associated with said
Event [0058] Signal Power (i.e., SNR, Eb/No, or the like, etc.) of
the Telecommunication Device and the Time associated with said
Event [0059] Entire or Portion of the Recorded Voice Message of the
Telecommunication Device during a Telephone Call and the Start
Time, End Time, and Duration of the said Telephone Call
[0060] It is an object of the present invention to provide a method
and system for enabling the capturing and logging of
Telecommunication Call Events on the Telecommunication Device. As
Telecommunication Call Events occur, they are registered and stored
or recorded to a data storage device, located either locally within
the Telecommunication Device or externally on a remote storage
device connected to the Telecommunication Device through either a
wired connection, such as the Internet/Intranet/Extranet, wireless
connection, infrared connection, optical connection, or any
combination of the aforementioned or similar connections (i.e.,
wired, wireless, infrared, optical, or the like connection). In one
embodiment, these local storage devices also include a flash memory
storage device, hard disc drive, optical memory, non-volatile
memory, or the like as well known to those skilled in the art. As
illustrated, it is also an object of the present invention to
enable the capability so that the storage of Telecommunication Call
Events, which typically occur in real-time, can be stored on a
remote networked storage device. In one embodiment, the
Telecommunication Call Events are packaged and pushed directly to
an online Internet-connected networked server that is connected to
the Telecommunication Device using first a wireless connection
through a wireless base station and then through the Internet to an
online networked server.
[0061] It is an object of the present invention to provide a method
and system for enabling the synchronization or transfer of said
Telecommunication Call Events, where the synchronization or
transfer of said Telecommunication Call Events are initiated based
on 1). Real-Time Telecommunication Call Events, 2). Scheduled
Ad-Hoc and/or Reoccurring Time Intervals, and/or 3). Locally or
Remotely Initiated Triggered Events. The Telecommunication Call
Events are synchronized or transferred from the Telecommunication
Device to 1). a Centralized Server Computing System (i.e.,
peer-to-server connection), 2). a Distributed Server Computing
System (i.e., peer-to-multiple servers), and/or 3). a Personal
Computing System using a variety of different transport mediums,
such as a wired, wireless, infrared, optical, or the like
connection. For example in one embodiment, the Telecommunication
Device can synchronize or transfer its Telecommunication Call
Events using a peer-to-peer (P2P) configuration directly to another
computing platform, such as a local PDA using a wireless Bluetooth
connection. In another embodiment, the Telecommunication Device can
synchronize or transfer its Telecommunication Call Events using a
peer-to-server (P2S) configuration to an online centralized server
for later retrieval of said call events and/or work flow status
information. In a similar embodiment, the online server embodies a
distributed server system for the purpose of enabling better
Reliability, Availability, and Scalability (RAS) of the
synchronization, transfer, or retrieval of said Telecommunication
Call Events and/or work flow status information.
[0062] It is an object of the present invention to provide a method
and system for enabling the synchronization or transfer of said
Telecommunication Call Events in Real-Time from the local
Telecommunication Device.
[0063] With advanced wireless telecommunication devices (such as
devices that provide simultaneous data and voice capability, etc.)
or telecommunication devices with out-of-band data functionality
(such as SMS functionality or the like), the transfer of
Telecommunication Call Events can occur in Real-Time to 1). a
centralized server computing system, 2). a distributed server
computing system, and/or 3). a personal computing system. This
particular object allows the storing of the Telecommunication Call
Events to the local telecommunication data storage device for the
purpose of ensuring the delivery of the Telecommunication Call
Events. In most scenarios, temporarily storing the
Telecommunication Call Events is the preferred method of operation
in order to provide a reliable data transfer, which is typically
necessary in a wireless environment. Whenever a Telecommunication
Call Event occurs, the event is transferred, synchronized, or
"pushed" in real-time to the accompanying receiving device(s).
After the real-time transfer of the Telecommunication Call Events
has occurred, a copy of the Telecommunication Call Event(s) may be
temporarily stored locally for added reliability until an
acknowledgement of the receipt of the specific Telecommunication
Call Event(s) is received by the Telecommunication Device. Once the
Telecommunication Device has received an acknowledgement or
confirmation from the receiving device(s), the Telecommunication
Device can then safely delete or remove the sent Telecommunication
Call Event(s). If the Telecommunication Device did not receive an
acknowledgment from the receiving device(s), the Telecommunication
Device will first store, then forward or resend the data at a later
time. This store-and-forward operation will continue until the
Telecommunication Device receives an acknowledgement from the
receiving device(s) confirming the delivery of the
Telecommunication Call Event(s) for the specific Telecommunication
Device. This method provides a mechanism for ensuring that the
transferred Telecommunication Call Events will reach their desired
destination in a wireless environment that periodically has no
coverage area or is subject to coverage loss due to a number of
various reasons, such as multipath, blockage, etc. In one
embodiment, when a call is received, that call's telephone call
event and Caller ID information (e.g., telephone number of caller,
telephone number of called telephone, time the call was started,
voice call event, received call event, non-roaming call event,
etc.) is transferred, synchronized, or "pushed" in real-time to an
online server.
[0064] It is an object of the present invention to provide a method
and system for enabling the Telecommunication Call Events
synchronization or transfer process to be scheduled to occur at
various reoccurring times or ad-hoc. Typically, for the Scheduled
Event Model, the Telecommunication Call Events are recorded to the
Telecommunication Device's data storage device in real-time as they
occur, such as in a Flash Memory storage device, hard disc drive,
or the like as well known to those skilled in the art. At a
predetermined or scheduled time, the accumulated Telecommunication
Call Events are synchronized or transferred to 1). a centralized
server computing system (i.e., peer-to-server connection), 2). a
distributed server computing system (i.e., peer-to-multiple
servers), and/or 3). a personal computing system. In one
embodiment, at the top of every hour the accumulated
Telecommunication Call Events are synchronized or transferred to an
online server.
[0065] It is an object of the present invention to provide a method
and system for enabling the Telecommunication Call Events
synchronization or transfer process to be triggered based on the
detection of a local and/or remote event. In this present
invention, locally triggered events may include Telecommunication
Call Events, pressing a key on the Telecommunication Device,
power-on event, low battery event, reaching a specified storage
size limit or storage threshold for the Telecommunication Device,
signing-in or executing an application or sub-process running on
the Telecommunication Device, or the like. Externally triggered
events may include receiving an E-Mail, SMS message, or TCP/IP or
UDP command packet to remotely initiate the synchronization or
transfer process. This command packet (for example, a SMS message)
may also utilize authentication and authorization protocols and
procedures in order to correctly identify and authenticate that the
user or process which remotely initiated the synchronization or
transfer process has the proper authority and credentials to
initiate such a request.
[0066] It is an object of the present invention to provide a method
and system for notifying and providing a confirmation message to
the Telecommunication Device that recently had a remotely-initiated
synchronization or transfer process performed. This object of the
present invention apprises the owner(s) or user(s) of the
Telecommunication Device that a remote synchronization or transfer
process had recently been completed by an authorized user that had
the appropriate credentials to make such a request. The
confirmation message may be digitally signed to authenticate that
the sender of the confirmation message is an authorized remote
system or user that initiated the synchronization request. This
present invention allows the confirmation message to be sent
directly to the Telecommunication Device's unique address, such as
an SMS address (i.e., telephone number of the Telecommunication
Device, such as 9495551212@wirelesscarrier.com), in addition to
numerous other unique addresses that are associated with the
Telecommunication Device. These additional addresses may include
the owner's or user's E-Mail address for the Telecommunication
Device, or the IT administrator's E-Mail address that maintains the
Telecommunication Device, or any predefined unique address (i.e.,
E-Mail Address, Pager Number, Telephone Voice Mail Address, or the
like) that was set by a user that has proper authority and
credentials for the Telecommunication Device.
[0067] It is an object of the present invention to provide the
synchronization or transfer process of Telecommunication Call
Events or data related to Telecommunication Call Events using a
wired, wireless, infrared, optical, or similar connection. For
example, in one embodiment, a Telecommunication Call Events log can
be transferred to an online networked server via both a wireless
connection, such as when using a cell phone to a base station, and
then through the Internet to an online networked server. In another
embodiment, the connection to the Internet can also be enabled
first through a serial, USB, Firewire, or the like connection that
is connected to a desktop or laptop computer, and then through the
Internet connection which is established from the desktop or laptop
computer. In a similar embodiment, the connection can also be
established wirelessly to either the desktop or laptop computer,
such as using a Bluetooth connection. In a different embodiment,
the wireless connection can be established using a Local Area
Network (LAN), such as in an office environment. In a similar
embodiment, the wireless connection can be established using a Wide
Area Network (WAN), as with a cellular device that is wirelessly
connected to a nearby base station which has an established
connection to the online networked server by means of an Internet
connection.
[0068] It is an object of the present invention to provide a method
and system to provide the association of either Contact(s) to
Telecommunication Call Events and/or Telecommunication Call Events
to Contact(s), in which the Contact(s) are stored and referenced
from a database, either locally or through an online centralized or
distributed server. The Contact fields are searchable and capable
of being correlated with the Telecommunication Call Events. For
example, in one embodiment, a Telecommunication Device received a
call from telephone number (732) 792-4265 on Jun. 17, 2001 at 4:30
PM EST. In this embodiment, the Telecommunication Device received
said telephone call and synchronized the Telecommunication Call
Events information (such as, but not limited to, the telephone
number of caller, telephone number called, time stamp when call was
started, call duration, time stamp when call was ended, voice call,
received call event, non-roaming call, etc.) to an online networked
server. In this embodiment, a user is able to view using a web
browser which Contact in their database initiated the call. The
server provided this functionality by correlating the received
Telecommunication Call Events which contained the caller's
telephone number with the telephone number that was stored in the
user's Contact database. This same object provides the capability
for viewing said correlated contacts for said Telecommunication
Call Events either locally on the Telecommunication Device or
remotely, such as from another computing device or other
Telecommunication Device.
[0069] It is an object of the present invention to provide a method
and system to enable users within a predefined group to share their
individual Contact databases with each other for the purpose of
providing a more complete and combined set of Contact Information
(i.e., vCard, which automates the exchange of information typically
found on a traditional business card) for the purpose of
correlating said Contact Information with Telecommunication Call
Events. Each Contact entry (i.e., vCard) has various user-defined
permissions associated with it that defines how the Contact entry
can be used by the system and users within a group. It is another
object of the present invention to allow group administrators, or
similarly authorized users, to assign permission control to users
within the group. This permission control allows specified users to
perform search queries, and view or edit other users' Contact
Information within their organization. Every vCard contained within
the group has a pre-defined owner of the Contact data where the
owner of said Contact data is provided with inherent default access
permissions unless otherwise designated by the administrator of the
group or user. The permissions model includes, but is not limited
to, the following permission attributes for each Contact entry:
Full Control, Read-Only, Search Enabled/Disabled, and Modify.
[0070] It is an object of the present invention to provide a method
and system to search all of the fields contained in the Contact
Information (i.e., vCard) for the purpose of correlating and
matching with Telecommunication Call Events either locally in the
Telecommunication Device or remotely on the server or other
computing device.
[0071] It is an object of the present invention to provide a method
and system to provide the association of Telecommunication Call
Events with any public or private database record, specifically
with the association of either White Pages or Yellow Pages (i.e.,
Points of Interest (POI)) information with Telecommunication Call
Events and vise-versa. It should be noted that White Pages and
Yellow Pages information is very similar to vCard information with
minor field variations and a different data compilation process.
