U.S. patent application number 14/579616 was filed with the patent office on 2015-07-02 for method and system for displaying universal tags.
The applicant listed for this patent is ABBYY Development LLC. Invention is credited to Konstantin Anisimovich, David Yan.
Application Number | 20150186366 14/579616 |
Document ID | / |
Family ID | 53481964 |
Filed Date | 2015-07-02 |
United States Patent
Application |
20150186366 |
Kind Code |
A1 |
Yan; David ; et al. |
July 2, 2015 |
Method and System for Displaying Universal Tags
Abstract
An illustrative method according to a set of instructions stored
on a memory of a computing device includes identifying, by a
processor of the computing device, a plurality of electronic files
stored on a plurality of electronic devices. The plurality of
electronic files includes different file types. The plurality of
electronic files is also associated with a user. The method also
includes determining, by the processor, metadata for the plurality
of electronic files. The method also includes generating, by the
processor, tags for the plurality of electronic files based on the
metadata.
Inventors: |
Yan; David; (Portola Valley,
CA) ; Anisimovich; Konstantin; (Moscow, RU) |
|
Applicant: |
Name |
City |
State |
Country |
Type |
ABBYY Development LLC |
Moscow |
|
RU |
|
|
Family ID: |
53481964 |
Appl. No.: |
14/579616 |
Filed: |
December 22, 2014 |
Related U.S. Patent Documents
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Application
Number |
Filing Date |
Patent Number |
|
|
61922597 |
Dec 31, 2013 |
|
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Current U.S.
Class: |
707/741 |
Current CPC
Class: |
G06F 16/248 20190101;
G06F 16/285 20190101; G06F 40/12 20200101; G10L 15/1815 20130101;
G06F 16/156 20190101; G06Q 10/107 20130101; G06F 16/2246 20190101;
G06F 16/16 20190101; G06F 3/04817 20130101; G06F 16/9535 20190101;
G06F 16/5866 20190101; G06F 16/24578 20190101; G06F 16/26 20190101;
G06F 3/04842 20130101; G06F 16/14 20190101; G06F 16/5846 20190101;
G06F 16/168 20190101; G06F 40/103 20200101; G06F 16/907 20190101;
G06F 16/40 20190101 |
International
Class: |
G06F 17/30 20060101
G06F017/30 |
Claims
1. A method according to a set of instructions stored on a memory
of a computing device, the method comprising: identifying, by a
processor of the computing device, a plurality of electronic files
stored on a plurality of electronic devices, wherein the plurality
of electronic files comprises different file types, and further
wherein the plurality of electronic files are associated with a
user; determining, by the processor, metadata of the plurality of
electronic files; and generating, by the processor, tags for the
plurality of electronic files based on the metadata.
2. The method of claim 1, wherein the tags are automatically
generated.
3. The method of claim 1, wherein the electronic files comprise
e-mail messages, text messages, instant messages, social network
messages, contacts, tasks, or calendar entries.
4. The method of claim 3, wherein the tags specify an organization
or person associated with the plurality of electronic files.
5. The method of claim 1, wherein the electronic files comprise
tasks or calendar entries and further wherein the tags specify a
location and a time interval associated with the plurality of
electronic files.
6. The method of claim 1, further comprising: receiving, by the
processor, a search input comprising a first tag; identifying, by
the processor, a first group of the plurality of electronic files
that are associated with the first tag; and displaying, by the
processor, on a graphical user interface (GUI), representative
information of at least one of the first group of the plurality of
electronic files, wherein the representative information comprises
descriptive information relating to the at least one of the first
group of the plurality of electronic files.
7. The method of claim 6, wherein the representative information
further comprises a second tag related to the at least one of the
first group of the plurality of electronic files.
8. The method of claim 7, further comprising: receiving, by the
processor, a watchdog designation input; designating, by the
processor, the second tag as a watchdog tag in response to the
watchdog designation input; identifying, by the processor, during a
baseline search, a first group of watched electronic files that are
related to the watchdog tag; and identifying, by the processor,
during a follow up search, a second group of watched electronic
files that are related to the watchdog tag.
9. The method of claim 8, wherein a predetermined amount of time
passes between the identifying of the first group of watched
electronic files and the identifying of the second group of watched
electronic files.
10. The method of claim 8, further comprising: determining, by the
processor, a first difference between the first group of watched
electronic files and the second group of watched electronic files;
and sending, by the processor, a notification in response to the
first difference.
11. The method of claim 10, wherein the notification indicates the
first difference.
12. The method of claim 8, further comprising determining by the
processor that the first group of watched electronic files and the
second group of watched electronic files are not different.
13. The method of claim 8, further comprising: determining, by the
processor, a magnitude of differences between the first group of
watched electronic files and the second group of watched electronic
files; determining, by the processor, that the magnitude of
differences is equal to or greater than a predetermined threshold
magnitude of differences; and sending, by the processor, a
notification in response to the determining that the magnitude of
differences is equal to or greater than a predetermined threshold
magnitude of differences.
14. The method of claim 6, further comprising: determining, by the
processor, a second tag associated with a second one of the
plurality of electronic files and is further associated with a
predetermined level of importance; and displaying, by the
processor, on the GUI, a second representative information of the
second one of the plurality of electronic files, wherein the second
representative information comprises descriptive information
relating to the second one of the plurality of electronic files,
and further wherein the second representative information is
displayed more prominently on the GUI than the representative
information.
15. The method of claim 1, wherein the generating tags for the
plurality of electronic files based on the metadata further
comprises: determining, by the processor, important metadata and
unimportant metadata from the metadata of the plurality of
electronic files; generating, by the processor, tags for the
plurality of electronic files based on the important metadata and
not on the unimportant metadata.
16. The method of claim 1, further comprising: generating, by the
processor, an index comprising the tags and the metadata of the
plurality of electronic files; storing, by the processor, the index
on a single one of the plurality of electronic devices.
17. The method of claim 1, further comprising: determining, by the
processor, a current storage utilization level of a first
electronic device of the plurality of electronic devices;
determining, by the processor, that the current storage utilization
level of the first electronic device exceeds an optimal storage
utilization level of the electronic device; determining, by the
processor, at least one of the plurality of electronic files that
is associated with a first tag of a predetermined importance level;
and automatically moving, by the processor, the at least one of the
plurality of electronic files from the first electronic device to a
second electronic device of the plurality of devices in response to
determining that the current storage utilization level exceeds the
optimal storage utilization level.
18. The method of claim 1, further comprising, receiving, by the
processor a user defined command to modify at least one of the
tags.
19. An apparatus comprising: a memory; a processor operatively
coupled to the memory; and a first set of instructions stored on
the memory and configured to be executed by the processor, wherein
the processor is configured to: identify a plurality of electronic
files stored on a plurality of electronic devices, wherein the
plurality of electronic files comprises different file types, and
further wherein the plurality of electronic files are associated
with a user; determine metadata of the plurality of electronic
files; and generate tags for the plurality of electronic files
based on the metadata.
20. A non-transitory computer readable medium having instructions
stored thereon that, upon execution by a computing device, cause
the computing device to perform operations, wherein the
instructions comprise: instructions to identify a plurality of
electronic files stored on a plurality of electronic devices,
wherein the plurality of electronic files comprises different file
types, and further wherein the plurality of electronic files are
associated with a user; instructions to determine metadata of the
plurality of electronic files; and instructions to generate tags
for the plurality of electronic files based on the metadata.
Description
[0001] This non-provisional application claims priority to U.S.
Provisional Application 61/922,597 filed on Dec. 31, 2013, the
disclosure of which is incorporated herein by reference in its
entirety.
BACKGROUND
[0002] Many people today use multiple devices and media in their
daily activities. For example, a typical person may use laptops,
smart phones, tablets, home and work desktops, external hard drives
and memory cards, media centers, smart TVs, cameras, DVRs, cloud
storage, as well as occasional use of the devices of family,
friends, coworkers, or roommates. Across these various devices,
people store large quantities of data of varying importance.
Additionally, people receive and store files, programs, messages,
and other media in external servers, such as e-mail or cloud
computing systems.
SUMMARY
[0003] An illustrative method according to a set of instructions
stored on a memory of a computing device includes identifying, by a
processor of the computing device, a plurality of electronic files
stored on a plurality of electronic devices. The plurality of
electronic files includes different file types. The plurality of
electronic files are also associated with a user. The method also
includes determining, by the processor, metadata of the plurality
of electronic files. The method also includes generating, by the
processor, tags for the plurality of electronic files based on the
metadata.
[0004] An illustrative apparatus includes a memory, a processor
operatively coupled to the memory, and a first set of instructions
stored on the memory and configured to be executed by the
processor. The processor is configured to identify a plurality of
electronic files stored on a plurality of electronic devices. The
plurality of electronic files includes different file types. The
plurality of electronic files are also associated with a user. The
processor is further configured determine metadata of the plurality
of electronic files. The processor is further configured to
generate tags for the plurality of electronic files based on the
metadata.
[0005] A non-transitory computer readable medium having
instructions stored thereon that, upon execution by a computing
device, cause the computing device to perform operations including
instructions to identify a plurality of electronic files stored on
a plurality of electronic devices. The plurality of electronic
files includes different file types. The plurality of electronic
files are also associated with a user. The instructions further
include instructions to determine metadata of the plurality of
electronic files. The instructions further include instructions to
generate tags for the plurality of electronic files based on the
metadata.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS
[0006] Illustrative embodiments will hereafter be described with
reference to the accompanying drawings.
[0007] FIG. 1 is a representation of a graphical user interface
(GUI) demonstrating an e-mail interface in accordance with an
illustrative embodiment.
[0008] FIG. 2 is a blown-up representation of a GUI demonstrating
an e-mail interface in accordance with an illustrative
embodiment.
[0009] FIG. 3 is a block diagram illustrating a file transfer
system in accordance with an illustrative embodiment.
[0010] FIG. 4 is a block diagram illustrating a second file
transfer system in accordance with an illustrative embodiment.
[0011] FIG. 5 is a representation of a GUI demonstrating a
multi-file type view in accordance with an illustrative
embodiment.
[0012] FIG. 6 is a representation of a GUI demonstrating a photo
view in accordance with an illustrative embodiment.
[0013] FIG. 7 is a representation of a GUI demonstrating a photo
view with a search menu displayed in accordance with an
illustrative embodiment.
[0014] FIG. 8 is a representation of a GUI demonstrating an e-mail
interface with a sorted contact list in accordance with an
illustrative embodiment.
[0015] FIG. 9 is a representation of a GUI demonstrating an e-mail
interface with a sorted contact list and an e-mail correspondence
chain in accordance with an illustrative embodiment.