The White or Yellow Pages data fields are searchable and capable of
being correlated with Telecommunication Call Events. In one
embodiment, a Telecommunication Device received a call from
telephone number (732) 792-4265 on Jun. 17, 2001 at 4:30 PM EST. In
this embodiment, the Telecommunication Device received said
telephone call and synchronized the Telecommunication Call Events
information (such as, but not limited to, the telephone number of
caller, telephone number of called, time stamp when call was
started, call duration, time stamp when call was ended, voice call,
received call event, non-roaming call, etc.) to an online networked
server. Using a web browser, a user is able to view information
about the White Pages (i.e., consumers and businesses) or Yellow
Pages (i.e., business) listing that initiated the call using the
server's capability to correlate the received Caller-ID provided
telephone number with the telephone number stored in the White or
Yellow Pages database listing. This same object provides the
capability for viewing said correlated White or Yellow Pages
database listing for said Telecommunication Call Events either
locally on the Telecommunication Device or remotely, such as from
another computing device or other Telecommunication Device.
[0072] It is an object of the present invention to provide a method
and system to search all of the fields contained in any database
record or field for the purpose of correlating and matching with
Telecommunication Call Events either locally in the
Telecommunication Device or remotely on the server or other
computing device.
[0073] It is an object of the present invention to provide a method
and system to log and process Telecommunication Call Events, such
as a telephone number that the Telecommunication Device is able to
establish a connection with while utilizing connections that are
based on various types of connections and protocols, such as PSTN,
CDMA, GSM, GPRS, iDEN, TCP/IP, UDP, or the like. This includes, but
is not limited to: International Access Numbers, International
Direct Dialing (IDD) prefix including the Destination Country Code
and Phone Number, Standard Phone Numbers, International Phone
Numbers, Information Call (411), Operated Assisted Call (611),
Distress Call (911), *69, *86, 11-digit phone numbers in the US,
*66, or the like.
[0074] It is an object of the present invention to provide a method
and system for the association of Telecommunication Call Events
with Contacts that have other threads or associations with
additional records. This object allows for the indirect correlation
of Telecommunication Call Events with these indirectly linked
records, which include, but are not limited to: Accounts,
Opportunities, Forecasts, Leads, Tasks, Documents, Cases, other
Events, or the like. In one embodiment, in a Customer Relationship
Management (CRM) application, a Contact is associated or linked to
an Account. An Account (i.e., such as a Business Customer) may have
a plurality of Contacts that are associated or linked with it
(i.e., such as a business account having multiple points of contact
or representatives). When viewing either the Contact or Account
information, it is possible with this invention to view at a glance
the "Activity History" for either the Contact or Account. The
Activity History can display Telecommunication Call Events that are
correlated with said Contact or Account, thus providing a detailed
snap-shot of the recent interactions with the Contact or Account.
It should be appreciated by those skilled in the art that the users
of the group do not have to manually update their calls with
Contacts of various Accounts or directly with the Accounts as with
prior art systems, since this invention provides an automated
method and system for updating said Activity History
automatically.
[0075] It is an object of the present invention to provide a method
and system that enables notifications that are triggered by
Telecommunication Call Events which are associated or linked to
either a single or plurality of database records for the purpose of
updating said database records by means of said notification. The
notifications relate information or content to said
Telecommunications Call Events. The notification can be delivered
to the local Telecommunication Device and/or a remote computing
device. These notifications can be displayed 1). in real-time while
a telephone call is in progress, 2). immediately after a telephone
call, 3). upon the execution of an application, process, or by
opening an application window or clicking on an application link
(i.e., such as a URL in a web browser), 4). at a predefined
scheduled time period, either once or at reoccurring intervals, 5).
at a specific geographic location or within a geographic range or
area, 6). upon receiving an e-mail, SMS message, or instant
message, 7). upon receiving a page, and/or 8). based on a user's
current presence or status or a change in presence or status, such
as Available, Busy, On the Phone, etc., or the like. In this same
object of this invention, the invention provides notifications that
contain associations, references, or links to database records that
are somehow correlated to the recent Telecommunication Call Events,
such as by a telephone number, on the Telecommunication Device that
is registered with the user. In one embodiment, a user receives a
telephone call on the wireless Telecommunication Device from a
Contact at a major Account called "Acme Manufacturing". After the
call has concluded, the system provides a notification display on
the user's Telecommunication Device with a link to: 1). the Contact
Information (i.e., vCard) for the Contact at "Acme Manufacturing"
that called, 2). the "Acme Manufacturing" Account information, and
3). the opportunity information for the "Acme Manufacturing"
Account. By means of the providing these three links (i.e., one for
the Contact, one for the Account, and one for the Opportunity), the
user of the Telecommunication Device is able to update the
information that had changed due to the telephone call conversation
that was privy between both calling parties. The user is then able
to update either the caller's Contact information (i.e., the
preferred Contact fields are illustrated in the preferred
embodiments of the invention), such as a new telephone number, mail
address, contact description, or the like. The user is also able to
update the Account related information, during or after the
telecommunication call, that was associated or had some degree of
correlation to the previous Telecommunication Call Events, such as
including, but not limited to the following: [0076] Account Name
[0077] Phone Number [0078] Parent Account Information [0079]
Website [0080] Account Number [0081] Ticker Symbol [0082] Type
(i.e., such as private, public, etc.) [0083] Industry: (i.e.,
Telecommunications, Media, Manufacturing, etc.) [0084] Number of
Employees [0085] Annual Revenue [0086] SIC Code [0087] Billing
Addresses [0088] Voice Notes or Memos [0089] Text Notes or Memos
[0090] Images [0091] Customizable Forms (i.e., Account Information,
Opportunity Information, Contact Information such as vCard
Information, Field Specific Forms, or the like, that is related to
the Telecommunication Call Event)
[0092] The user is also capable of updating the Opportunity
Information that was associated or had some degree of correlation
to the previous Telecommunication Call Events, such as including,
but not limited to the following: [0093] Opportunity Information:
[0094] Primary Information [0095] Opportunity Owner (i.e., Contact
Owner) [0096] Opportunity Name [0097] Account Name (i.e., the
Account that is linked to this Opportunity) [0098] Type: (i.e.,
new, existing, etc.) [0099] Lead Source [0100] Deal Amount (i.e.,
the size of the deal) [0101] Status (i.e., Open, Pending, Closed
and Close Date) [0102] Next Steps (i.e., Need estimate Update,
etc.) [0103] Stage (i.e., Needs Analysis, Proposal/Price Quote,
Closed Lost, Negotiation/Review, etc.) [0104] Probability (%):
(i.e., 80%, 90%, etc.) [0105] Description
[0106] In a similar embodiment of this invention, the user received
the notification while the call was in progress on their laptop
computer and was able to update the information during the course
of the conversation.
[0107] An additional part of this object provides for a user that
calls or receives calls from a corresponding Telecommunication
Device to receive a notification event based on recent
Telecommunication Events that were correlated with database
records. These notification events include pending alerts or To-Do
tasks apprising the user of the Telecommunication Device that
un-correlated information needs to be updated, based on recent
Telecommunication Events that the system is not able to update and
correlate autonomously. In one embodiment, a user receiving or
making a telephone call to a single or group of users receives a
notification event that includes a pending To-Do task after that
call has been terminated, determined by Telecommunication Call
Events.
[0108] The pending To-Do task requires the user to update the notes
information for that contact in order to describe the call, through
the means of entering information into text entry forms that are
specific to the user's business, or by updating the deal flow of
the account information for the particular account that is
associated with the telephone number (i.e., Telecommunication Call
Event). In another embodiment, while the telephone call is in
progress a user receives a reminder to update text entry forms
about the contact they are having a conversation with, such as
updating the sales projections for the current account that is
associated with the user. In another embodiment, after a phone call
has concluded, the authorized user of the Telecommunication Device
will be apprised, by the Telecommunication Device's program that is
running on said device, that a user should create voice-recorded
notes in reference to the phone call. In a similar embodiment,
after a phone call has concluded, the Telecommunication Device's
application that is running on said device will notify the user if
they wish to copy and save for later access a part of, or the
entire, recorded voice phone call and associate it with the contact
corresponding to the called or received phone number. The recorded
phone call can reside locally on the Telecommunication Device and
can also be synchronized or transferred to the online server system
for access via a web browser or custom application program running
on a computing device which is associated with various database
records, such as vCard, Account Information, Opportunity
Information, or the like.
[0109] It is an object of the present invention to provide a method
and system that enables database records that have none or old
time-stamped references to Telecommunication Call Events for the
purpose of triggering notifications based on a predefined temporal
threshold for the aging of each database record. This notification
event can also be based on the frequency of Telecommunication Call
Events that relate to a database record. For example, in one
embodiment an Account was established with a company that
represents a large Opportunity for the business to sell their
product to.
[0110] The account has a group of associated Contacts that are the
key decision makers of the Account. Since time may be critical to
closing this sale for this Account, this invention allows an aging
trigger event to be defined and triggered if a user within the
organization does not call the telephone numbers of any Contacts
who are associated with the Account within the predefined time
limit set by the administrator of the organization. In this
embodiment, this can be used for capturing the Telecommunication
Call Events for a particular user and can be applied to users in
the organization or department, or to a single user that owns or
uses a Telecommunication Device upon which the application is
executed. In another embodiment, a user of an organization is
required to call an Account at least once a week. If the user does
not perform the task of calling the Account's Contact (i.e., from
their vCard data) a notification will be sent to the administrator,
or to the user that initiated the event, illustrating that the
frequency of calls to this Account for the particular user fell
below the set threshold of calls to this Account for past
predefined period of time.
[0111] It is an object of the present invention to provide a method
and system that enables only one unique user account to be
associated with one or many unique Telecommunication Devices. This
invention allows multiple users to be associated with a single
Telecommunication Device. However the preferred method of this
invention is to allow only one user account to be assigned to
multiple unique Telecommunication Devices (i.e., since users
typically have more than one Telecommunication Device). This object
of this invention also enables the prevention of a
Telecommunication Device from being registered by multiple user
accounts. This guarantees that Telecommunication Call Events that
occur can be correlated with one and only one user account at a
time. In one embodiment, when a user executes an application on the
Telecommunication Device, the application will send a unique
identifier, such as an ESN number, telephone number, or the like,
to an online serer that will register the Telecommunication Device
with the registered user that authenticated themselves and executed
the application.
[0112] It is an object of the present invention to provide a method
and system that displays an outgoing call history log of recent
Telecommunications Call Events on a Telecommunication Device or
other computing device, such as a desktop or laptop personal
computer. This invention provides no limit on the number of
outgoing calls that can be displayed. This object of this invention
enables the display of outgoing call history, including additional
information and/or references or links that are associated with the
outgoing call history log item(s) of recent Telecommunication Call
Events for a particular or group of Telecommunication Device(s).
These references or links connect Telecommunication Call Events
with database records through the use of common keys present in
both the Telecommunication Call Events and the database records.
This invention allows partial or exact matches of common keys.
Common keys include Telecommunication Call Events, or the like. For
every outgoing call history item, typically denoted as a Telephone
Number, other information can be displayed through this invention,
such as, but not limited to the following Contact informational
fields that are correlated with the Telephone Number: Title, First
Name, Middle Name, Last Name, Suffix, Company, Department, Job
Title, Street Address, Street Address 2, Street Address 3, City,
State, Postal Code, Country, Address' Latitude, Address' Longitude,
Address' Altitude, etc. A plurality of unique Contact records can
be displayed in this invention.
[0113] In addition to displaying the most prominent Contact
Information, links (i.e., known as shortcuts) are provided for
allowing users to update various additional database records that
have an association with the Telecommunication Call Event. These
additional links or shortcuts include, but are not limited to the
following database records: Accounts, Opportunities, Forecasts,
Leads, Tasks, Documents, Cases, other Events, or the like. It is an
object of this invention to allow the updating or populating of the
outgoing call history log information by 1). real-time updates as
Telecommunication Call Events are processed, 2). scheduled ad-hoc
and/or reoccurring time intervals, and/or 3). running an
application or process such as a button or link (i.e., URL) that
initiates a call history log update from an online server or local
computing platform. In this same object of this invention, it is
possible to read database records, such as the Opportunities record
database, which has a common association using the
Telecommunication Call Events as the common key. Using this link or
shortcut, the user is able to quickly and effectively review and
update database records that are related to recent
Telecommunication Device activities without having to first search
for said database record information. The retrieval of additional
database records can either be cached locally or accessed upon
demand. This object of the invention also provides for mapping any
database record that has geographical information associated with
it through the call history.
[0114] It is an object of the present invention to provide a method
and system that enables the Telecommunication Device or other
computing device, such as a desktop or laptop personal computer, to
display an incoming call history log of recent Telecommunications
Call Events. This invention provides no limit on the number of
incoming calls that can be displayed. This object of this invention
enables the display of incoming call history including additional
information and/or references or links that are associated with the
incoming call history log item(s) of recent Telecommunication Call
Events for a particular or group of Telecommunication Device(s).
These references or links connect Telecommunication Call Events
with database records through the use of common keys present in
both the Telecommunication Call Events and the database records.
This invention allows partial or exact matches of common keys.
Common keys include Telecommunication Call Events, or the like. For
every incoming call history item, typically denoted as a Telephone
Number, other information that can be displayed through this
invention includes, but is not limited the following Contact
information fields that are correlated with the Telephone Number:
Title, First Name, Middle Name, Last Name, Suffix, Company,
Department, Job Title, Street Address, Street Address 2, Street
Address 3, City, State, Postal Code, Country, Address' Latitude,
Address' Longitude, Address' Altitude, etc. A plurality of unique
Contact records can be displayed in this invention.
[0115] In addition to displaying the most prominent Contact
Information, links (i.e., known as shortcuts) are provided for
allowing users to update various additional database records that
have an association with the Telecommunication Call Event. These
additional links or shortcuts include, but are not limited to the
following database records: Accounts, Opportunities, Forecasts,
Leads, Tasks, Documents, Cases, other Events, or the like. It is an
object of this invention to allow the updating or populating of the
incoming call history log information by 1). real-time updates as
Telecommunication Call Events are processed, 2). scheduled ad-hoc
and/or reoccurring time intervals, and/or 3). running an
application or process such as a button or link (i.e., URL) that
initiates a call history log update from an online server or local
computing platform. In this same object of this invention, it is
possible to read database records, such as the Opportunities record
database, which has a common association using the
Telecommunication Call Events as the common key. Using this link or
shortcut, the user is able to quickly and effectively update
database records that are related to recent Telecommunication
Device activities without having to first search for said database
record information. The retrieval of additional database records
can either be cached locally or accessed upon demand. This object
of the invention also provides for mapping any database record that
has geographical information associated with it through the call
history.
[0116] It is an object of the present invention to provide a method
and system that enables the Telecommunication Device or other
computing device, such as a desktop or laptop personal computer, to
display a missed call history log of recent Telecommunications Call
Events. This invention provides no limit on the number of missed
calls that can be displayed. This object of this invention enables
the display of missed call history including additional information
and/or references or links that are associated with the missed call
history log item(s) of recent Telecommunication Call Events for a
particular or group of Telecommunication Device(s). These
references or links connect Telecommunication Call Events with
database records through the use of common keys present in both the
Telecommunication Call Events and the database records. This
invention allows partial or exact matches of common keys. Common
keys include Telecommunication Call Events, or the like. For every
missed call history item, typically denoted as a Telephone Number,
other information can be displayed through this invention,
including, but not limited to the following Contact information
fields that are correlated with the Telephone Number: Title, First
Name, Middle Name, Last Name, Suffix, Company, Department, Job
Title, Street Address, Street Address 2, Street Address 3, City,
State, Postal Code, Country, Address' Latitude, Address' Longitude,
Address' Altitude, etc. A plurality of unique Contact records can
be displayed in this invention. In addition to displaying the most
prominent Contact Information, links (i.e., known as shortcuts) are
provided for allowing users to update various additional database
records that have an association with the Telecommunication Call
Event.
[0117] These additional links or shortcuts include, but are not
limited to the following database records: Accounts, Opportunities,
Forecasts, Leads, Tasks, Documents, Cases, other Events, or the
like. It is an object of this invention to allow the updating or
populating of the missed call history log information by 1).
real-time updates as Telecommunication Call Events are processed,
2). scheduled ad-hoc and/or reoccurring time intervals, and/or 3).
running an application or process such as a button or link (i.e.,
URL) that initiates a call history log update from an online server
or local computing platform. In this same object of this invention,
it is possible to read database records, such as the Opportunities
record database, which has a common association using the
Telecommunication Call Events as the common key. Using this link or
shortcut, the user is able to quickly and effectively update
database records that are related to recent Telecommunication
Device activities without having to first search for said database
record information. The retrieval of additional database records
can either be cached locally or accessed upon demand. This object
of the invention also provides for mapping any database record that
has geographical information associated with it through the call
history.
[0118] It is an object of the present invention to provide a method
and system that enables the Telecommunication Device to update the
local address book based on a statistical analysis of the
Telecommunication Call Events associated with a user (i.e., since
the user can own multiple Telecommunication Devices) or with the
Telecommunication Device. The Telecommunication Device's address
book is an array of Contacts that can be stored locally on the
Telecommunication Device for the purpose of accessing the vCard
contents in real-time without a high-degree of access latency as
typically observed when requesting data through a wireless network.
This object of this present invention provides the means for
calculating which Contacts are associated with a Telecommunication
Device's Telecommunication Call Events and the frequency and age of
updates for the purpose of ordering the user's Contact (i.e.,
vCard) information from the most active to the least active for a
given user. This ordering is calculated in real-time as
Telecommunication Call Events are recorded. Since most
Telecommunication Devices have a finite number of Contact (i.e.,
vCard) allocations that can be stored locally in the
Telecommunication Device, a maximum number of address book Contacts
has to be established and may vary across different
Telecommunication Devices. Since the user of the Telecommunication
Device can have a larger base of Contacts than the
Telecommunication Device can support, this maximum number will
artificially limit how many Contacts can be synchronized or
transferred to the Telecommunication Device.
[0119] The synchronization or transfer process for updating the
Telecommunication Device's address book can be implemented 1). in
real-time as Telecommunication Call Events are processed, 2). at
scheduled ad-hoc and/or reoccurring time intervals, 3). upon
running an application or process such as a button or link (i.e.,
URL) that initiates an address book update, and/or 4). based on a
percentage difference threshold in which the current address book
listing differs from the new address book listing, or the like.
Thus this object of this invention uses Telecommunication Call
Events to calculate and then populate which Contacts are stored in
the local address book of the Telecommunication Device. This object
of this invention also provides a provision to for certain
high-priority Contacts, such as emergency Contacts, to override
other lower-priority Contacts, in the event that these Contacts
normally would not be stored in the address book due to storage
size limitations, but are required to be store locally on the
Telecommunication Device.
[0120] It is an object of the present invention to provide a method
and system that enables the correlation or matching and/or
extrapolation (i.e., partial matching) of Telecommunication Call
Events with either local and/or remote database records. Since
Telecommunication Call Events vary across different
Telecommunication Devices, Telephone (i.e., landline) and Wireless
Carriers, Telecommunication Standards (i.e., CDMA, GSM, iDEN,
etc.), or the like, it is paramount to provide a means to correlate
either exact or partial matches between Telecommunication Call
Events and database records. This object of this invention provides
the means to allow partial match correlations between
Telecommunication Call Events and database records, such as
Contact, Account, or the like. The following points provide
additional dependent objects that increase the accuracy of the
matching of exact and/or partial match correlations with said
database records: [0121] 1. Extrapolate NPA (i.e., area code)
Information for Telecommunication Events (i.e., Caller-ID) when
said Telecommunication Events do not provide NPA information for
local calls. Thus, it is an object of the invention to add NPA
information to Telecommunication Events that do not include said
NPA information, where the NPA information is derived from the
local telephone number of the Telecommunication Device. [0122] 2.
Allow partial matches for Telecommunication Devices contained
within a Private Branch Exchange (PBX) system. For example, ANI
(Automatic Number Identification or Caller-ID) provides the Direct
Inward Dialing (DID) trunk from the PBX on which the call
originated and not the actual PBX extension of the
Telecommunication Device. Thus, it is an object of this invention
to allow the partial match searches for telephone numbers that have
a high degree of correlation to a particular or set of database
records (i.e., Contact, Account, etc.). These partial correlations
can be presented to the user in a different manner than exact match
correlations. [0123] 3. Provide a mechanism that allows the user to
confirm and/or correct partial match correlations and enabling the
user to select the correct database record or records to associate
with the exact or partial Telecommunication Call Event (e.g., a
user can select from a list the Contact, Account, or the like, that
is associated with the telephone number, etc.).
[0124] It is an object of the present invention to provide a method
and system that enables the user to match or choose which
Telecommunication Call Events are to be associated with various
database records. This can occur on the Telecommunication Device
after a Telecommunication Call Event has ended (e.g., the end of a
phone call), during a Telecommunication Call Event (e.g., during a
phone call), or when a user authenticates and is authorized to sign
in to a remote application, such as a custom application or web
browser, for the purpose of updating PIM (Personal Information
Management), or the like, information. For example, in one
embodiment, a user can receive a number of phone calls from users
that do not have any Caller-ID information and thus no phone number
is provided. When the user signs in to their organization using a
standard web browser, a list of uncorrelated Telecommunication Call
Events will be listed so that the user can manually associate the
uncorrelated Telecommunication Call Events with current database
records, such as vCard contacts, or so that the user can create a
new database record, such as a user vCard or business Account, for
the purpose of associating the Telecommunication Call Event with a
database record for reports, notifications, or like.