[0016] FIG. 10 is a representation of a GUI demonstrating a single
photo view in accordance with an illustrative embodiment.
[0017] FIG. 11 a representation of a GUI demonstrating an
electronic files view with reminders in accordance with an
illustrative embodiment.
[0018] FIG. 12 a representation of a GUI demonstrating a dynamic
birds-eye view of a user's data in accordance with an illustrative
embodiment.
[0019] FIG. 13 is a representation of a GUI demonstrating a
multi-level view including a hierarchical tree structure in
accordance with an illustrative embodiment.
[0020] FIG. 14 is a representation of a GUI demonstrating a
multi-level view including a document preview in accordance with an
illustrative embodiment.
[0021] FIG. 15 a representation of a GUI demonstrating the contents
of a specific device's storage in accordance with an illustrative
embodiment.
[0022] FIG. 16 is a representation of a GUI demonstrating a
multi-level view including a document preview and an icon based
tagging section in accordance with an illustrative embodiment.
[0023] FIG. 17 is a representation of a GUI demonstrating an e-mail
interface with a sorted contact list, an e-mail correspondence
chain, and an icon based tagging section in accordance with an
illustrative embodiment.
[0024] FIG. 18 is a block diagram illustrating various computing
and electronic storage devices that may be used in accordance with
an illustrative embodiment.
[0025] FIG. 19 is a flow diagram illustrating a method of
displaying representative information of files and e-mails on a GUI
utilizing a two tab display in accordance with an illustrative
embodiment.
[0026] FIG. 20 is a flow diagram illustrating a method of
determining files a user has access to and displaying
representative information of the files on a GUI in accordance with
an illustrative embodiment.
[0027] FIG. 21 is a flow diagram illustrating a method of
determining the status of various electronic devices and displaying
that status on a GUI in accordance with an illustrative
embodiment.
[0028] FIG. 22 is a flow diagram illustrating a method of
extracting data from an electronic file and displaying a preview of
the file on a GUI in accordance with an illustrative
embodiment.
[0029] FIG. 23 is a flow diagram illustrating a method of receiving
an input from a user and displaying a context menu on a GUI in
accordance with an illustrative embodiment.
[0030] FIG. 24 is a flow diagram illustrating a method of receiving
an input from a user and opening an electronic file to be displayed
on a GUI in accordance with an illustrative embodiment.
[0031] FIG. 25 is a representation of a GUI demonstrating a tagging
system and a context menu in accordance with an illustrative
embodiment.
[0032] FIG. 26 is a flow diagram illustrating a method of
generating tags associated with electronic files in accordance with
an illustrative embodiment.
[0033] FIG. 27 is a flow diagram illustrating a method of
displaying search results related to a tag search in accordance
with an illustrative embodiment.
[0034] FIG. 28 is a flow diagram illustrating a method of utilizing
a watchdog tag in accordance with an illustrative embodiment.
[0035] FIG. 29 is a flow diagram illustrating a method of
displaying electronic files with high importance tags in accordance
with an illustrative embodiment.
[0036] FIG. 30 is a flow diagram illustrating a method of indexing
tags associated with electronic files in accordance with an
illustrative embodiment.
[0037] FIG. 31 is a flow diagram illustrating a method of moving
files according to an optimal storage utilization of an electronic
device in accordance with an illustrative embodiment.
DETAILED DESCRIPTION
[0038] Described herein are illustrative embodiments for methods
and systems that provide for a universal tagging system for various
electronic files. Additionally, the systems and methods disclosed
herein can display the tags related to the various electronic
files. In an illustrative embodiment, a user of the systems and
methods may define tags for the various electronic files. In
another embodiment, the system may automatically generate tags for
the various electronic files. In a further embodiment, a user may
modify tags that were created by the user or automatically
generated by the system.
[0039] In an illustrative embodiment, tags may be applied to
various electronic files that are stored across various electronic
devices, cloud storage servers, online file sharing websites, and
other electronic devices that are capable of storing electronic
files. Further, a user may be able to search for electronic files,
where relevant search results are generated using the tags
associated with the various electronic files. For example, if a
user seeks to find photos related to his or her recent vacation, a
user may specify that the tags "vacation," "photo," and "2014" be
searched for. The system can then return and display on a graphical
user interface (GUI) all of the electronic files that are
associated with the three tags input by the user. In another
example, the user may seek to find e-mail correspondence relating
to a recent purchase that the user did not like, and therefore had
returned. The user may specify a search input of "refund" or
"purchase" as well as "e-mail" to return e-mail messages related to
the tags "refund" or "purchase." Utilizing the disclosed systems
and methods, large quantities of a user's data and electronic files
can be more easily organized and located across multiple electronic
devices. By utilizing the universal tagging, a user can easily and
conveniently locate different types of electronic files across
different devices that utilize different platforms and software
applications. Further, the system is capable of automatically
tagging electronic files, making utilization of the universal
tagging system even more convenient and easy for a user.
[0040] Tags may be applied to various types of electronic files.
For example, an electronic file may be a task list, reminder list,
calendar, document, spreadsheet, presentation, photo, video, e-mail
message, chat message, instant message, text or short message
service (SMS) message, voicemail, contact, song or other sound
file, or any other type of electronic file that may be stored on an
electronic device memory. The same tag may be applied to multiple
different file types if the files are relevant to the tag. For
example, multiple types of files may be related to the tag
"#skiing." For example, photos of skiing, videos of skiing,
documents or webpages detailing ski equipment, and e-mail messages
organizing a ski trip may all be associated with the tag "#skiing."
If a user searches for files related to the tag "#skiing," the
system can return all relevant files, regardless of file type, that
are associated with the tag.
[0041] Tags may also be applied in a way that signifies a broader
concept than just the contents or description of an electronic
file. For example, a tag indicating an organization name may be
applied to all contacts that are a part of the organization. In
another example, electronic files may be related to such an
organization and may also be associated with that tag. For example,
a user may generate documents relating to a company that the user
works for. All of those documents generated for that organizational
company may also be associated with the tags for that company or
organization.
[0042] In another example, a user may generate files that are all
related to a cohesive project. For example, a photographer may have
several files and file types related to a wedding the photographer
worked at. Accordingly, photo files, video files, documents related
to billing, and e-mails correspondence regarding the wedding
details and payment from the wedding party may all be tagged with a
particular tag related just to that project. In this way, a user
could easily enter an input of that particular tag and the system
will subsequently display all of the videos, photos, documents,
e-mails, etc. relating to that particular wedding
[0043] In another example, tags may be established that indicate
the date and/or time an electronic file was created or was first
stored on an electronic device accessible by the system. The user
can then specify a time interval in which he would like to find a
file. For example, that user may specify a particular week in which
the user would like to see all files that were created. Since each
file, regardless of type, is tagged with the date the files were
created, the system can determine the files that apply and display
on a GUI information related to the files. The user may then
perform further searches, review the current search results,
navigate to where current search results are stored, and/or open
electronic files displayed in the search results.
[0044] In another example, tags may be established that are related
to a physical location where files are established, originated, or
created. For example, if a photo is taken by a digital camera, the
digital camera may store as metadata location information related
to where the photo was taken. In another example, the system may
note that, when an electronic file was imported or downloaded onto
the memory of an electronic device the system has access to, the
electronic file was acquired at a location where the acquiring
electronic device was physically located when the file was
downloaded or imported. In an alternative embodiment, a location
tag may be related not to an actual physical location, but a memory
location of a particular electronic device. For example, if a photo
resides on the memory of a user's smart mobile telephone, a
location tag of the photo may indicate the storage location of that
photo. Notwithstanding the type of location tag applied to a file,
the user may specify a location tag to have the system display
electronic files related to that tag. Accordingly, the user may be
able to search for electronic files that originated, were
established, or were created at a common physical location. For
example, a user may be able to search for all photos that were
taken at "the beach." In another example, the user may search for
all files that were downloaded while at "the coffee shop." In
another example, the user may be able to search for all files that
are stored on the user's "external hard drive."
[0045] In an illustrative embodiment, the system identifies a
plurality of electronic files stored on a plurality of electronic
devices. As disclosed herein, the plurality of electronic files may
be a variety of different file types. Furthermore, the plurality of
electronic files are associated with a user. An electronic file is
considered associated with a user if, for example, a file is stored
on an electronic device of the user. In another example, a file
associated with the user may be stored on an electronic device that
is not the user's, but that the user otherwise has access to, such
as the electronic device of a family member. In another example, a
file associated with a user may be a file sent to the user as an
e-mail attachment or otherwise in some sort of messages. In another
example, a file may be associated with a user if it resides on a
cloud storage or file sharing system that the user has access to.
For example, any documents that the user has originated or has been
granted access to in a file sharing system may be considered a file
associated with the user. Therefore, even if a user did not
originate a file stored on a file sharing system, the system may
still identify the file because the user has been granted access to
the file by the originator or some other third party. The system
can determine metadata of the various plurality of electronic
files. The system can also generate tags for the various plurality
of electronic files based on the determined metadata as disclosed
herein. In some embodiments, the tags are automatically generated
by the system. In one embodiment, the electronic files are e-mail
messages, text messages, instant messages, social network messages,
contacts, tasks, or calendar entries. Such electronic files may be
associated with tags that specify an organization or individual
person (either the person or organization may be one of the user's
contacts) that the electronic files are related to. In another
alternative embodiment, the electronic files may be tasks or
calendar entries, and the system may associate such files with a
tag indicating a location or time interval associated with the
electronic files. For example, the tag may be related to a certain
date on which the task or calendar item should or will be complete
(or date the task or calendar item was completed). In another
example, the tag may indicate a time interval in which the task or
calendar item should or will be complete. The system may also
generate notifications based on these time related tags that remind
a user to complete a task or attend an appointment on a calendar.
In another example, a tag indicating a location where a task or
calendar item should be completed may be generated.
[0046] In another illustrative embodiment, the system receives a
search input from a user specifying a tag to search. In an
alternative embodiment, the user does not input a particular tag,
but they system may recognize an input from a user as similar to an
existing tag. In this embodiment, the system can still search for
that tag. The system can identify a group of electronic files
stored in various electronic device locations that have the tag
specified in the search input. In an alternative embodiment, the
system may also search for and identify files that have a similar
tag to the one entered by the user for the search. The system can
display, on a graphical user interface (GUI), representative
information of the identified files from the search. In other
words, the entire files are not displayed, but rather information
describing the files such as title, a preview, size, location,
and/or other information including tags and metadata may be
displayed as representative information.
[0047] In an illustrative embodiment, when search results are
displayed, additional tags related to the displayed electronic
files that were not the subject of the search may be displayed. A
user can select one of these other tags (or in other embodiments a
tag that was a subject of the original search) to be a watchdog
tag. The system may perform a baseline search for the watchdog tag,
and store information relating to the results of the baseline
search. For example, an index of the baseline search results may be
saved as a group of watched electronic files. The system can then
automatically and periodically perform subsequent searches for the
watchdog tag, even without the user being aware of the searching.
The subsequent follow up searches may be performed according to a
predetermined schedule or amount of elapsed time. The schedule may
be determined by the user or may be automatically defined by the
system. In another embodiment, a user may also specify at will that
a follow up search be performed on command. After a follow up
search, the system compares the results of the follow up search to
the indexed results of the first baseline search. If there is a
difference in the electronic files, metadata of the files, and/or
tags of the files, the system may notify the user of the change. In
an alternative embodiment, the system may not notify the user of
the particular change or changes, but instead may simply notify the
user that a change has occurred and encourage the user to access
the system to view the specific changes. Such notifications could
be effected through e-mails, text messages, chat messages, a
message center built in to the current system and method, or other
message and notification methods.
[0048] In another alternative embodiment, a notification may not be
generated whenever a change is identified. Instead, the system may
only send notifications regarding certain types of changes. For
example, the system may only notify the user if the watchdog tag
itself was newly applied to the document. That is, the follow up
search actually returned a an electronic file that was not found in
the baseline search. In another example, the system may only notify
the user when the changes are of a certain type. For example, the
system may not notify the user regarding modifications to the
contents of the watched files. Instead, a notification may be
generated only if a file is deleted or added. In another example,
the system may identify a changes of a certain magnitude before
notifying the user. In a first example, the changes in magnitude
may refer to the entire group of files found in the baseline
search. For example, the system may be programmed to only notify
the user if 10% or more of the files found during the baseline
search have changed. In another example, the system may only notify
the user if a certain percentage of a file and/or the files
metadata is changed. In another example, the user may only be
notified when a certain number of tags have been added or deleted
to a watched file or group of files.
[0049] If no differences are identified between a baseline search
and a follow up search, the system sends no notification to the
user. In an alternative embodiment, the system may send a
notification to the user that no change regarding the watchdog tag
has occurred (or that no significant change regarding the watchdog
tag has occurred). Subsequent follow up searches may also be
performed regarding the watchdog tag. Such subsequent follow up
searches may also be performed at certain times according to a
predetermined schedule. The subsequent follow up search results may
be compared to the baseline search results to determine changes, or
the subsequent follow up search results may be compared to a
previous follow up search to determine changes. Where the
subsequent results are compared to a previous follow up search, the
system will have saved and indexed the previous follow up search
results so that they might be used to identify changes after the
subsequent follow up search results have been determined. The index
of the follow up search may replace the original index of the
baseline search, may add to and supplement the original index, or
may be saved completely independently of the original index.
[0050] A watchdog tag may be established by the user to watch a
particular electronic file. Where there is activity relating to
that electronic file, the user may be notified. For example, if the
file is a contact and the user receives a message from the contact,
the user may be notified. If the file is a document and the
document is edited, the user may receive a notification. If an
electronic file that is relevant to a search is associated with a
watchdog tag, that file may be associated with a higher ranking
than an electronic file not associated with a watchdog tag. Other
specific tags may also be weighted and associated with higher
rankings for search results. For example, a tag titled "IMPORTANT"
may be associated with a higher ranking than other tags, such as
descriptive tags like "Vacation." In another embodiment, tags may
be weighted for purposes of calculating ranks based on the
origination of the tags. For example, a tag that was created or
assigned by a user to the electronic file may be worth more to the
relative rank of a file than a tag that was automatically generated
by the system.
[0051] In one embodiment, and as discussed above, watchdog tags may
be implemented in which the user may note some query as the watch
tag. The system may then copy all of the search results to a
special folder that is not visible to the user. These search
results may renew periodically: when changes in the folder are
detected, the user may then receive notifications concerning these
changes.
[0052] In an illustrative embodiment, a user may enter a search
input that includes or is similar to a tag. The system can identify
electronic files related to the tag and display representative
information of the files on the GUI. Further, the system may
determine an importance associated with a particular second tag
that is associated with one or more of the search results. In this
embodiment, representative information of electronic files that are
associated with this important second tag may be displayed more
prominently on the GUI than the representative information of other
files that are identified as not being associated with a tag of
importance. If representative information is displayed more
prominently, it may be, for example, larger, closer to the top,
include more information (such as a preview), and/or not be omitted
from the GUI altogether. Importance of a tag may be determined by
the system based on the frequency of use of the tag, a user
determination that the tag is important, a similarity of the second
tag to the tag that was originally searched for, or other
prioritizing and/or ranking factors disclosed herein.
[0053] In another illustrative embodiment, the system can
automatically generate tags based on the metadata of an electronic
file. However, in this embodiment, the system does not generate a
tag based on every aspect of the electronic file's metadata.
Accordingly, the system can prioritize the important metadata of a
file to establish related tags and pass over unimportant metadata
related to the file that will not get a tag created. For example,
the system may consider the date created or originated, keywords of
the title or contents of the file, contacts mentioned in the file,
contacts corresponded with via the file, and organizations related
to the file as important and deserving of establishing a tag.
Metadata that the system may not consider as deserving of a tag
(i.e., unimportant metadata) may be the version number of the file,
how large the file is, what date it was last modified, what file
type it is, and the exact nature of the content and title of the
file. Accordingly, the metadata considered more important will have
related tags generated. In other embodiments, the system may
consider different metadata to be important and unimportant. In
still other embodiments, the user may custom define particular
metadata the system should consider as important and/or
unimportant.
[0054] Tags may be automatically generated in many various ways in
different illustrative embodiments. In a first example, metadata
may be utilized by the system to automatically generate tags. For
example, tags may be generated related to metadata determined by
the system about an electronic file. Such metadata may include, but
is not limited to, a user or person who has modified a file (or who
has last modified the file), an author of the file, a size of the
file, a file type or software application or website utilized to
access the file, a virtual or physical location of the file, a
sender of the file, a receiver of the file, and/or a time created
or received of the file.
[0055] In another embodiment, a context of an electronic file may
be utilized to automatically generate a tag for the file. For
example, if a file is saved in a virtual location folder for a
particular organization or project, the system may generate a tag
related to that organization or project. The system may also learn
from previous tags defined and applied by user. For example, if a
user defines an e-mail message as relating to a particular
organization, the system may categorize future e-mail messages from
that sender as part of the particular organization and apply a tag
accordingly. The system may also apply tags based on the content of
files themselves. For example, the system may analyze a file
content and determine that the file is related to basketball.
Accordingly, the system may automatically apply a tag for
"basketball" to the file. In another example, the system may
utilize lookups from external sources to determine tags for
electronic files. For example, if the system receives an e-mail
message from a previously unknown sender (at least unknown to the
system), the system may mine third party web sites or other
information for generating tags for the file. For example, the
e-mail message may have a signature line at the bottom identifying
the name of the sender. The system may search the user's social
networks and contact lists for an individual that goes by the name
of the signature on the e-mail message. If found, the system may
use additional profile information from the third party source to
further tag the e-mail message. For example, the system may
discover an organizational affiliation of the sender, such as where
the sender works. Accordingly, the system may add an organizational
tag to the e-mail message indicating the sender's place of
employment, which was gleaned from the user's social network. Other
outside sources of information could be used such as dictionary and
definition websites, websites that contain publicly available
biographical or demographic information, online shopping websites,
etc. Other tags may be established based on usage, accessibility,
and/or importance levels as disclosed herein.
[0056] In an illustrative embodiment, the system may utilize a
usage level of the electronic file to generate tags for an
electronic file. The usage level indicates how much a user has
directly or indirectly used an electronic file. By calculating how
much a user has used an electronic file, the system can determine
an approximation of importance or relevance of the electronic file
to the user. That is, if there are electronic files with higher
usage levels, those files may be more desirable to a user. As a
result, those electronic files may be given tags such as
"important" or "often used." This may be helpful because such files
may be more likely to be the target of a search.
[0057] A usage level may be calculated using a variety of
information. For example, the system may track how many times an
electronic file is accessed or opened. This may define or
contribute to the usage level. Another factor that may be used to
determine a usage level may be an amount of time the electronic
file has been displayed on the GUI. For example, the system may
track how long a user has had an electronic file open, and that
cumulative amount of time may be used to calculate the usage level
of the electronic file. In a related embodiment, the system may
track the amount of time that an electronic file is open and
actually being displayed on the GUI. In other words, the system may
not count an amount of time when a file is open but minimized when
calculating usage level; but any time the electronic file is open
and displayed on the GUI may be counted when calculating the usage
level. In another related embodiment, the system may only count the
time when an electronic file is open and active. In other words,
the system may count time for purposes of calculating a usage level
where an electronic file is open and being interacted with by the
user. Such interactions may include scrolling, changing metadata,
changing the content of the electronic file itself, commenting on
the electronic file, responding to the electronic file (where the
electronic file is a message or e-mail, for example), listening to
and/or watching the electronic file, etc. A usage level could also
be determined by a number of tags applied automatically by the
system or a user. That is, if a file has more tags, it is likely
more important to the user.
[0058] Other factors and statistical data may also be utilized to
generate and assign tags to an electronic file. The system may
calculate an accessibility or mobility level, which can be used for
applying tags to electronic files. For example, the accessibility
or mobility of an electronic file may be impacted by the electronic
device or type of electronic device that an electronic file is
stored on. As a result, the electronic device or type of electronic
device may be considered when assigning a tag for an electronic
file. That is, if a file is more likely to be unavailable to a user
because of how it is stored, what applications are required to open
it, etc., this information can be used to determine tags that
indicate importance of a file. For example, the system may assign a
higher accessibility or mobility level to electronic files stored
on internet accessible servers, such as an e-mail exchange or cloud
server storage system. In another example, the system may assign a
medium accessibility or mobility level to other electronic devices
that the system is likely to have access to, such as a smartphone
or laptop. In another example, the system may assign a low
accessibility or mobility level to an electronic file that is
stored on electronic devices that the system is less likely to have
access to, such as an external hard drive, USB drive, or SD
card.