[0125] It is an object of the present invention to provide a method
and system that provides a plurality of reports that utilize the
Telecommunication Call Events for either a particular
Telecommunication Device and/or user (i.e., which may use a
plurality of Telecommunication Devices). These reports include
numerous combinations of the Telecommunications Call Events, in
addition to correlating said Telecommunication Call Events with a
plurality of database records. Reports can be a critical part of
this invention, as those skilled in the art will agree. Making use
of a multitude of Telecommunication Call Events is only possible by
recognizing and illuminating the patterns and frequency of
Telecommunication Call Events with their respective database
records to the end user in a clear and simple format, which would
not otherwise be possible if only the raw data is displayed. The
invention provides a plurality of reports, without limitation, and
including the following: [0126] Incoming Calls Report [0127]
Outgoing Calls Report [0128] Missed Calls Report [0129] Contact
Reports [0130] Contact Call History [0131] Last Time Group of
Contacts were Called [0132] Total Contact Call Time [0133] Contact
Normalized Call Time vs. User's Total Call Time [0134] % of Calls
that are Personal vs. Business [0135] New Account Report--Customers
that are being Serviced [0136] Active Contacts--Current Contacts
that are Active [0137] Neglected Contacts--Contacts that need
Attention [0138] Active Accounts--Current Accounts that are Active
[0139] Neglected Accounts--Accounts that need Attention [0140]
Aging Reports--Contacts, Accounts, Opportunity, Leads, Forecast
[0141] Return Call Response Time--The amount of time between a
Contact calling a user and leaving a voice mail message, to the
time the user returned the call to the Contact. [0142] Sales
Reports [0143] Account and Contact Reports [0144] Opportunity and
Forecast Reports [0145] Support Reports [0146] Lead Reports [0147]
Fields Service Reports [0148] Wireless Airtime Billing
Report--Associated wireless airtime charges and the user
appropriate account. [0149] Opportunity ROI Report
[0150] Based on recorded call information related to a specified
Account's Opportunity that has Contacts associated with said
Account. Each Account Opportunity has a monetary value and this
report provides the Telecommunication Call Events information
related to said Opportunities, such as including, but not limited
to: Time of Calls, Frequency of Calls, Frequency of Return Calls
from Contact, Return Call Response Time, or the like.
[0151] It is an object of the present invention to provide a method
and system that provides a plurality of maps of varying resolution
and size reporting events, patterns, and/or frequencies of
Telecommunication Call Events and their respected associated
database records illustrating a spatial thematic representation of
the data. In one embodiment, it is possible to spatially view the
call history for a particular user and their Telecommunication
Devices over a given period of time. In another embodiment, a
thematic map of Accounts that the business organization has won or
closed is illustrated spatially, which graphically depicts the
amount of calls and visits made in the process of winning each
Account.
[0152] It is an object of the present invention to provide a method
and system that provides a plurality of alerts and exceptions that
are triggered based on the changes, modifications, or creation of
Telecommunication Call Events and related database records. Alerts
and Exceptions are configured by authorized users with the
appropriate privileges to create, modify, or remove alert and
exceptions for individual users of Telecommunication Devices. For
example, in one embodiment, a user can request to be alerted when a
specified Telecommunication Call Event occurs, such as to be
notified when a call is made to a specified telephone number and/or
NPA/NXX designation, such as with use a PBX phone system, or when a
particular Contact is called or the Contact calls the user at one
of their Telecommunication Devices (i.e., denoted as Telefencing).
In another embodiment, notifications and alerts are used when a
user's Telecommunication Device(s) have used a specified amount of
airtime or bandwidth for a given period, or if the user's
Telecommunication Device transitions from a roaming to non-roaming
state or vise-versa. Additionally, this invention enables an alert
when Telecommunication Call Events are made to a particular
Telecommunication Device to notify a specific user or group of
users that an action is required which is related to the user
initiating the Telecommunication Call Events and/or to the user of
said Telecommunication Device. In one embodiment, this alert can
illustrate that a sales deal has been closed or moved to a
different deal-stage. This invention allows alerts to be sent using
various different communication methods, such as, and without
limitation: E-Mail, SMS Messages, Instant Message, Telephone Call,
Page, or the like.
[0153] It is an object of the present invention to provide a method
and system that provides the capability to access or download
related Telecommunication Call Events and/or their associated
database records to a computer device in both processed and raw
formats. In one embodiment, a user is allowed to download
Telecommunication Call Events in a comma delimited format (i.e.,
.CSV format) for the purpose of integrating said information into a
spreadsheet for the tabulation of various fields that are not
typically exposed through an online website report. This provides
the user with ultimate flexibility in viewing the Telecommunication
Call Events, such as the total call duration for a specified range
of time. In another embodiment, downloading the Telecommunication
Call Events and their associated database records enable the
updating of Personal Information Management (PIM) applications,
such as updating Contacts, Journals, Calendar Events, Tasks, or the
like.
[0154] It is an object of the present invention to provide a method
and system that provides the capability to for the
Telecommunication Device running an application to perform searches
which can be transferred or synchronized to an online server system
for later retrieval via the online server system, remote computer,
or on the Telecommunication Device. It is an additional object of
this invention to allow the searches to be performed on a remote
computer that interfaces with the online server system and allows
searches to be cached on the online server system which are later
synchronized or transferred to the Telecommunication Device or
remote computer. It is a further object of this present invention
to allow the searches to include spatial related searches, such as
Yellow Pages or White Pages searches, or POI searches for creating
Routes on the phone, in order to allow the application running on
the Telecommunication Device or remote computing device to transfer
the searched places to the online server system or remote
computer.
[0155] For example, in one embodiment, a user that is authenticated
and authorized by an application running on a wireless telephone is
able to access the Internet and search for a Point of Interest
(POI) or Place (e.g., such as a restaurant, airport, or the like).
Those searched Places are then transferred to an online server
system. When the user is authenticated and authorized via a web
browser on a different computing device that has access to said
online server system, the user is then able to retrieve and access
the Places that were recently searched for on the user's wireless
telephone. Additionally, from the web browser, the user is able to
save the Place information into their own personal database and add
additional objects of information, such as text notes, documents,
articles, or the like, about the Place. It would be appreciated by
those skilled in the art that searches performed on the
Telecommunication Device are transferred to a remote database for
future retrieval from disparate computing devices that have access
to an online server system that stores the data records.
[0156] It is an object of the present invention to provide a method
and system that provides the capability for searching Places (i.e.,
POIs), saving Places, creating Routes/Directions, and saving
Routes/Directions using a computing platform, which may include a
Telecommunication Device, that is connected to an online server
system, and then accessing said saved or searched Places, or saved
or searched Routes/Directions from a Telecommunication Device. It
is an additional object of this invention to allow the accessed
Places and/or Route/Direction information to be integrated and
associated with the Telecommunication Device's specific interfaces,
such as GPS, Address Book, Voice Recorder, Camera, Phone
Capability, SMS, or the like. The associated data (e.g., Place and
its associated Camera Image(s), Route and its associated Camera
Image(s), etc.) derived from the Telecommunication Device's
specific interfaces can then be transferred or synchronized to the
online server system or remote computer. After the synchronization
or transfer process, the recently searched Place and/or
Route/Direction information that is stored on the online server
system now has additional database records (i.e., Camera Images,
etc.) that were derived from the Telecommunication Device
associated with the Place and/or Route/Direction information.
[0157] It is an additional object of this invention to allow a
Telecommunication Device to generate real-time maps based on
retrieved Places' address information which was searched or saved
on the online server system. It is an additional object of this
invention to modify driving directions in real-time, while using a
Telecommunication Device, which are based on driving directions
that were searched or saved on the online server system. It is an
additional object of this invention to create new driving
directions in real-time, while using a Telecommunication Device,
which are based on Places that were searched or saved on the online
server system. In one embodiment, a user that has a dentist
appointment in an hour first signs in to a web page by entering a
username and password. The user searches for the dentist using the
web browser that is connected to an online server system that has
access to Places (i.e., POIs, Yellow Pages, White Pages, etc.)
information. By noting the general location and area of the dentist
office and without saving the Place (i.e., the dentist office), the
user takes their wireless telephone with them and drives to the
dentist office. During the trip to the dentist office the user gets
lost and needs to find his way to the location of the dentist
office.
[0158] The user signs in to an application that is running on the
wireless phone and retrieves his recently searched Places that were
searched for on the web. The user is then able to quickly map the
dentist office (i.e., the Place) and even directly call the dentist
office (i.e., since the Place information contains the phone number
of the dentist), in the event that he might be late for his
appointment. The user can do all this from his wireless telephone
without having to perform a new search on the phone or call 411 to
get the dentist office's phone number. Additionally this invention
provides the user with the ability to dynamically create a route
from their current location (i.e., route origin) to the dentist
office (i.e., route destination) without having to enter in the
destination address, which is very cumbersome on a wireless phone.
In another embodiment, a user is able to retrieve a Place that was
searched for and saved to the online server system from their
wireless telephone by simple requesting recently saved Places by
clicking on a menu option on their wireless telephone. After
retrieving and selecting the desired Place the user is able to take
a picture using the camera that is integrated into the wireless
telephone, and then associate the picture with said Place on the
wireless telephone application. Additionally, the application that
is running on the user's wireless telephone will then transfer or
synchronize the picture to the online server system so that when
the user accesses the Place using a web browser on a laptop, the
user will be able to see the picture that they took associated with
the particular Place. Similarly, in another embodiment, the Place
was not searched for on the web, but instead on the wireless phone.
In a similar embodiment, a recently saved route was retrieved onto
the wireless telephone and a set of pictures that were taken on the
wireless phone were associated with the route and transferred or
synchronized to the online server system for later viewing.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS
[0159] FIG. 1 illustrates a network system for providing a
communication channel between various wireless and landline
computing devices;
[0160] FIG. 2 illustrates one embodiment of the present invention
showing a personal computer with an integrated web browser;
[0161] FIG. 3 illustrates one embodiment of the present invention
of a wireless Telecommunication Device and an accompanying
high-level block diagram of a wireless Telecommunication
Device;
[0162] FIG. 4 illustrates one embodiment of linking Contacts in a
database with synchronized call history or logged calls from a
wireless Telecommunication Device;
[0163] FIG. 5 illustrates one embodiment of the main sign-in page
of an online website for accessing and managing Telecommunication
Devices, Contact data, Accounts information, Account Opportunities,
and other data and reports that typically relate to said data;
[0164] FIG. 6 illustrates one embodiment of the Contacts home page
in the website;
[0165] FIG. 7 illustrates one embodiment of a list of all Contacts,
or a subset of all Contacts filtered by a given alphabetical
letter, or numerically, or the like;
[0166] FIG. 8 illustrates one embodiment for displaying detailed
Contact information for a particular Contact and the associated
call history for said Contact;
[0167] FIG. 9 illustrates one embodiment for displaying a page to
edit all fields of a Contact's information;
[0168] FIG. 10 illustrates one embodiment for creating a new
Contact;
[0169] FIG. 11 illustrates one embodiment for selecting a
predefined date and time range for the purpose of generating
various reports and also illustrates a list of phone statistics for
a user and their team;
[0170] FIG. 12 illustrates one embodiment for viewing a list of
incoming, outgoing, or missed calls and the ability to print or
export the data related to said calls;
[0171] FIG. 13 illustrates one embodiment for finding various map
related objects on a map, such as an address, a place (i.e., Point
of Interest which is also known as a POI), an area code with or
without prefix data, map coordinates, or the like;
[0172] FIG. 14 illustrates one embodiment for displaying a list of
partial matches for a searched place (i.e., POI);
[0173] FIG. 15 illustrates one embodiment for displaying a map
resulting from a found address, POI, area code/prefix location, or
map coordinates and the ability to pan or zoom around on the map or
add the mapped point to a planned route's destination or
origin;
[0174] FIG. 16 illustrates one embodiment for entering, or
selecting, origin and destination addresses in order to plan and
compute a route;
[0175] FIG. 17 illustrates one embodiment for displaying a map or a
route, travel time, driving distance, and driving directions for a
planned route;
[0176] FIG. 18 illustrates one embodiment for displaying a
particular user's account information;
[0177] FIG. 19A illustrates one embodiment for displaying the
personal information of a particular user;
[0178] FIG. 19B illustrates one embodiment for displaying the group
permissions settings for a particular user;
[0179] FIG. 19C illustrates one embodiment for displaying the login
history for a particular user;
[0180] FIG. 20 illustrates one embodiment for viewing and/or
removing Telecommunication Devices that are associated and assigned
to a particular user's account;
[0181] FIG. 21 illustrates one embodiment for associating a single
or group of Telecommunication Devices to a particular user's
account;
[0182] FIG. 22 illustrates one embodiment for changing the mobile
access PIN for a user's Telecommunication Devices;
[0183] FIG. 23 illustrates one embodiment for displaying to a user
a summary of the user's team members in an organization and their
respective top-level account information and settings;
[0184] FIG. 24 illustrates one embodiment for changing the password
policies for a particular user;
[0185] FIG. 25 illustrates one embodiment for displaying the total
disk usage, such as that used for contact information, for an
organization and for each individual user in the organization;
[0186] FIG. 26 illustrates one embodiment for displaying a menu on
a Telecommunication Device for searching yellow pages information,
retrieving user specific Place information, and recently viewed or
saved Place and Trip information;
[0187] FIG. 27 illustrates one embodiment for displaying a Map of a
Place on a web page;
[0188] FIG. 28A illustrates one embodiment for displaying the
recently viewed or saved Places on the Telecommunication Device
that were retrieved either locally from the Telecommunication
Device or remotely from an online server system;
[0189] FIG. 28B illustrates one embodiment for displaying the
detailed information for a Place that was retrieved either locally
on the Telecommunication Device or remotely from an online server
system;
[0190] FIG. 29 illustrates one embodiment for displaying the
recently viewed or saved Trips on the Telecommunication Device that
were retrieved either locally from the Telecommunication Device or
remotely from an online server system; and
[0191] FIG. 30 illustrates one embodiment for displaying a
representation of a Trip and the associated data that was acquired
while using the Telecommunication Device on said Trip;
DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE EMBODIMENTS
[0192] The present invention provides a method and system for
capturing, processing, mapping, reporting, and/or displaying
Telecommunication Call Events that occur on either landline or
wireless Telecommunication Devices (i.e., POTS telephones, cellular
telephones, 3G-based wireless data/telephones, etc.), by which the
information content of said Telecommunication Call Events can be
presented locally on the Telecommunication Device or remotely on a
desktop or laptop computer using a computer application or a web
browser that can interface to an online networked server. This
invention also provides for the synchronization or transfer of said
Telecommunication Call Events either locally or remotely to another
computing platform. This invention also provides the ability to
associate said Telecommunication Call Events with various database
records for a multitude of purposes, such as matching
Telecommunication Call Events with a Contact database. This
invention also enables associating Telecommunication Call Events
with Contacts and other threads, such as Accounts, Opportunities,
Forecasts, Leads, Tasks, Documents, Cases, other events, or the
like. This invention also provides alerts, exceptions, and
notifications that are related to the Telecommunication Call Events
and associated database records. The present invention may be
embodied in an online and Telecommunication Device application,
such as the "AtlasBook" application owned and licensed by Networks
In Motion, Inc. of Irvine, Calif.
[0193] The preferred embodiments of the present invention will now
be described in detail with references to FIGS. 1-30.
[0194] FIG. 1 and FIG. 2 illustrate high-level diagrams of a
suitable computing and networking environment in which the various
embodiments of the present invention may be implemented. The
preferred embodiment of the present invention will be described in
the general context of an application that executes on an operating
system in conjunction with a personal computer or server, but those
skilled in the art will realize that this invention may also be
implemented in combination with other program modules. Program
modules typically include routines, programs, data structures, etc.
that perform particular tasks or implement particular abstract data
types. This invention is not limited to a typical personal
computer, but may also be utilized with other computing systems,
such as handheld devices, mobile lap top computers, wireless
phones, in-vehicle navigation systems, programmable consumer
electronics, mainframe computers, distributed computer systems,
etc., and the like.
[0195] FIG. 1 is a network block diagram illustrating the
connection (125 & 101) of both wireless 100 and wired 126
Telecommunication devices to an Application Service Provider (ASP)
123, also referred to as an online server system. This online
server system may be configured at a single location and on a
single computer, or can be configured as a distributed computer
system and at different locations. The wireless Mobile
Telecommunication Devices 100 are wirelessly connected 101 to a
nearby wireless base station 102, which are typically connected or
have access to 105 the Internet, Intranet, or Extranet 106.
Additionally, a landline Telecommunication Device 126 is typically
connected to a nearby central office 124 which is connected or has
access to 123 the Internet, Intranet, or Extranet 106.
Additionally, the Application Service Provider (ASP) 123 also has
access 109 to the Internet, Intranet, or Extranet 106. The ASP 123
generally consists of a front-end firewall and XML router 113 which
itself has access (111 & 114 & 119) to other local
computing modules, such as a database 112, POI server 115,
geocoding server 116, mapping server 117, and webpage client server
118. The web-server front-end 118 can be connected to the outside
Internet, Intranet, or Extranet 106 either through the local
front-end firewall 113, or as in this embodiment, via 120 the web
server 121, which is connected 122 directly to the Internet,
Intranet, or Extranet 106 by using a software firewall which is
well known to those skilled in the art. Additionally, either mobile
104 or landline 108 computing devices, such as a personal computer,
are connected to the Internet, Intranet, or Extranet 106, either
directly 107 or through a wireless connection 103 and base station
102.
[0196] FIG. 2 illustrates a typical personal computer 150, that
includes a central processing unit (CPU) 173, video adapter 172,
hard disk drive 157, optical disk 158, serial port 159, magnetic
disk drive 163, system bus 156, and network interface
176.fwdarw.177 & 167 & 169.fwdarw.109. The hard disk drive
157 typically refers to a local non-volatile storage system for
storing large amounts of data, such as a web browser program files
or cookies or a user's Contact data. The optical disk 158 typically
refers to a CD-ROM disk used for storing read-only data, such as an
installation program. The serial port interface 159 is typically
used to connect 161 the computer 150 to external devices 160, such
as a keyboard, mouse, and graphical touch screen interface, and
also can connect 164 to positioning devices 165, such as a GPS
receiver. The keyboard and mouse 160, amongst other input devices
165, enable users to input information into the computer 150. The
connection 161 & 164 cables can include a serial cable or
universal serial bus (USB) cable. Other input devices, that are not
shown, may include a joystick, scanner, camera, microphone, or the
like. The magnetic disk drive 163 is typically used to store small
amounts data, in comparison to a hard 157 or optical 158 disk
drive, and typically lacks the data transfer rates of those other
storage drives, but it enables both readable and writable
capability.
[0197] The hard disk drive 157, optical disk drive 158, serial port
interface 159, and magnetic disk drive 163 are all preferably
connected to the main system bus 156 of the computer 150 for
transferring data. A monitor 170 or other type of display device,
such as a LCD display, is connected 171 to the computer system's
150 video adapter 172, which is connected to the system bus 156.
Additional peripheral output devices, which are not included in
this embodiment, such as a printer, speaker, etc., can also be
connected to a personal computer 150. The system bus 156 also
connects to the network interface 176, central processing unit
(CPU) 173, and system memory 151. The system memory 151 contains
both random access memory (RAM) 153, and read only memory (ROM)
152, that typically consists of the BIOS (Basic Input/Output
System) of the computer, necessary for containing basic routines
that enable the transfer of information between elements within the
personal computer 150. The RAM 153 stores a number of program
modules, such as the web browser and synchronization applications
155, and the Operating System 154 of the personal computing device
150 or personal computer 150. One example of such a program module
155 would be a web browser that is connected to the "AtlasBook"
server that was previously mentioned.
[0198] FIG. 3 illustrates a next generation wireless
Telecommunication Device 311 in accordance with a preferred
embodiment of the present invention, which preferably includes a
display 314, an antenna 313, and a keypad 312. The next generation
wireless Telecommunication Device 311 & 300, as illustrated in
FIG. 3, provides a foundation 302 for running programs or
applications that can access the Telecommunication Device's 311
internal interfaces, such as the Bluetooth 309, Speech/Audio Codec
308, GPS Interface 307, TAPI (Telephony Application Program
Interface) 306 Interface, Screen/Keypad API (Application Program
Interface) or Interface 305, Camera API 304, or the like as well
known to those that are skilled in the art. As those that are
skilled in the art will appreciate, a Telecommunication Device (300
& 311) will also include scheduling/timers 310 for scheduling
specific events as is provided with standard computing platforms.
Additionally, next generation Telecommunication Devices (300 &
311) have graphical user interfaces (GUI) 301 for applications to
allow user input using a graphical display 314. As people skilled
in the art will appreciate, these next generation Telecommunication
Devices provide the means to access the Telecommunication Devices'
internal APIs using a middleware 302 platform, such as J2ME or
BREW, which are both well known to those skilled in the art. This
simplifies the development process since there is significant
support for obtaining developer's access to the Telecommunication
Devices internal APIs, such as the TAPI interface for making
telephone calls and capturing call logs.
[0199] Standard Telecommunication Devices provide an internal call
logging capability, such as incoming call history 400, missed call
history 401, and outgoing call history 402. Prior art solutions
enabled the storage of vCard contact data on the Telecommunication
Device, which is usually standard for wireless Telecommunication
Devices. As those skilled in the art will appreciate, this
invention provides the means to first run an application on the
Telecommunication Device for the purpose of collecting
Telecommunication Call Events, by using either Telecommunication
Device timers 310, or by having the Telecommunication Device
trigger the application when a particular Telecommunication Call
Event occurs, such as when a telephone call is received,
transmitted, or the like. As illustrated in FIG. 1, the wireless
Telecommunication Device 100 is indirectly connected to the ASP
server 123 preferably by means of the Internet, Intranet, or
Extranet 106. This provides a pathway for the synchronization or
transfer of Telecommunication Call Events that are captured or
recording on the Telecommunication Device to the ASP server 123.
This transfer or synchronization process can occur in real-time or
stored and then forwarded at a later time as previously mentioned
in this invention.
[0200] Once the Telecommunication Call Events have been transferred
to the ASP server 123, the ASP server 123 can then correlate said
Telecommunication Call Events with Contact data that is also
located on the ASP server 123 system. Using the Telecommunication
Call Events history, it is possible to correlate said history with
actual contact data that is stored in the ASP server 123 system.