[0059] The accessibility or mobility level may also be calculated
based on the type of electronic file. For example, an electronic
file that requires a specific stand-alone software application to
access may be considered to have a lower accessibility or mobility
level. For example, if an electronic file can only be opened by
Microsoft PowerPoint.TM., the system may consider the accessibility
or mobility level of the electronic file to be relatively low. In
another example, if a file can be opened or accessed by several
software applications or can be opened or accessed by a web-based
application, the system considers the electronic file to have a
high accessibility or mobility level. In other words, the system
can determine whether it is more or less likely that a user will be
able to access and/or modify an electronic file and will calculate
the accessibility or mobility level of the electronic file
accordingly. Similarly, the system may determine an access level of
an electronic file to determine the accessibility or mobility level
of the electronic file. For example, if an electronic file is
read-only (i.e., the user cannot edit the electronic file), the
system may consider the electronic file to have a relatively lower
accessibility or mobility level. If an electronic file has a higher
access level, such as a file where the user has full access and
editing privileges, that electronic file is considered to have a
relatively higher accessibility or mobility level. All of these
factors can be utilized in determine what tags to apply to an
electronic file.
[0060] The system may consider the file type of an electronic file
in another way to calculate an accessibility or mobility level and
determine how to apply tags to the files. The system may consider
the file type and the version of the electronic file to determine
what version of a software application may be used to access and/or
modify the electronic file. For example, if the system had to use a
software application that was out of date or old to access and/or
modify an electronic file, the system may rank the accessibility or
mobility level lower. If the file type of the electronic file uses
a current and up to date version of a software application to
access and/or modify it, the system may consider that electronic
file to have a relatively higher accessibility or mobility level.
If the accessibility or mobility level are lower, the system will
be less likely to assign tags that reflect important files.
[0061] In another embodiment, the system may utilize the file type
in yet another way to determine an accessibility or mobility level.
For example, the system may determine whether an electronic file is
a copy or a replica. As disclosed herein, for the purposes of this
disclosure, a copy of a file is identical to the original file at
the time of duplication, but is not automatically updated after
changes in the original file on a separate machine. A replica of a
file is identical to the original file at the time of duplication,
and is automatically updated after changes are made to the original
file, even if the original file exists on a separate machine than
the replica file. In this embodiment, a replica file may be
considered to have a higher accessibility or mobility level than a
copy file.
[0062] In another embodiment, the system may consider the version
of an electronic file when determining an accessibility or mobility
level. For example, if an electronic file is stored as multiple
different versions of the same electronic file, a most recent
version may be given a higher accessibility or mobility level,
while previous versions of an electronic file are given a lower
accessibility or mobility level.
[0063] In another illustrative embodiment, the size of an
electronic file may also be used when determining an accessibility
or mobility level, which can be used for automatically assigning
tags. For example, if the user is searching for photos using a
mobile smart phone device, the system may apply important tags to
photos that are of a medium resolution as having a relatively high
accessibility or mobility level. The system may not apply important
tags photos with very high or very low resolutions due to having a
relatively lower accessibility or mobility level. In this way, the
user's search results may reflect photos that are tailored for the
size of the display of a mobile smart phone device and limitations
on the mobile smart phone device's internet connectivity and
processing speeds. In such an embodiment, the way tags are applied
can be dynamic rather than static, because the tags applied may
change based on what device is used to perform the search.
Accordingly, if these type of dynamic factors are used, the tags
should be applied at least as a part of after a search is
performed.
[0064] In another embodiment, the system may determine an
importance level of a file in order to automatically apply a tag
relevant to the file. A contact with a high importance level will
be assigned tags indicating the higher importance levels so that
they can be more easily organized and searched for by a user. The
importance level may be determined in a variety of ways. For
example, the system may determine the importance of a contact based
on a level of correspondence between the user and the contact. For
example, if the user and contact send each other numerous e-mails,
text messages, chat messages, voice calls, video calls, and/or
instant messages, the system will consider that contact as having a
higher importance level. In other embodiments, the system may
consider only correspondence to or from the contact in determining
the importance level, as opposed to combining the correspondence to
and from the contact, as in the previous example.
[0065] In another embodiment, the system may determine the
importance level of a contact based on a user's response rate to
correspondence or any type of message from the particular contact.
For example, if the user has directly responded to 70 out of 100
e-mail messages (70%) from contact A, then contact A will have a
higher importance level relative to a contact B, to whom the user
has only responded to 20 out of 50 e-mail messages (40%).
[0066] In another illustrative embodiment, the system may consider
groups of contacts together in determining an importance level. For
example, the user may define certain contacts to be grouped
together, such as family members. In such an embodiment, the system
may determine an importance level of groups such as family members
cumulatively, and return search results based on the increased
importance levels that come with being a part of such a user
defined group. As already noted, groups of contacts may be defined
by the user. In another embodiment, a group may be automatically
defined by the system. For example, several contacts may have
e-mail addresses that are routed to the same e-mail servers. For
example, employees of an ABC Company may all have e-mails that end
in "@ABCCompany.com." Accordingly, the system may define all of
those employees in a single group associated with the ABC Company.
This group may be treated by the system as a single organizational
contact. Accordingly, the system may determine the importance level
of the single organizational contact by cumulatively considering
the importance level of all the group members together. Further, an
individual contact may be deemed more important simply based on its
inclusion in the group. The system may further classify an
organizational contact as an ontological object.
[0067] In further illustrative embodiments, the tags established
for the electronic files may be stored in an index along with other
metadata relating to the various electronic files. Additionally,
the index may be stored only on one electronic device or storage
area, even though the index includes information regarding many
electronic files that are stored on a plurality of electronic
devices.
[0068] In another illustrative embodiment, the system may utilize
tags to assist in performing file management functions. For
example, the system may determine a current storage utilization
level of a first electronic device and compare that to an optimal
storage utilization level for that first electronic device. If the
current storage utilization level meets or exceeds the optimal
level, the system can seek to move electronic files from the first
electronic device. In one embodiment, the system may identify
electronic files associated with a tag that is deemed to be of
lower importance. For example, files with tags that indicate a
relatively old creation date may be considered less important than
files with tags that indicate a relatively recent creation date. In
this embodiment, the system can move the electronic files with
lower importance to a second electronic device to make sure the
first electronic device meets storage level goals, which may be
predetermined or configured by a user. In another embodiment, the
system may relocate files that are of relatively higher importance,
with the rationale that these files should be moved to another
location to ensure that they are preserved.
[0069] In another illustrative embodiment utilizing optimal storage
levels and goals, a user may specify that their mobile phone memory
should not get more than 70% full so that they are always able to
snap a photo with their mobile phone when the mood strikes. In such
an embodiment, the user may take several photos that pushes the
phone's memory beyond the 70% threshold. In this scenario, the next
time the phone is online with the system (which could be all the
time if the system is actually executed on the phone), the system
can automatically generate an instruction to move files from the
phone to one or more other storage mediums based the importance
level of tags associated with the photos. For example, the system
may only relocate photo files and may relocate the files that were
created the longest time ago as indicated by tags of the photos. In
this way, the user will always keep her newest photos on her phone
while the older ones go to auxiliary storage. In another
embodiment, the criteria used to determined which files to move may
rest on a determination of which files are used more often or the
most recently according to the tags of the file. That is the system
may move files that are not used as much rather than files that are
used frequently or recently. In the previous example, the higher
priority files are not moved. In an alternative embodiment, higher
priority files may be moved in order to ensure that the files are
preserved on another storage device. In some embodiments, files
that are determined to be high priority according to important tags
may be automatically moved by the system utilizing the systems and
methods disclosed herein regardless of storage utilization levels.
In this embodiment, the moving of the files serves as a sort of
back up or file preservation for high priority or important files.
In another embodiment, high priority files are automatically copied
but not moved unless storage utilization level concerns result in
movement of files.
[0070] Photo and video data may often have little or no
accompanying metadata that describes the information itself. The
use of system generated metadata are useful in developing more
information about photos and videos. Metadata used to generate tags
may also be generated by the system. For example, videos and photos
may be analyzed to determine information about the files. For
example, facial recognition may allow the system to automatically
tag those in a video or picture. In another embodiment, the system
may be able to determine a portion of an audio file and use an
internet look up to determine what song or specific audio file it
is. By performing this operation, the system may also be able to
determine the title of the file, the artist, any individuals
appearing or performing in the file, and any other information that
may be available on the internet regarding a photo, video, audio,
or other type of file.
[0071] In another embodiment, data may be recorded by an electronic
device by the user, such as audio data. The data may include a tag
or other instruction for organizing and managing data and
electronic files. The system may convert the audio into raw
searchable data so that the system may determine the instruction
and/or tag that the user desires based on the audio data. The
system can analyze the raw searchable data and determine the
instruction from the user and apply the tags and organize the data
according to the instructions from the user in the recorded audio
file. In one embodiment, the audio file is actually associated with
particular files and used as metadata and/or a tag itself. However,
since the system has determined what words the user actually said,
the tag and instruction from the user can still be searched
utilizing standard search inputs. In an alternative embodiment,
such a search may also be performed by receiving an audio file. In
one alternative embodiment, a user may enter a search input
utilizing an audio and/or visual file, and the system actually uses
the search input to find similar audio and/or visual files. That
is, if a user quotes a movie, song, or other audio, the system can
locate the file that contains such a quote. In another example, if
the user searches for an object prominently displayed in a digital
photograph entered as the search term, the system can find other
photo files that also contain the object in the search for
image.
[0072] Disclosed herein is an audio tagging functionality. Users
may like to share photos through social networking channels and by
using devices themselves (e.g., a user shows his smartphone to a
friend to show a series of pictures from a recent trip). Users may
use any number of devices, such as a laptop, desktop, tablet,
wearable device, and the aforementioned smartphone to share photos.
During such demonstrations, the user may discuss these photos. The
user may describe, for example, elements of the photo itself. This
may include where the photo was taken, the object and/or persons
that were the subject of the photo, who is represented in the
photo, when the photo was taken, etc.). In addition, the viewer may
ask questions about the photo being shown by the user demonstrating
the photo, to which the user responds with additional information
about the photo. All of these verbal discussions may be recognized
by the built-in microphone in the device, and associated with the
particular photo or set of photos. Such a verbal discussion may be
converted into raw searchable metadata, or converted to more formal
sets of metadata (e.g., organized by who, where, when, what, etc.).
In addition, detailed analysis of the discussion may provide
further cues to the mechanisms to rank the best photos. In one
example, the user may himself describe a selected photo as the best
composed, or representative as the most photogenic of the subjects
in the picture. The timbre of the user's voice may also be analyzed
to determine if the change in timbre should correspond to assigning
a higher rank to the photo in question.
[0073] Such a functionality may be implemented in a single user
mode, where the user verbally describes photos on the screen
without a discussion with a second person. This may occur, for
example, by the person dictating to his device various details
about a particular photo that is then subsequently used in tagging
and/or ranking operations.
[0074] In addition to the foregoing, the functionality previously
described may be implemented for tagging video information relating
to the user. In this case, for example, the metadata may be
associated not only to the video file as a whole, but even more
precisely, with reference to a particular time line in the file. In
addition, this functionality may be implemented for tagging music.
Here again, in this case the metadata may be associated not only to
the music file as a whole, but also more precisely with reference
to a particular time line in the file.
[0075] In one embodiment, in order to rank photos, various
statistical information and other parameters may be utilized for
determining importance of a file and tagging. For example, the
system may consider the following factors: a number of times that
the photo had been displayed (including full screen or slide show),
how much time the user was watching the particular photo (e.g.,
some photos may be quickly glanced at by the user, while others are
viewed for a longer period of time, indicating an affinity by the
user to the particular photo), was the particular photo ever shared
through email, cloud, social media, the file system, or another
communication channel.
[0076] Herein, use of the terminology contact may refer to an
individual or an organization. Herein, an organization may be an
ontological object. A user herself may create her own tags in the
system. Tags may be created to correspond with varying entities,
such as organizations, persons, projects, places, and dates. If the
user creates a specific tag (such as for an organization), the
systems and methods of the illustrated embodiments may implement
varying hypotheses. For example, the systems and methods disclosed
herein may assume that this tag is more important to the user since
the user created it herself. Moreover, the systems and methods
disclosed herein may make certain associations automatically (i.e.,
the organization in the email address from whence the email
originated is associated with the sender of the email, such as an
employee) and query the user to verify these associations.
[0077] In another illustrative embodiment, a tag may be associated
with a contact that has a high ranking. The system may analyze the
user's contact ratings and send the user short message service
(SMS) notifications about a message from a person with a
correspondingly high rating. Based on the contact's rating, the
system can decide on what the user should be reminded of. Differing
types of activities may be assigned a higher ranking and/or
priority, such as an assignment made to an individual or a task
that is assigned to the user. For example, if the contact is very
high ranking, the notification might have the contents of the
message in it. If the contact is only somewhat highly ranked, the
system may only notify the user that a message has been received.
The system may also assign particular tags to a contact or message
based on the contacts ranking.
[0078] For all user information (files, letters, contacts, social
network data, etc.), the embodiments disclosed herein introduce a
single end-to-end system of: tags (color, hash tags, smart tags),
commentaries, and contact ratings (which may be arranged
automatically, yet are adjustable by the user). Auto-tagging of
electronic files is available, but the user may also modify tags.
In one embodiment, a smart tag with a project name may be
generated. In this way, the embodiments herein may create a tag
with the project name based on the analysis of contents and
participants of an electronic correspondence, social network files,
and correspondence.
[0079] Object recognition technology may also be applied to create
metadata and/or tags about the content of photos and video files
and for searching of those files. In one example, a user is looking
for a photo where their family is at sea from 2005 to 2008. The
system can understand in advance that the image contains an object
"body of water" so, when the system receives the search term "sea,"
the system will return images containing a "body of water." The
system may also create an ontology of contacts, including
relatives, their photos etc.
[0080] In one embodiment, the system may implement photo tagging
according to the following example. The user may have 500 photos of
Pete which he posts to a social media website. Subsequently,
another individual tags one of the photos in which Pete appears.
The system can identify this tag of the photo, use this tag to
create a "Pete" tag in the system, and query the user to confirm by
displaying similar faces of Pete to the user. In this way, future
pictures with Pete in them may also be tagged by the system.
[0081] In another embodiment, a user may have comments of his
photos from other individuals in a particular social media. The
comments may also be used by the systems of the illustrated
embodiment for full-text searching, and extracted to create tags,
which later are used to characterize various photos.
[0082] Various illustrative embodiments also include methods and
systems that provide for a displaying files and tags, regardless of
where the files are actually stored. The display may indicate a
file location. Also described herein are systems and methods which
allow users to disclose, access, distribute, synchronize, manage,
and search different types of content and electronic files,
including but not limited to file content, communication content,
contact content, and other personal information across multiple
devices and cloud servers. Also described herein is a graphical
user interface (GUI) that displays representative information of
different electronic files. The electronic files may be physically
stored on multiple devices, but the representative information
relating to the electronic files may be displayed on a single GUI.
The representative information of an electronic file may include
the physical location where the electronic file is stored, the size
of the electronic file, a date and/or time the electronic file was
created or last modified, a file type of the electronic file, a
preview of the electronic file, or any other representative
information relating to the electronic file. Furthermore, a user
can interact with the GUI to view, open, access, organize, backup,
synchronize, distribute, or locate different electronic files
stored on various electronic devices. Representative information as
defined herein may include, but is not limited to, various types of
metadata.
[0083] In an illustrative embodiment, the system can determine the
presence of electronic files of a user among multiple devices. For
example, the user may utilize a tablet, smart phone, laptop,
universal serial bus (USB) drive, cloud storage, set top boxes
(smart TVs), and many other electronic storage and computing
devices and methods. Further, software applications may include
files that relate to a user or the user has access to. Such files
may include e-mails, messages, chats, documents, pictures, videos,
contacts, or other electronic data. The system can determine all of
these types of data from a plurality of devices and index the data.
Even if a user was not the creator or owner of the document, the
system can index the data as long as the user has access to it. The
index may be stored on a particular device of the user's, for
example, a laptop. The user may also designate which device will
store the index. In another embodiment, the index will be stored on
a cloud storage system. Advantageously, when the index is stored on
a cloud storage system (e.g., a remote server), the index may be
updated regarding changes to data or files on any device whenever
the device is connected to the internet.
[0084] After electronic files such as documents, pictures, e-mails,
contact information, and the like have been indexed, representative
information of the electronic files can be displayed on a graphical
user interface (GUI) to a user. In one embodiment, the
representative information may be displayed in a single window
format. Representative information may include a file name, a file
preview, date last modified, version number, date created, number
of related files, number of files in a folder, and any other
information relating to an electronic file. In some embodiments,
the representative information may include information regarding
the location of the electronic file. The location information can
be indicated utilizing a symbol or icon. For example, if a file is
on the user's smartphone, a smartphone icon may be used to indicate
the location of the file. Different icons or symbols may have
different shapes, colors, sizes, or text content. For example, the
device where a file is stored may be part of the representative
information. The system may also index a virtual location of a
file. For example, regardless of where an e-mail might be
physically stored, it might be virtually located in a user's e-mail
inbox within the system and displayed as such whenever the inbox is
displayed on the GUI. In this case, the system may indicate either
or both of the virtual and physical locations. In some embodiments,
the representative information may be displayed in a single window,
but may be divided within a multiple tab configuration. For
example, a GUI may include tabs for files, photos, e-mails, and
contacts. In another embodiment, the GUI may have tabs for files
and e-mails, where photos are categorized under files and contacts
are categorized under e-mails. The user may be able to switch
between tabs by interacting with the GUI. For example, a user may
utilize a motion translation device and input, such as a
touchscreen in which the user may touch the location on the screen
where one of the tabs appears, activating and displaying that tab.
To switch to a different tab, the user may touch the different tab.
In another example, the user may use a mouse or touchpad to locate
a pointer over the desired tab on the GUI. The user may then make
another input, such as a single mouse click, to activate and
display the desired tab the pointer is located over.
[0085] Whether or not tabs are used, the representative information
of electronic files displayed by the system may include information
relating to where and how the electronic files are stored. For
example, the representative information may include an indication
that the file is stored on a particular device or in a cloud
storage system. The representative information may also include an
indication of whether the file has been backed-up or not. The
representative information may also include the location of a
backed-up copy of the file. The representative information may also
include an indication of whether the device where the file is
stored is online or offline. In the case where a file is stored on
two different devices, the system may indicate the status of both
devices. In another embodiment, the system may only indicate enough
about the status of the devices to indicate whether the file is
available for opening and/or editing. For example, if a file is on
two different devices, and one is online and one is not, the system
may indicate on a GUI that the device where the file is stored is
online, because the user's actual access to the file is not
hindered by one of the devices being offline. Other status's than
online and offline may also be indicated by the system. For
example, the connections speed or status of a device may be
indicated. In another example, a passive or active status may be
indicated. Such a status may be relevant if a computing device has
a standby, sleep, hibernate, or screen saver mode that restricts
remote access to the memory of the device. In another example,
instead of online or offline which indicates communication between
two devices over a network, a device status may be connected or
unconnected. This may be useful for a secure digital (SD) card,
portable hard drive, or USB storage device, where the devices are
connected directly to a computing device rather than communicating
with devices over a network. Other potential statuses that may be
indicated by the system about a computing device may include a
currently operational status, a currently non-operational status,
or a set in a lower functional mode status. Despite the status of a
device however, if a file has been previously indexed, the
representative information relating to the file can be
displayed.
[0086] In an illustrative embodiment, the representative
information for a file may be manipulated or changed by the user.
For example, if the user receives a file through a file sharing
website or attached to an e-mail, the file may have a computer
generated name or a name that is otherwise undesirable by the user.
Accordingly, the user may then change the name of the file that is
used in the representative information. Any other of the
representative information may also be changed by the user.
[0087] The system may also display a preview of electronic files on
the GUI. This may occur automatically, or may occur based on some
sort of interaction by the user with the GUI. For example, the
system may display the preview only if the user clicks or taps on
the file once. In another example, a preview may be displayed when
the user moves a pointer over a file. In another embodiment, a
preview may be automatically displayed, but a further preview may
be displayed when a file is interacted with. For example, the first
page of a document may be shown, and when a pointer is moved over
the document, the second page of the document is shown. In another
example, a thumbnail of a picture may be shown. When the user moves
a pointer over the thumbnail, a larger and/or more high resolution
version of the photo may be displayed by the system. In order to
generate the preview of electronic files, the system may extract
all or a portion of content from an electronic file to generate the
preview. For example, where a first page of a document is used as a
preview image, the first page of the document is extracted. Various
types of previews may be displayed by the system. For example, a
preview may include a first group of words from a document or
message (such as an e-mail). Another preview may be a thumbnail
image of a larger image, or a screen shot of a video. The preview
image could also include some or all of the contact information
relating to an e-mail or other type of message. A preview image
could also include a task information relating to an electronic
file. For example, where the electronic file is a task list,
reminder list, or calendar, such a task list, reminder list, or
calendar may include information that can be used in the preview.