For example, in one embodiment, a user many have 1,000 Contacts'
data (i.e., vCard data) stored on the online ASP 123 system. As
illustrated in FIG. 4 Contact data consists of various user
specific fields, including but not limited to the following:
[0201] Typical Contact (vCard) Data Fields: [0202] Title [0203]
First Name [0204] Middle Name [0205] Last Name [0206] Suffix [0207]
Company [0208] Department [0209] Job Title [0210] Business Street
[0211] Business Street 2 [0212] Business Street 3 [0213] Business
City [0214] Business State [0215] Business Postal Code [0216]
Business Country [0217] Business Latitude [0218] Business Longitude
[0219] Business Datum [0220] Business Altitude [0221] Business SIC
Code [0222] Home Street [0223] Home Street 2 [0224] Home Street 3
[0225] Home City [0226] Home State [0227] Home Postal Code [0228]
Home Country [0229] Home Latitude [0230] Home Longitude [0231] Home
Datum [0232] Home Altitude [0233] Other Street [0234] Other Street
2 [0235] Other Street 3 [0236] Other City [0237] Other State [0238]
Other Postal Code [0239] Other Country [0240] Other Latitude [0241]
Other Longitude [0242] Other Datum [0243] Other Altitude [0244]
Assistant's Phone [0245] Business Fax [0246] Business Phone [0247]
Business Phone 2 [0248] Callback [0249] Car Phone [0250] Company
Main Phone [0251] Home Fax [0252] Home Phone [0253] Home Phone 2
[0254] ISDN [0255] Mobile Phone [0256] Other Fax [0257] Other Phone
[0258] Pager [0259] Primary Phone [0260] Radio Phone [0261] TTY/TDD
Phone [0262] Telex [0263] Account [0264] Anniversary [0265]
Assistant's Name [0266] Billing Information [0267] Birthday [0268]
Business Address PO Box [0269] Categories [0270] Children [0271]
Directory Server [0272] E-mail Address [0273] E-mail Type [0274]
E-mail Display Name [0275] E-mail 2 Address [0276] E-mail 2 Type
[0277] E-mail 2 Display Name [0278] E-mail 3 Address [0279] E-mail
3 Type [0280] E-mail 3 Display Name [0281] Gender [0282] Government
ID Number [0283] Hobby [0284] Home Address PO Box [0285] Initials
[0286] Internet Free Busy [0287] Keywords [0288] Language [0289]
Location [0290] Manager's Name [0291] Mileage [0292] Notes [0293]
Office Location [0294] Organizational ID Number [0295] Other
Address PO Box [0296] Priority [0297] Private [0298] Profession
[0299] Referred By [0300] Sensitivity [0301] Spouse [0302] User 1
[0303] User 2 [0304] User 3 [0305] User 4 [0306] Web Page
[0307] It should be appreciated by those skilled in the art that
Contact data has a plurality of telephone data, such as mobile,
car, home, or the like, telephone fields in typical Contact data.
As illustrated in FIG. 4 this Contact data may consist of Name (417
& 412 & 406), Account (418 & 413 & 407), Primary
Telephone (419 & 414 & 408), Mobile Telephone (420 &
415 & 409), and Fax (421 & 416 & 410) fields, amongst
other various fields 411 that were previous noted. Any given user
can have a plurality of Contacts (403 & 404 & 405) that are
associated with either a single user or group of users in an
organization or across multiple organizations. This Contact Data
can also embody Point of Interest (POI) records, such as waypoints,
or the like, since a Contact Data record is very similar to a
phonebook listing (i.e., White Pages or Yellow Pages). As those
skilled in the art know, Contact Data, White Pages, and Yellow
Pages records can be categorized together with very similar
fields.
[0308] As further illustrated in FIG. 4, the preferred embodiment
of the present invention provides the linking, either by implicit
or explicit threads or links (422 & 423 & 424), between
call history (400 & 401 & 402) and Contact Data (403 &
404 & 405). For example, an incoming call history telephone
number (949-555-1213) can be linked or threaded 422 to a Contact
403 or group of Contacts, which may include POIs, or the like.
Additionally, both missed call history 401 and outgoing call
history 402 can also have threads or links (423 & 424) to
various Contacts (404 & 405) or groups of Contacts.
[0309] In the preferred embodiment, a Telecommunication Device runs
or executes a program that collects and transfers Telecommunication
Call Events in real-time, on schedule, at predefined intervals, or
the like, for the purpose of processing the data, in this
embodiment, at the ASP server 123 system. This unique approach
enables the ability to provide a mechanism on the ASP server 123
system to display said Telecommunication Call Events in a plurality
of methods. FIG. 5 illustrates such a Mechanism as the main home
page 510 of a website after a user has been authenticated and
authorized by the system. The web page 500 of the ASP server 123
system displays a row of headers, such as Home 518, Contacts 519,
Leads 520, Accounts 521, Opportunities 522, Call History 523,
Search 524, Find on Map 525, Directions 526, and Reports 527. Each
main tab, such as Contacts 519, provides a submenu of information
related to said tab subject or to the main essence of the
application. For example, in this illustration the Contacts Tab 519
provides a submenu directly related to Contacts that allows a user
to create a New Contact 511, New Lead 512, New Account 513, and New
Opportunity 514. Also provided in the Contacts Tab's 519 submenu
are functions that indirectly reference Contacts, such as allowing
a user to view its Incoming Calls 515, Outgoing Calls 516, and
Missed Calls 517.
[0310] This page also indicates the name of the user that is signed
in to the website 532 and its organization 533, in addition to the
current date 534. Additionally, each web page 500 provides common
functions, such as by the Setup 528, Help 529, Trash Bin 530, and
Logout 531 links to other web pages 500. Other common features
include the Search field 501, My Recent Contacts 502, My Recent
Places 509, and the Last Activity 503 consisting of the user's
recent activity within the web page 500. The Last Activity 503
provides a cache of all recently accessed Contacts 504, Maps or
Places 508, Routes 507, Opportunities 506, Leads, Accounts 505,
Call History, or the like. My Recent Contacts 502 and My Recent
Places 509 illustrate a more specific cache of only the recent
contacts and places, respectively, that were searched. It should be
appreciated by those that are skilled in the art, that if you
search for a place on the ASP server 123 system, and it is
displayed on the web page 500 in the My Recent Places 509 list, the
same fields are accessible on a user's mobile device. For example,
if a user searches for a Dentist office on the website it will be
stored as a recent item in the user's My Recent Places 509 list.
When that user is on the Move, the user can access this location on
its wireless telephone by simply searching its My Recent Places
list. This part of the invention allows a user to easily and
quickly mirror and retrieve the recent searches that the user
performed on the web site 500 for fast retrieval on the mobile
telephone.
[0311] As illustrated in FIG. 6, when you first visit the Contacts
519 web page 500, the information displayed is a table 611 that
lists the contacts whose information was recently viewed on the web
page 500. Some standard fields provided include Contact Name 608,
Company 609, and Phone Number 610. This Recently Viewed 600 contact
web page provides a quick glance at the most recently viewed
contacts. Additionally, a user can request to view a list of their
contacts unfiltered (i.e., "All Contacts" 601), or by other
filters, such as "Recently Edited" 602, "My Recent Contacts" 603,
"My Recent Places" 604, "Birthdays this Month" 605, Contacts "New
Last Week" 606, and Contacts "New this Week" 607.
[0312] As illustrated in FIG. 7, the "All Contacts" view 700
provides a detailed view of all of a user's contacts. This view's
700 data can be sorted by a number of fields, such as Name 705,
Company 706, Group 707, Title 708, Phone 709, E-Mail 710, or Owner
713. Contact data can be sorted and viewed 701 alphabetically
(i.e., A-Z), numerically (i.e., "123"), or viewed in its entirety
(i.e., "All"). Each displayed set of contact data is numbered 702
and displayed to the user, and a user may view the next 711 and
previous 712 sets of contact data easily. Additionally, the number
of contact data records displayed at a time (i.e., per set) is
preferably configurable 716. As people skilled in the art will
appreciate, a user can edit 703 any contact or delete a single or
multiple contacts 704. A user can also select contacts to be
downloaded to the Telecommunication Device by checking the check
box for the On Ph (on the phone) 715 field and clicking the Update
714 button. This enables the wireless phone to download the
selected Contacts to the Telecommunication Device's local address
book. As people in the art will appreciate, the Contact data can be
compressed for download, and each contact can be identified by a
pre-defined ID in order to allow for differential updates of
contacts that have changed since the last download.
[0313] Providing a full view of information about a particular
Contact 800 is preferred in an address book application. FIG. 8
illustrates the main fields for providing said vCard fields. These
fields include Name, Job Title, company Department, Birthday,
Reports To, and Contact Source, as illustrated in one block of
information 806. Another block of information 825 illustrates
contact information, such as Work Phone, Work Fax, Mobile Phone,
Home Phone, E-Mail Address, IM Address, and Web Page. Other
information blocks include Contact Owner, vCard Group and Type 807,
as well as information on the maintenance of the contact (i.e.,
Created By and Modified By) and its viewing Permissions 824.
[0314] Address information is provided in separate blocks of
information, such as Home 823 and Work Address fields 808, which
provides the ability to map the contact in the application. Other
contact fields blocks include a block 809 with alternate email
addresses (i.e., E-Mail 2, E-Mail 3) and Pager and Car Phone
numbers, and a block 822 with the Home Fax number, Anniversary,
Spouse, and Children information fields. A final block 810 is
provided for the notes field. The summation of all of these
individual blocks of information provides complete Contact (i.e.,
vCard) information for any contact. A user can also edit 801, copy
802, print 803, and delete 804 the contact. Finally, an image 826
associated with the Contact is displayed to the user alongside the
other Contact data. This invention also allows a user to obtain
driving directions 805 to and from the contact.
[0315] In accordance with the preferred embodiment, the
Telecommunication Call Events made to the Telecommunication Devices
associated with the signed-in user that were initiated or received
by the viewed Contact are preferably displayed, as all of the
Telecommunication Call Events that were captured for said user are
stored on the online ASP 123 system. For example, in one embodiment
as shown in FIG. 8, the call history 811 is provided for the user
800 that had calls with 812 various other Contacts, which may be
the same said user or another user within the same team as said
user. If a Contact name is provided, the Contact Owner field 820 is
also displayed, since each contact belongs to someone (i.e.,
another user which is responsible for the maintenance of a
contact). The call history 811 displays each call's "From Phone"
815 and "To Phone" 816 phone number identifiers, as well as the
start 817 and end 818 time of the call and the call's duration 819.
This list only provides a subset of the complete call history for
this Contact 800, and the user can choose the length of this
displayed subset by selecting the number of records displayed per
page 813. To view the Contact's 800 complete call history, a user
can click on a button 814 in the webpage. Additionally, a user can
also send an e-mail to this contact by clicking a different button
821 in the web page.
[0316] As illustrated in FIG. 9, preferably all of the contact
fields can be edited, except the Created By and Modified By fields.
Additionally in one embodiment, each contact can have different
permissions 903 associated with it, since a contact can be shared
by a group of users if it is a public contact. In one embodiment,
each Contact can be placed in a folder or Group 901 and each
Contact has an associated Type 902 that can be changed as shown
below in the following tables.
TABLE-US-00001 Type Fields Contacts Places Group Fields Unfiled
Business (default) Personal Family Friends Colleagues School VIP
Favorites Competition Suppliers International Miscellaneous
[0317] Furthermore, each Contact can have an image (826 & 904)
associated with it, which is uploaded to the server by clicking on
the "Upload Contact Photograph" 905 button. The Path 906 of the
image 904 on the local machine is displayed to the user in the web
page. When all changes save been made, a user clicks a button to
apply changes 900 using a mouse in a web browser, which is known to
all people that are skilled in the art.
[0318] As illustrated in FIG. 10, it is possible to create a new
Contact 1000 and enter in all of the available information fields
for a Contact, except the Created By and Modified By fields.
[0319] Searching for Call History 1100 for a team's members can be
implemented using a date and time range. As illustrated in FIG. 11,
a user can select either a predefined time range 1101, such as
Today's date 1103 or can select from a group of time range
identifiers 1102. For each search and in this preferred embodiment,
a user is required to select the member or group of members 1104
and the type of call 1106, such as an incoming, outgoing, or missed
call. In order to generate the call history view, after selecting
the required fields, a user simply clicks on the generate button
1105.