For example, a reminder list may include an item reminding the user
to pay their rent. Accordingly, a preview of the reminder list or
of the item on the reminder list itself may include the text "Rent
is Due!" In another embodiment, such a task or preview may be
derived from an e-mail, such as an e-mail requesting information
from the user. The preview of such an e-mail may include text
indicating the request.
[0088] In another illustrative embodiment, context menus may be
used. Context menus are menus that pop-up on the GUI relating to a
particular part of the GUI. For example, a context menu may pop-up
if a user moves their mouse over the representative information of
an electronic file. In another embodiment, the user can move a
pointer over the representative information and make another input,
such as a mouse click, to get the context menu to display. In other
embodiments, such as when a touch screen is in use, the user may
only input with regard to the representative information, and a
pointer may not be utilized. A context menu may include information
related to a particular electronic file or actions that may be
taken related to the electronic file. For example, a context menu
may indicate that an electronic file is classified as read only. In
another example, a context menu may present a user with options
relating to the electronic file, such as download the file, delete
the file, rename the file, move the file, back-up or copy the file,
etc.
[0089] In another illustrative embodiment, various user inputs and
interactions may be made to effectuate opening an electronic file
by clicking on or otherwise interacting with the representative
information of a file on the GUI. For example, if the user wishes
to open a document stored on a laptop, even though the user is
currently using a tablet, the user may activate the system
disclosed herein. The user can then navigate to or search for the
representative information of the document desired, and tap on it
through the touch screen of the tablet. The system receives the
input from the user, and the system then uses an application that
matches the file type of the document to open the document and
display it to the user on the tablet. The application may be
located on the tablet or located elsewhere. As long as the system
has access to the application, the document can be opened. In an
alternative embodiment, the system may select an application to
utilize when opening a document based on a number of factors. For
example, the system may consider whether the user made any choices
regarding what application to use (e.g., an open-with option) or
how the file should be displayed (e.g., read-only). The system may
also choose an application that is appropriate for the device the
user is currently using. The system may also select an alternative
application to use where a preferred application is not available.
In an alternative embodiment, electronic files that have been
opened may be displayed directly by the system and even edited
within the GUI. If a document is not available (for example, the
device where the document is stored is offline), the system may
automatically find another copy or replica of the document on
another device and open that one. In this way, the user may never
have to worry about how the document is actually opened. For
example, there may be a copy or replica of the document on an
external hard drive, a cloud storage server, or the user's home
personal computer (PC). In another embodiment, the system may be
able to locate a copy or a replica of the document on an e-mail
server or otherwise find it among other message types that the user
has sent or received.
[0090] In another illustrative embodiment, the GUI may display some
representative information more prominently than other
representative information. For example, if the representative
information includes an icon such as a piece of paper type icon for
a document. The piece of paper type icon for certain files may be
displayed larger and/or further toward the top of the GUI than the
icons for other files. Such a difference in prominence may be
random, so as to make the display less monotonous and more pleasing
to the eye. If groups of files are displayed together in a solitary
representative information, different groups of files represented
by an icon or symbol may also be displayed more prominently than
other groups or individual files. In another embodiment, such
differences in prominence may result from a decision made by the
system to display the representative information of the files
accordingly. For example, the system may determine to display more
recently opened or edited files more prominently. In another
example, the system may display messages that have been received
but not read or responded to more prominently. In another example,
the system may display photos or videos posted to the user's social
networks that have a relatively greater number of social
interactions with others on the social networks more prominently.
If the system is displaying search results, the system may display
results with more relevance to the search more prominently. Other
criteria, such as number of times modified, date created, size of
the file, or tag or metadata associated with the file, may also be
used by the system to determine how to determine representative
information to display more prominently on the GUI.
[0091] In another illustrative embodiment, the GUI may also display
a representation of a current storage utilization of a device in
which the GUI is being displayed. For example, the representation
may include a graphical representation indicating a percentage or
fixed amount of free storage space and used storage space. In
another embodiment, such a representation may be used to indicate
an amount of free and used storage space on a different device. In
another embodiment, such a representation may be used to indicate
an amount of free and used storage space on all of the user's
devices combined. In another embodiment, such a representation may
be used to indicate an amount of free and used storage space in a
portion of a cloud storage space allotted to the user. In yet
another embodiment, such a representation may be used to indicate
an amount of free and used storage space in all of the user's
devices and the portion of the cloud storage space allotted to the
user.
[0092] In another illustrative embodiment, the representative
information displayed on the GUI may include a hierarchical tree
structure. Such a tree structure may indicate the various physical
devices of the user and the files and folders stored thereon. The
hierarchical tree structure may also indicate the files and folders
stored on a user's allotted cloud storage space. In addition to
showing where files are physically stored on various devices and/or
cloud storage space, a hierarchical tree structure may
alternatively or additionally display files in their designated
virtual locations. A virtual file location is defined herein as a
location the system visualizes a file being in, even if the file is
not physically stored there. For example, a virtual location of "My
Music" may contain all of a user's audio files, regardless of what
device or folder the audio files are in. Thus, each audio file has
a virtual location of the My Music folder. Other files and contacts
may similarly have other virtual locations as determined by the
system or the user. A virtual file is defined herein as a file that
is a merged version of several files. The virtual file may
physically exist on a storage device, or may exist locally when
opened by the user and incorporates data from multiple physical
files. A virtual file may be displayed as representative
information on the GUI. The representative information may indicate
that it is a virtual file, or the representative information may
appear similar to the representative information for any other
file, not indicating to the user that the file is a virtual
file.
[0093] In an alternative embodiment, the representative information
displayed on the GUI may be an amalgamation of representative
information of multiple files. For example, the amalgamation may be
represented by a circle. The circle may be sized according to the
number of files represented by the amalgamation, a relative
importance of the grouping of files, or other criteria. The
amalgamation may also include text, such as the device or devices
where the files in the amalgamation are stored, a file type or
types of the files in the amalgamation, a total size of the
amalgamation, or a preview of at least one of the files in the
amalgamation.
[0094] Electronic files indexed, displayed, used, etc. by the
system can include many things. For example, files as defined
herein may include things such as documents, presentations,
spreadsheets, e-mails, messages, audio files, video files, contact
information, web pages, information from webpages, tasks,
calendars, and the like. Such files may be gleaned by the system
from various sources such as local file storages powered with
operating systems (e.g., laptops, phones, tablets, media centers,
etc.), external passive file storages (e.g., external hard drives,
memory sticks, CD/DVD's, etc.), cloud storages (e.g., Dropbox.TM.,
Google Drive.TM., Evernote.TM., Flickr.TM.' Facebook.TM. galleries,
etc.), e-mail accounts (e.g., Gmail.TM., Hotmail.TM., Yahoo.TM.
mail, exchange servers, etc.), messenger services (e.g.,
Twitter.TM., Skype.TM., SMS, Snapchat.TM., Viber.TM., Google
Hangouts.TM., etc.), social media feeds (e.g., Facebook.TM.'
Google+.TM. LinkedIN.TM., etc.), contact lists (from e.g., e-mail
accounts, messengers, telephone, personal address books,
Outlook.TM. contacts, etc.), tasks, calendars, dictionaries,
encyclopedias, internet sites, and any other services like
FineReader.TM. online.
[0095] Advantageously, the systems and methods disclosed herein
provide benefits over an exclusive utilization of cloud storage.
Some people store information in a cloud storage in order to
synchronize information on different personal devices. However, for
other people, cloud storage is not necessary because personal
devices have become very productive, and often have sufficient
capabilities to handle the needs of many users without resorting to
cloud storage strategies. In other cases, the amount of data
produced by some people is so massive that transferring that data
to cloud servers may be cumbersome and time consuming. For example,
a digital camera owner may return from a vacation with hundreds, if
not thousands, of photos or videos in high resolution. If these
photos and videos were moved to cloud storage, the photos and
videos could occupy multiple gigabytes of memory in the cloud
storage servers, and may additionally severely tax data transfer
resources to move all the photos and videos to a cloud server.
Further, many devices have become wirelessly connected to each
other (e.g., smart TVs, media centers, cameras, fitness bracelets,
Google.TM.-glasses, other wearable computers, etc.) so that it may
be preferable to keep some data on local devices rather than remote
servers. Additionally, much of the data that could be stored on a
cloud storage may never be used again, thus unnecessarily taking up
space on the cloud storage servers.
[0096] Accordingly, there may not be sufficient resources and/or
desire to move vast quantities of generated data from multiple
devices to cloud storage and organize all of the data.
Additionally, cloud storage systems or leaving data on multiple
devices may not be satisfactorily searchable to make such methods
for file storage useful.
[0097] The systems and methods discussed herein provide for a
multiple device storage system where files can be organized across
all personal devices, cloud locations, and applications (e.g.,
e-mail, word processing, videos, pictures, etc.). Further, people
share computer files sending them as e-mail attachments or
attaching them to instant messages, social media feeds, blogs, or
publishing them in their galleries or cloud storages. Accordingly,
the systems and methods herein provide for organization and
searching not only across all personal devices and cloud locations
but also through a user's e-mails, instant messages, social media
feeds, blogs, media galleries, and other communication content.
[0098] In one illustrative embodiment, a system can display,
access, distribute, synchronize, manage, and search different types
of content, including but not limited to file content,
communication content, contact content and other personal
information across multiple devices and cloud servers. The system
may also include a server system that communicatively couples to an
agent-type application on one or more client devices.
[0099] In another illustrative embodiment, a method provides
multi-platform content access, distribution, and synchronization of
files on different devices including using a client-side
application to manage transfer and presentation of files on a
device and across server systems.
[0100] In another illustrative embodiment, a method provides
multi-platform content access including full-text indexing of the
content, files, and metadata of files located on a device and
searching of files using full text index located on a server
system.
[0101] In another embodiment, a method is disclosed for displaying
data from local, external, offline, and other sources in a single
interface presented to a user. The display can also include
information on where the data and/or files are actually stored.
[0102] In another embodiment, a computer-readable medium may
include instructions executable by a processor to cause the
processor to perform functions enabling multi-platform content
access, distribution, and synchronization on different devices.
Such instructions may be embodied in a client-side computer
organization application. In addition to the foregoing embodiments,
other systems and computer program product embodiments are provided
and supply related advantages.
[0103] The number of devices that a user may implement in her
day-to-day life has proliferated. While these individual devices
are often-times interconnected via, for example, wireless
networking, cellular networking, and other infrastructures, systems
and methods as disclosed herein can effectively manage data shared
between such devices. For example, the systems and methods
disclosed herein address platform content access, distribution, and
synchronization of data and files, while managing the data and
files as well.