[0320] Additionally; this call history view 1100 preferably
displays an overview of a team's members 1110 and their phone
statistics, such as Last Phone Synchronization time 1111 and Last
Login 1112 either on the phone or the web site, and provides links
to view the call history 1120 for incoming 1121, outgoing 1122, and
missed 1123 calls. This view can also enable the remote
synchronization of Telecommunication Call Events by checking a box
1109 and clicking the synchronize button 1107. The team's call
history information can also be printed by clicking on a print
button 1108.
[0321] When a Call History 1200 view is generated, it provides
information illustrating the type of call history, such as
incoming, outgoing, missed, or all calls 1201. The call history
information identifies who the user had conversations with 1207 and
can be generated for a plurality of Telecommunication Devices
associated with the user's account. General call history
information fields include "From Phone" 1208, "To Phone" 1209,
"Start Time" 1210, "End Time" 1211, "Duration" 1212, and the
"Contact Owner" 1213 of the contact if any exists. A link next to
each phone number (both From and To) provides a way to Map (1215
& 1216) that phone number's location at the time the call was
made or received or Map (1215 & 1216) the vCard's home or
business address that is associated with said phone number. The
number of call history records per page (1214 & 1206) can vary
and previous 1204 or next 1205 page information can also be
displayed. The entire or subset of said call history can be printed
1202 or exported 1203 by clicking the appropriate buttons on the
web page.
[0322] The preferred embodiment of the present invention also
includes a find on map 1300 functionality, which, in one
embodiment, allows a user to search and map addresses 1301, places
1302, area code and prefix phone number information 1303, and
latitude and longitude map coordinates 1304. Every time an address
is searched for and found it is stored for future use by the Recent
Locations 1305 feature on the web page. This allows a drop down
menu for users to select from a number of recent pre-defined
locations that were mapped on the web page. When entering an
address, typically the fields required are a street address 1306,
city 1307, state 1308, zip code 1309, and country 1310. After all
or a subset of said information has been entered, a map can be
generated by clicking on a button or link 1311 in this
embodiment.
[0323] Finding a place or POI 1302 is a similar process, but
typically the only field that is required to be entered is the
place name 1312 or description, such as the phone number, address,
or the like as known to those that are skilled in the art. A map
can be generated by clicking on a button or link 1313 in this
embodiment. Additionally, a map of an area code and prefix 1303 can
be obtained by entering said information 1314 and clicking on a
button or link 1315 in this embodiment. In a similar manner, a user
can enter latitude 1316 and longitude 1317 coordinates and click on
a button or link 1318 in this embodiment to map the coordinates'
location. For the case where a user entered a place name 1302 and
requested a map 1313, if an exact match was not found a list of
partial matches 1400 & 1401 is provided, as illustrated in FIG.
14. This partial list of information will highlight the closest
matches 1402 and display a listing of the next immediate partial
matches 1403. A user need only select a suitable match and click on
a button or link 1404 to obtain a map in this embodiment.
[0324] After a map has been obtained, as shown in FIG. 15, it will
be displayed on a different web page 1500 illustrating the essence
of the map 1506 and a mechanism to zoom 1501 and pan 1506 around
the map. The panning 1506 is simply performed by clicking on the
new center point of the map as known to people that are skilled in
the art, or by selecting some other button in the direction of the
desired pan. A user can add this mapped location to their Contacts
1502 or can print 1503 or E-Mail 1504 this map. Additionally, this
location can be added to an origin or destination of a route for
the purpose of creating driving directions 1505 to or from this
location. At anytime a user can obtain a new map 1507 for another
location.
[0325] As illustrated in FIG. 16, one embodiment of this invention
allows a user to request driving directions 1600 from an entered
starting address (i.e., origin) 1601 to an entered destination
address 1604. A list of recent locations 1603 is available to the
user in addition to the standard fields for mapping a location,
such as the street address 1605, city 1606, state 1607 and zip code
1608. A user need only enter the required fields and may obtain a
map by clicking on a button or link 1609 in this embodiment. After
a successful search for the locations of the entered origin and
destination addresses or selected locations is completed, a route
is computed and driving directions are displayed in a new web page
1700. The resulting driving directions are summarized by displaying
the start 1706 and end 1707 addresses, total trip driving distance,
and total trip drive time 1710. Also provided is another
opportunity to add the start 1706 or end 1707 address to the user's
Contacts database by pressing a button next to the address (1708
& 1709). As another means of summarizing the route, a map of
the destination location 1704 and a map of the entire route 1705
are displayed. Detailed driving directions 1711 are displayed in a
list with route maneuver order numbers, maneuver instructions
(i.e., "Turn Left on Jamboree Rd."), elapsed distance, and a
graphical representation of the maneuver (i.e., left turn arrow).
The driving directions view can be printed with the displayed maps
1702, without maps and just as text directions 1703, or can be
emailed 1701.
[0326] FIG. 18 illustrates the setup view 1801 which offers options
available to a user setting up its account, and displays the user's
name 1802 that the options apply to. The setup view 1801 may offer
options for the following settings: Personal Settings 1803, such as
editing the user's personal information or password; Tools 1804,
such as wizards for importing or deleting numerous Contacts; Phone
Settings 1805, such as adding, editing or deleting phones
associated with said user's account, or changing the user's mobile
access PIN; and Administration Settings 1806 for authorized users,
such as for managing the members of the user's team, changing
password policies, and viewing login history and member
statistics.
[0327] FIG. 19a illustrates the various fields associated with a
user's Personal Information 1900, which is part of a user's
Personal Settings 1803. The user's Personal Information 1900 fields
are very similar to those of a Contact, since in a team this user
can serve as a Contact and said user's Personal Information 1900
can serve as that Contact's information. Personal Information 1900
fields may include several blocks of information. For example,
general account settings (1905 & 1911) may be described by
username, nickname, permission level, user account status
(active/disabled), last login date and time, disk space used by
this account, user's time zone, user's preference for receiving the
company's product newsletter, and the user's typical schedule for
consideration in reports. More specific user identification
information 1906 can be specified by name, job title, company,
department, birthday, the direct supervisor of the user, and the
source of this user's involvement with the team, if there is one.
The user can then categorize its own Group and Type, being its own
Contact Owner 1907, and the user can identify its contact
information as private if necessary 1913. A user's contact
information includes the usual address and phone number fields,
such as Work 1908 and Home 1914 Street Address, City, State, Zip,
and Country, Work and Home Phone and Fax, and Mobile Phone numbers
(1912 & 1915). Other forms of contact, such as Email Addresses,
IM Address, Web Page, Pager and Car Phone numbers (1912 & 1909)
can also be included. For more personal notes, the user can enter
information about their Anniversary, Spouse, and Children 1915, or
miscellaneous information in the Notes field 1910.
[0328] Whenever a user's Personal Information 1900 is created or
modified 1913, the time of that activity is recorded and also
displayed along with the information. Once a user's Personal
Information 1900 is recorded, the user can Edit 1901 its own
personal information, view or modify its Group Permissions 1902,
view its Login History 1903, or Change its Password 1904. From this
detailed view of Personal Information 1900, a user can follow links
provided to map the work or home address, to send an email to a
clicked-on email address, to visit a clicked-on web page address
(i.e., URL), or to view detailed call history for a clicked-on
phone number.
[0329] FIG. 19b illustrates a sample list of Groups and their
Permissions 1925, where each Group is identified by a pre-defined
name 1926 and has a permission setting 1927. The permission setting
1927 determines if a Group, by which Contacts are grouped, is
considered private or public. If a Group is made public, then all
Contacts with that Group assignment are also made public and can be
viewed in full detail by all team members. If a Group is made
private, then all Contacts with that Group assignment are also made
private and can be viewed in detail only by the Contact Owner.
[0330] FIG. 19c illustrates an example of a user's login history
1950, where each login event is identified by the time the user
signed in 1951, the IP Address the user logged in from 1952, and
the result of the login attempt 1953, whether it succeeded or
failed.
[0331] FIG. 20 illustrates an example of a user's phone assignments
2000, which is part of a user's Phone Settings 1805. All of the
user's phone assignments, that is, those phones that are associated
with said user's account, are listed 2001, and each phone
assignment is described by its phone number and the time the phone
was activated on said user's account. A phone number can be treated
as a unique identifier, because, as previously described, a phone
number can only be associated to one account, although an account
may have multiple phone numbers associated with it. A phone
assignment may be removed at anytime by clicking a Remove button
next to the phone number to be removed.
[0332] A phone assignment may also be easily added, as illustrated
in FIG. 21. A user may add a phone 2100, which is part of a user's
Phone Settings 1805, for its own account, of for another team
member's account if the user has the appropriate permissions. The
user whose account the phone assignment is being added to is
identified by displaying that user's username 2601. In one
embodiment, to add a phone assignment the user needs two pieces of
information, the phone number 2102 and the phone's PIN 2103. The
phone's PIN 2103 is obtained during the phone application's
registration process, which requires communication with the server
to allow the server to authorize registration, ensuring the phone
number in question is not assigned to any other user accounts, and
to allow the server to provide the phone application with a valid
PIN. The phone's owner or user then uses that PIN on the web page
to complete the process of associating that phone to the user's
account. This ensures that the user requesting the phone addition
has physical access to the phone, either directly or indirectly
through a communicating phone user, and is thereby permitted to
request the assignment. To complete the addition of a phone
assignment, the user enters the required information and presses
the Add Phones button 2104. Once the phone number is cleared for
assignment and the PIN is verified, the new phone assignment is
complete.
[0333] Another part of a user's Phone Settings 1805 is the ability
to change the user's Mobile Access PIN 2200, as illustrated in FIG.
22. The Mobile Access PIN is the password used on the phone's
application to access the user's account features, such as
Contacts, My Recent Places, etc. The username 2201 for the user
whose Mobile Access PIN will be changed is specified 2202, since
users with appropriate permissions can also change another user's
Mobile Access PIN. This may be useful, for example, when an
employee leaves a company and the supervisor wants to ensure that
the ex-employee can not access his/her old account anymore. To set
a new Mobile Access PIN, the user enters the new Mobile Access PIN
2203 and confirms the entry by typing it in again 2204, and then
presses the Apply Changes button 2205 to complete the change.
[0334] For use by teams, a team administrator should preferably be
able to quickly view and modify the teams account settings. FIG. 23
illustrates the Administration Settings 2300 that a team
administrator can use to manage the team's members. A team
administrator can get a quick overview of the team in a tabular
format, such as that illustrated, which summarizes each team
member's name 2307, username 2308, nickname 2309, account status
(active or disabled) 2310, and permission level 2311. Each member's
information can be edited, simply by clicking on the Edit link 2305
next to the member's name, or by clicking on the links on the
member's name 2307, username 2308, and nickname 2309. Multiple
members' password can be reset by the administrator by checking the
Password Reset checkbox 2306 next to each member whose password
should be reset and pressing the Update button 2301. This overview
of the team's member can be sorted, by clicking on any of the
column headers, such as Name 2307, and can also be sorted by a
specific letter or numerically 2302. The number of team members to
display per web page 2312 may be selectable and the page number
currently being viewed 2303 is also displayed. An administrator can
move from page to page using Previous Page and Next Page links
2304. Clicking on a user's account status link 2310 will allow the
administrator to change that user's account status from Active to
Disabled or Disabled to Active. Clicking on a user's Permission
Level link 2311 will allow the user to change that user's
permission level, giving them more or less account privileges that
their current settings provide. For example, a user who has
Permission Level Account Manager can be made into an Administrator
in order to increase that user's access and/or control over more of
the team's functions and settings. Likewise, a user may be given a
lower Permission Level in order to restrict that user's access
and/or control more over the team's and/or user account's functions
and settings.
[0335] FIG. 24 illustrates an additional safety feature that helps
administrator ensure their users' account information is accessed
only by those users. Another part of Administration Settings 2300,
Password Policies 2400 allow an administrator to require that all
team members reset their passwords routinely in order to keep
passwords secure and less prone to hacking 2401. To do this, an
administrator simply specifies an expiration period 2405, after
which the team's current passwords expire. To ward off hacker
attempts, the administrator can set the maximum number of failed
login attempts 2402 before a login attempt is no longer allowed.
This too is a setting that can be changed simply by editing the
current value displayed 2406. Once the maximum number of failed
login attempts 2402 has been reached, the user attempting to login
is "locked out" for a pre-defined period of time 2403. This lockout
effective period 2403 can be adjusted from its current value simply
by changing the period value 2407. Any changes made to any of the
Password Policies values can be applied by pressing the Apply
Changes button 2404.
[0336] Another part of Administrator Settings 2300 is being able to
view Member Statistics 2500, as illustrated in FIG. 25. The
administrator can get an at-a-glance overview of the team's usage
of the application and the website and the amount of storage space
currently used. This overview summarizes the whole team's
statistics, such as by displaying the total number of contacts
created by the team 2501 or the total amount of disk space used by
the team 2502. The overview also summarizes each member's
statistics in a tabular format, where the members can be viewed
alphabetically, by a particular letter, or numerically 2503. Each
team member in the overview is identified by its name 2505 and
username 2506, and the member's displayed statistics include the
number of contacts created 2507, the number of contacts
synchronized to the phone 2508, and the amount of disk space used
by that team member's account 2509. Clicking on any of the column
headers sorts the overview list according to the clicked column
data type. Clicking on the links where the data values are, such as
on the team member's name or username, will link to more
information on that user in reference to the data type clicked.
Multiple web pages of members may be necessary, depending on the
number of members the administrator chooses to display per page
2511, and the administrator can scroll to the next and previous
pages using a link 2510, while the currently viewed page is
numbered and displayed 2504.
[0337] As people skilled in the art will appreciate, searching for
Places and Trips (i.e., Directions or Routes) on a mobile wireless
telephone is a daunting task, primarily due to the limited form
factor of the wireless telephone (i.e., Telecommunication Device).
As illustrated in FIG. 26 a wireless telephone 2600 is comprised of
a display 2601 and a keypad 2614. As people skilled in the art
understand, a user can maneuver around a wireless telephone's GUI
2601 using a rocker 2603 and a select button 2602 which simulates
the functionality of a personal computer mouse. For this
embodiment, as illustrated in FIG. 26, a GUI 2607 is shown
displaying a menu of options that illustrates a graphical interface
for searching for places (2609 & 2611) and trips (2610 &
2612) and for displaying maps 2613 on a wireless telephone. This
GUI 2607 is illustrated by magnifying the projection (2604 &
2605) of the wireless phone's GUI 2607 in order to aid in the
illustration of this invention.
[0338] In one embodiment, using a web browser it is possible to
display a web page 2715 that illustrates the core functionality of
finding a Place. A Place 2700 is typically defined as having a
geographical location, such as an address which can further derive
a Place's latitude and longitude coordinates. A Place 2700 that is
derived from a realizable address can be shown on a Map 2705 of
varying resolution and size. A Map typically allows a user to zoom
in or out 2703 or to pan around the Map 2705. As illustrated in
this invention, a Place 2700 does not have to be saved, as required
by prior art systems. As people skilled in the art will appreciate,
geographical locations (i.e., Places) that were found using the ASP
system 123 are cached by the system and displayed to the user in
the Last Activity 2706 portion of the web page 2715. This
illustrates not only saved and cached (i.e., not purposely saved by
the user) Places (2707 & 2708 & 2709), but also saved and
cached Trips (2710 & 2711 & 2712). Saved Places and Trips
are accessible using the "My Recent Places" 2714 and "My Recent
Trips" 2713 links from this web page 2715. The "Last Activity" 2706
preferably embodies all activity (i.e., in reverse chronological
order) initiated by the user on the web page 2715 and on one or
more of their Telecommunication Devices or remote computing
devices, and which was registered since the user was authenticated
and recorded by the ASP system 123. For example, a user may have
searched from the Place "My Fishing Hole #2" 2708 on their wireless
telephone and then searched for the address "18872 Bardeen Avenue,
Irvine, Calif. 92612" via the web page 2715. This search is
illustrated in the "Last Activity" 2706 section of this web page.
It should be appreciated by those skilled in the art that this
"Last Activity" 2706 illustrates searches from multiple computing
devices that had, at one time, a direct connection with the ASP
system 123. It should also be appreciated by those skilled in the
art that any geographical search (e.g., POI, Address,
Latitude/Longitude Coordinates, etc.), can be saved as a Place 2701
or waypoint. Additionally, any geographical search can be used as a
route destination point 2702 (i.e., Start, End, Via, or Stop
point). FIG. 27 illustrates only a Start and End 2702 point,
however this invention supports Via and Stop points as known to
those that are skilled in the art. Additionally, a user can
initiate a geographical search 2704 from this web page 2715 to find
another Place 2700.
[0339] Additionally, FIG. 28a illustrates a GUI display (2800 &
2601) of the "Recent Places" 2801 view on the wireless telephone
2600. It should be appreciated by those skilled in the art that
this "Recent Places" 2801 view illustrates Places that were both
saved and viewed or searched on the wireless telephone 2600 and on
the web page 2715. As people skilled in the art will appreciate,
this allows a user to plan on the web page 2715 and view the
results on their wireless telephone without having to initiate the
search on the wireless telephone's 2600 application. For example,
in this embodiment the user had searched for a map of the address
"18872 Bardeen Avenue, Irvine, Calif. 92612" using the wireless
telephone 2600, but also searched previously on the web page 2715
for their stored Places (2803 & 2804 & 2806) and searched
addresses 2805 and POI's (2806 & 2807) that were done while
signed in to the web page 2715 that was accessing the ASP system
123.
[0340] Illustrated in FIG. 28b, after searching for a Place 2851 on
the wireless telephone 2600 a user is able to display the Recent
Place's 2850 detailed information. This information can consist of
a business 2852 address 2853, telephone 2854, fax number 2855,
e-mail address 2856 and a link to view a Map 2857 of this Place's
location or create a route 2858 to the Place's address 2853. It
should be appreciated by those skilled in the art that a route can
be dynamically generated using the wireless telephone's 2600 GPS
interface 307 to create a real-time route from the mobile position
of the wireless telephone 2600.
[0341] Similar to the "Recent Places" 2801 view, as illustrated in
FIG. 29, is the "Recent Trips" 2901 view on the wireless
telephone's 2600 GUI display (2900 & 2601). It should be
appreciated by those skilled in the art that this "Recent Trips"
2901 view illustrates Trips that were both saved and viewed on the
wireless telephone 2600 and on the web page 2715. As people skilled
in the art will appreciate, this allows a user to plan on the web
page 2715 and view the results on their wireless telephone without
having to create a Trip on the wireless telephone's 2600
application. For example, in this embodiment the user had created a
Trip starting from the address "18872 Bardeen Avenue, Irvine,
Calif. 92612" to the destination address "32314 Golden Lantern,
Laguna Niguel, Calif. 92677" on the web page 2715 as illustrated in
FIG. 16 & FIG. 17. The wireless telephone 2600 displays and can
retrieve both the created and cached Trips 2904, as well as the
created and saved Trips (i.e., Trips that were named) (2902 &
2903 & 2905 & 2906) from either the ASP system 123 or the
Trips that were created and/or stored on the wireless telephone
2600.
[0342] FIG. 30 depicts a Trip 3012 and Driving Directions 3000
which were calculated and displayed using a web page 3028 as known
to those that are skilled in the art. As those that are skilled in
the art will appreciate, FIG. 30 illustrates the method and system
for creating a Trip 3012 with a plurality of destination points
(3008 & 3010 & 3013) including a start point (3006 &
3001) and an end point (3016 & 3002). A Trip 3012 can be
associated with a plurality of database records (3007 & 3009
& 3011 & 3014 & 3015) that were created and
synchronized or transferred from the Telecommunication Device and
were collected using the Telecommunication Device's specific
interfaces, such as a camera interface 304 as illustrated in FIG.
3. For example, in one embodiment, a user plans a Trip 3012 on the
web page 3028. The Trip has a travel time and driving distance 3005
as known to those skilled in the art. Additionally, the Trip has
start 3001 and end 3002 points, which in this invention can be
added to a user's saved Places using the "Add to Place" buttons for
both the start 3003 and end 3004 points. After the user creates a
route, they can journey along the route and take pictures or images
using their wireless telephone's integrated camera 304. This allows
a user to associate their Trip 3012 with the wireless telephone's
camera. Each image (3007 & 3009 & 3011 & 3014 &
3015) that is recorded along the Trip 3012 has a time stamp and GPS
coordinates that are associated with the image. Images with GPS
coordinates are not required, but are the preferred embodiment for
this invention.
[0343] After the images have been taken, they can be synchronized
or transferred in real-time or in a batch process to the ASP system
123. One the user signs back into the web page 3028, they are able
to review their entire trip and the photographs that they recorded
during their Trip 3012 in the order that they took the pictures. As
people that are skilled in the art will appreciate, the web page
3028 displays a timeline 3017 illustrating the chronological
procession of the trip and the start 3018, destination (3020 &
3022 & 3024), and end point 3027 of the Trip 3012, in addition
to the images that were taken along the Trip (3019 & 3021 &
3023 & 3025 & 3026) that map directly to the locations
where the images were taken on the mapped route (3007 & 3009
& 3011 & 3014 & 3015). It should be appreciated by
those skilled in the art that the Trip does not need to be created
in advance, since a Trip is defined as having a Start and an End
location, all of which can be calculated using a GPS device, which
can determine when a device, such as a wireless telephone, has
stopped moving for a defined period of time or the like. This type
of GPS application that determines when a Telecommunication Device
has stopped moving is currently available in the art. One
embodiment of this type of application that determines when a
wireless telephone has stopped moving is known as the "AtlasTrack"
application owned and licensed by Networks In Motion, Inc. of
Irvine, Calif. When a user signs into the web page 3028, the user
is able to review their images in a Trip or Route format which was
automatically created by the ASP system 123, and displayed to the
user for their review. This allows a user to view their photographs
both chronologically and spatially.
[0344] It should be noted that the present invention may be
embodied in forms other than the preferred embodiments, described
above without departing from the spirit or essential
characteristics thereof. The specification contained herein
provides sufficient disclosure for one skilled in the art to
implement the various embodiments of the present invention,
including the preferred embodiment, which should be considered in
all aspect as illustrative and not restrictive; all changes or
alternatives that fall within the meaning and range or equivalency
of the claim are intended to be embraced within.
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