[0104] The systems and methods disclosed herein better effectuate
such platform content access, distribution, and synchronization,
while at the same time managing the data itself so as to make more
effective use of available cloud-based solutions. Finally, the
systems and methods disclosed herein provide for utilizing
multiple, yet interconnected, devices while making file
organization over such devices and systems easy for a user.
[0105] The embodiments disclosed herein provide a convenient
one-stop (unified) access to multiple forms of personal data. The
embodiments facilitate a unified catalog of personal files across
all devices, as well as an ability to view or play files locally or
remotely.
[0106] In addition, the embodiments disclosed herein provide file
and/or data management functionality, such as opening, copying,
moving, deleting, archiving, sharing, and editing. The disclosed
embodiments promote technology to automatically smart move files in
a user's family cloud, so that there is always space on the user's
phone and laptop, and the most necessary files are always at
hand.
[0107] The embodiments disclosed herein also provide search
functionality. Advantageously, the search functionalities disclosed
herein expand searching beyond file name searching. This may be
helpful where, for example, files arrive in e-mail or are shared
online or by other means and have a computer generated file name.
Accordingly, the embodiments disclosed herein can examine the
metadata for full-text content utilizing a fuzzy search, within the
meaning according to different ontologies, etc.
[0108] The embodiments disclosed herein also provide
privacy/security functionality. In some embodiments, a repository
of data will not be stored in the cloud for users concerned about
privacy and security issues. There may be temporary or
compartmentalized storage for proxy caching, data manipulation, or
convenience, but significant duplication or long-term storage in
the cloud can be avoided. Additionally, some embodiments may
include no indexing or cataloguing of data in the cloud to ensure
data protection, theft protection, corruption, integrity of data,
and related issues with cloud based repositories. Further, some
embodiments may keep no file catalogue or full theft index in the
cloud. Further still, the architecture envisioned can either
utilize or not utilize a mirrored or master copy of the
index/catalogue data in the cloud. In some embodiments, a mirrored
or master copy of the index/catalogue data in the cloud may be
stored and indexed locally on the client side to facilitate local
control of the index. In some cases, such an arrangement may be
considered a peer-to-peer index and data synchronization
process.
[0109] As will be further described, the embodiments disclosed
herein provide search and data management functionality over an
entire available range of data storage mediums and systems of
exchange between devices. For example, various embodiments
disclosed herein promote (a) disclosure, (b) manage, and (c) search
information functionality for (1) locally stored files, (2) offline
files, (3) cloud-based files, (4) e-mail information (whether
stored locally, offline, or remotely), (5) instant message/short
message format information (again stored in a variety of
locations), (6) social media feeds, (7) contact information, (8)
other type of content including but not limited to dictionaries and
encyclopedias, tasks, calendars, etc.
[0110] An illustrative embodiment includes a distributed platform
and a client application that allows users to have very easy access
to their files and e-mail. The embodiment brings together all user
information sources available in the user's network, including
local and cloud sources, external devices, social networks, e-mail,
and telephone communications. Furthermore, the embodiment allows
for data management, which may be configured to be seamless and
automatic. For example, one of the user's devices may be running
out of available storage space on a particular data medium. The
system may make the decision to migrate data in order to free
space, or perform backup operations.
[0111] Another illustrative embodiment includes a platform based on
a back-end and a front-end, native client and external device
architecture. Any product/service that generates data and files
(documents or messages) can integrate with this platform as a
source of data and files. Accordingly, the user can see these data
and files in a uniform interface with an ability to search, tag,
preview, manage, share, etc. The platform may include built-in
smart rules and notification functionality. For example, a
particular device may be wearable, such as a fitness bracelet. This
device, through the embodiments disclosed herein, may trigger a
rule or notification based on the activity of the user to provide
an alert. Moreover, embodiments as disclosed herein may include
infrastructure through which data may be displayed. For example, a
user may again be wearing a device, through which the
infrastructure facilitates the viewing of a video message or
otherwise displays data.
[0112] In an illustrative embodiment and from the point of view of
architecture--agent software is installed under Operating System
(OS) software. The agent extracts text and metadata from all local
files and e-mail and passes on the data to a server or other local
or remote processing device (herein referred to as cloud service)
for indexing. The agent monitors changes in files. The agent
collects the actual aggregate of all the devices of the user code
and creates a local copy of the relevant index (cache).
[0113] In an illustrative embodiment and from the point of view of
the user interface, the cloud service provides a combination of a
simple, but very dynamic, attractive, and convenient e-mail client
and a simple, but very comfortable file manager. Such a program may
function in ways used in a traditional e-mail client (e.g.,
Microsoft.TM. Outlook.TM.), but also may include the ability to
view not only an e-mail message but also files included in
correspondence. This program, a client tied to the cloud service,
or cloud service client, may be implemented for desktop operating
systems (OSX.TM. and Windows.TM.), and for mobile operating
systems, such as iOS.TM. and Android.TM..
[0114] In one illustrative embodiment, the cloud service client
interface for desktop OS is very fresh and light in the spirit of
interfaces for mobile OS. This program is not intended to replace
traditional e-mail clients or file managers, but aims to make
working with mail and files easier. For example, a first type of
functionality may serve to review incoming mail. A system may
provide a radically more convenient way of presenting the incoming
mail than traditional systems, such as Outlook.TM. and Mac Mail.
Such a presentation may be based on the fact that important
messages are displayed in a different way than un-important
messages. Another feature of such a system may relate to the
formation of responses to messages directly within the cloud
service client.
[0115] Furthermore, content management technology can be used with
a mail client, which facilitates easy sharing of local files. In
the system, a file may be shared as either a copy or a replica. For
the purposes of this disclosure, a copy of a file is identical to
the original file at the time of duplication, but is not
automatically updated after changes in the original file on a
separate machine. A replica of a file is identical to the original
file at the time of duplication, and is automatically updated after
changes are made to the original file, even if the original file
exists on a separate machine than the replica file.
[0116] In one embodiment, efficient management of photos and/or
video information on personal devices is possible. Such embodiments
allow for the following objectives to be realized. The local
storage associated with the camera can be emptied, or at least can
always have some available memory. The data can be made accessible
from and to the user's network of devices, from cameras, phones,
tablets, wearable devices, and others. The data can be made
accessible to the user's contacts. The data can be retained in one
backup location, while freeing space on the user's other devices.
Finally, the interface allows Original Equipment Manufacturers
(OEMs) access to retain communication with the user to enhance
consumer loyalty, address usage (i.e., provide instruction to the
user), and maintain accessibility in the event of a recall,
warranty, or other consumer support issue.
[0117] Illustrated embodiments incorporate innovative data
management functionality, for example, an ability to automatically
move the files between a user's devices and a public, private, or
personal storage account, so that: (1) the cloud service client
moves important and frequently used files to the user's local
device, (2) the client always maintains a certain predetermined
amount of free space (e.g., 25%, 30%, 35%, 40%, etc.) on the local
device by gradually moving less-used files to remote devices, and
(3), the client keeps copies of important files at 2 or 3 physical
locations on different devices to avoid data loss caused by the
loss of one of the devices or data unavailability due to no network
access. In other words, an important file can still be accessed
from one device even while a second device containing the file is
offline.
[0118] An example can be the following usage scenario. A user
inserts a secure digital (SD) card containing photos into a device.
The system then copies newer photos on the SD card to a photo
folder on the local device, while retaining free space on the
device as will be further described. The system can then apply
optional photo filters, smart tagging, object-facial recognition,
audio tagging, and the like. Newer photos are then replicated from
the photo folder to an external hard drive or default backup
device. The newer photos can also be replicated from the photo
folder to a replica at a remote storage location (e.g., cloud). The
replica copies on the cloud storage may serve as the backup copies
or may be separate from the backup copies. The user is then able to
share the photos with contacts as indicated on the interface. For
example, certain icons may be displayed to indicate that the photos
are available in the system. The user may be able to click on an
icon of the interface to start a slide show, share the photos, or
perform another activity.
[0119] In an additional usage scenario, the user may turn on a
scanner, and receive scans to a scan folder on his laptop. The
mechanisms retain enough free space on the laptop by moving older
images and retaining newer ones. The system may also apply photo
filters, de-skew, perspective correction, optical character
recognition (OCR), smart tagging, object-facial recognition,
audio-tagging and the like. Newer scans can be replicated from the
scan folder on the laptop to an external hard drive or default
backup device. Newer scans can also be replicated from the scan
folder to the remote storage location, again while retaining a
certain amount of designated free space on the laptop and external
and remote storage locations. The user is therefore able to share
the scan with contacts as indicated by the interface.
[0120] In another embodiment, the system may implement an external
communications link with a device that is accessible via the
Internet, for example. The link may be provided to a user, whom
after a short registration process then has the ability to connect
a device through the external communications link, which then
provides the user with OEM vendor content and accessibility through
the interface. For example, the user may be asked to register an SD
card, or verify a camera connection, during which the camera
version is determined or confirmed. The mechanisms then will allow
bi-directional communication between the user and the OEM via, for
example, a designated tab, which may display OEM vendor content
therein.
[0121] Software incorporating such embodiments may be installed via
sharing (link shared via e-mail or other social networking
contact), file sharing requiring installation of the software
itself, or download from the appropriate website. Upon first use,
the software may prompt for login information. If the user has used
the software before, the user may be prompted to enter a login ID
(such as an e-mail address) and a personal password. If the user
has not used the software before, the user may be prompted to enter
their e-mail address. A confirmation message can then be sent to
the user's e-mail address that includes a temporary password in the
message.
[0122] After confirming the user's e-mail address by using the
temporary password to log in, a software window is displayed. In
one illustrative embodiment, the left-hand side of the software
window is empty initially. This side may be referred to as the
workspace. On the right-hand side of the software window, available
icons for sources such as my hard drive, external drives, if
currently connected, cloud drives, Exchange, mail servers (Gmail
etc.), other locations: camera, media centers etc., and other
computers may be displayed. A user may be able to interact with the
icons that represent the various sources. For example, a user may
be able to drag an icon representing a source into the left-hand
side workspace. By doing so, the software will recognize that the
user has assigned that service or device to their personal cloud.
The dragging may be accomplished using a mouse in a point and click
fashion, or may be accomplished using a touch screen of some
kind.
[0123] For example, the user may drag their hard drive icon to the
left (the workspace). The software can further query the user for
specific folders from the device that are to be indexed. By
default, it suggests to index all folders on the user's local disk
except for applications. The user can also connect their
traditional e-mail clients (e.g., Outlook.TM., Exchange.TM. etc.).
As soon as devices are assigned to the user's personal cloud, the
workspace on the left is filled with a list of folders and files
that have been assigned to the cloud storage.
[0124] At the top of the graphical user interface (GUI) window, the
user views two large tabs: one for files and one for e-mail. In an
alternative embodiment, a third tab may also be presented on the
GUI for contacts. In other embodiments, other tabs may exist as
well. For example, other tabs may include calendar and tasks tabs.
A search field may also be presented on the GUI. As the sources are
indexed, the system may display on the GUI a progress of the
indexing. In the indexing, the system can detect duplicate files or
very similar files in the user's personal cloud or other devices.
For example, such matched files categorized as duplicates or other
matched files may be categorized based on how well they match each
other. For example, 100% duplicate files may have the exact same
content and metadata, including the date and time the files were
created and/or modified. In another example, 99.9% duplicate files
may have the same content and metadata, save for being created at
and/or modified at a different date and time. In another example,
99.8% duplicates may have the same content but may have different
other metadata, such as a different file name. In another example,
99% similar files may have small differences in content.
[0125] The system may offer to consider files that are not 100%
duplicate files as different versions. In an alternative
embodiment, the system may utilize a different threshold. For
example, the system may only offer to consider files that are 99%
similar as different versions. The system may also consider the
date and author of a last modification of a file, which of the
files originates in an e-mail, by whom a possible e-mail was sent,
when a possible e-mail was sent, etc. The system may utilize that
information to make automatic decisions for indexing files. For
example, if files meet a certain threshold of similarity or are
duplicates, the system may only save the most recently modified
version. In another example, the system may save all versions of
the file but designate one version as an official version using one
of the aforementioned criteria. In another embodiment, the system
may offer to merge duplicates into one file. In such a case, the
system may treat these physical files as a single logical file and
synchronize the changes of this file across all its physical
copies. If the duplicate is located within the same physical
medium, the software will remove the physical duplicate (keeping an
official copy).
[0126] The system may also analyze a user's e-mails and clear up
the user's disorganization in contacts. Namely, the system may
assign heuristically photos (or avatars) to any contacts of the
user. The system may also obtain the photos or other information
about the contacts from the user's social networks. For example,
the system may obtain the 50 most active contacts with whom the
user had communications in the last six months and may search for
their e-mail addresses in a first social network. The system may
also use other criteria to search for the contacts in the first
social network, such as name or other data relating to a contact
that the system may be able to glean from e-mails from the contacts
or information manually entered by the user relating to the
contacts. If the system fails to find such persons in the first
social network, the system may move to a second social network and
search for the contacts there using similar methods. The system may
also locate contacts on social networks by searching for similar
names to the contacts among friends of the user (such methods may
include transliteration and fuzzy search functionality).
[0127] In one embodiment, for each contact that a user has, a kind
of dossier can be assembled for each contact. That is, the system
can associate documents, files, e-mails, photos, etc. with each of
the user's contacts. The system may also identify among all of the
user's e-mail addresses, e-mail addresses that are preferred for
e-mailing a contact, e-mail addresses that are not preferred for
e-mailing a contact, and any wrong e-mail addresses (either e-mail
addresses that are not valid or e-mail addresses that are not
properly associated with the correct contact). The system may also
add comments to e-mail addresses. Similarly, the system may clean
up phone numbers on a contact list by analyzing the history of the
user's SMS correspondence and phone calls. The system may also
associate phone numbers with e-mail addresses that belong to the
same contact.
[0128] Further, the system can analyze actual correspondence and
make a brief summary of the user's relationship with a contact. For
example, the system may determine the main theme of the
correspondence, the degree of importance to the user of the contact
or correspondence, or recommendations based on a particular
correspondence. For example, a recommendation may be based on an
e-mail from several months ago that asked the user for information,
but has not yet been responded to. Such recommendations may be
configurable by a user, or turned on and off by a user. In this
case, the system may recommend that the user write a response, and
the system may further prompt the user to include an answer to the
specific inquiry in the original correspondence from several months
ago. Any length of time used to determine a recommendation may also
be configurable by the user. In another example, the system may
note that a family member's birthday or anniversary is approaching,
and the system may therefore alert the user to send them a message.
The user may further be able to configure how long before such a
birthday or anniversary the user should be alerted by the system.
The user may further specify which family members or other contacts
recommendations for special events like birthdays and/or
anniversaries should generate alerts. In a similar example, the
system may determine that a user has not sent an e-mail to a
grandparent in two months. The system may send the user an alert
that the grandparent should be e-mailed, which again can be fully
configurable by the user. In another example, the system could
generate a recommendation to correspondences that request a
response (RSVP) for an event. Another example where a
recommendation may be made is if correspondence indicates that the
user owes someone money. The system may send such recommendations
to the user in a variety of ways. The system may send the user a
short message service (SMS) message, an e-mail message, a
Facebook.TM. message, or other type of message that includes the
recommendation. The recommendations could also be added to a
calendar, task list, or reminder list for the user. In another
embodiment, the recommendation could comprise an icon displayed
along with the e-mail message.
[0129] In an illustrative embodiment, data to or from each contact
can be automatically assigned a rank of importance. The rank of
importance could be represented by a number, such as a number from
1 to 100. The rank of importance could also be a high, medium, or
low categorization. Other ways of ranking may also be used. The
user may change the ranking system manually, and may also change
the rank of particular data manually. The ranks of importance for
data may be used to determine how to visualize the incoming
messages and e-mails from different contacts. For example, messages
from higher ranked contacts or related to higher ranked
conversations may be displayed by the system more prominently than
other messages. By analyzing the data in social networking
channels, e-mail addresses, message structures, and/or signatures
in messages, the system may extract a contact's possible past and
current places of employment. In this way, the system may build an
ontology of the people and companies with whom the user has been
corresponding and contacting.
[0130] In another illustrative embodiment, the system may analyze a
user's e-mails, the user's contacts' ratings, the user's telephone
communications and the like to simplify and organize the user's
tasks. For this purpose, the system may implement a series of
alerts, follow-ups, reminders (as well as by means of SMS), and the
like, some of which may be generated based on the preceding
discussion. The system can also identify the promises that the user
once gave to e-mail recipients and prioritize and categorize them
by identifying certain tasks or e-mails that the user needs to do
or write today. The system can also be configured to generate tasks
or e-mails that the user needs to do or write within other time
periods, such as three days, one week, two weeks, or one month as
just some illustrative examples. The system can also identify the
promises that someone once gave the user in the correspondence and
prioritize and categorize them by identifying the most important
cases or e-mails where someone promised to do something for the
user. The system may also be configured to create a draft letter
reminding these contacts on the user's behalf that something is
owed to the user as previously promised. Such a draft letter may
include a copy or a quotation from the original correspondence
where something was promised.
[0131] In another illustrative embodiment, the system may generate
messages or recommendations to the user based on the user's usage
and interaction with the system. For example, by analyzing content
and user behavior with respect to folders and information sources,
the system may jokingly inform the user in a natural language form
about the user's activities with respect to the source. For
example, when user hovers over a folder the system may gently and
jokingly informs him, "You haven't opened this folder for
ages."
[0132] In another embodiment, a user may wish to find a
presentation, but does not recall the name of the file and does not
remember the name of the file's location. The file may be located
on the user's personal laptop or their work laptop. The user does
remember that the file was prepared for John Smith, and that the
presentation contained a red pie chart diagram. The user may
selects a files tab. The system may then display to the user a
complete file tree hierarchy of files on all of the user's devices.
The user may browse the file tree hierarchy or may utilize a search
field.
[0133] For example, the file may be located on the user's remote
work computer. The user may wish to edit the document and send it
to his manager. If the user attempts to open this remote file, the
system can make a local physical copy of the file, and the user can
work safely without worry about being disconnected from the network
and losing the user's edits. However, the system retains the
document as one logical file, and when the user is finished
editing, the system will update the original copy. The system also
attempts to make use of available local applications to execute the
file, though where that is not possible, remotely located
applications may be utilized.
[0134] The system also allows any files to be moved, deleted,
renamed, and copied in any personal cloud. In some embodiments, the
actions may be immediately executed if the device the user is using
and the device where the file of interest is stored are both
online. In some embodiments, being online means being connected to
the internet. However, more generally, being online as disclosed
herein means that the two devices are able to communicate with each
other, either through the internet or otherwise. If the devices are
not online, some operations can be ordered with deferred execution.
Such a process may prevent the need for people to constantly think
about backing up files. Utilizing various mechanisms of the
illustrated embodiments, the user can forget the problem of
back-ups. In one embodiment, the system simply communicates the
system folders and files that are important to the user, and asks
the system to always store three physical copies in different
locations. The system keeps track of the fact that these folders
have at least three replicas. In the event that the user damages a
device, for example, they can buy a new device, log into the
cloud-based server using their e-mail address, and simply ask to
restore the data to the new device. For security purposes, the user
may designate those files and folders that he does not wish to be
indexed.
[0135] As will be appreciated by one skilled in the art, aspects of
the embodiments disclosed herein may be embodied as a system,
method or computer program product. Accordingly, aspects of the
embodiments disclosed herein may take the form of an entirely
hardware embodiment, an entirely software embodiment (including
firmware, resident software, micro-code, etc.) or an embodiment
combining software and hardware aspects that may all generally be
referred to herein as a "circuit," "module" or "system."
Furthermore, aspects of the embodiments disclosed herein may take
the form of a computer program product embodied in one or more
computer readable medium(s) having computer readable program code
embodied thereon.
[0136] Any combination of one or more computer readable medium(s)
may be utilized. A computer readable storage medium may be, for
example, but not limited to, an electronic, magnetic, optical,
electromagnetic, infrared, or semiconductor system, apparatus, or
device, or any suitable combination of the foregoing. More specific
examples (a non-exhaustive list) of the computer readable storage
medium would include the following: an electrical connection having
one or more wires, a portable computer diskette, a hard disk, a
random access memory (RAM), a read-only memory (ROM), an erasable
programmable read only memory (EPROM or Flash memory), an optical
fiber, a portable compact disc read-only memory (CD-ROM), an
optical storage device, a magnetic storage device, or any suitable
combination of the foregoing. In the context of this document, a
computer readable storage medium may be any tangible medium that
may contain, or store a program for use by or in connection with an
instruction execution system, apparatus, or device.
[0137] Program code embodied on a computer readable medium may be
transmitted using any appropriate medium, including but not limited
to wireless, wired, optical fiber cable, RF, etc., or any suitable
combination of the foregoing. Computer program code for carrying
out operations for aspects of the embodiments disclosed herein may
be written in any combination of one or more programming languages,
including an object oriented programming language such as Java,
Smalltalk, C++ or the like and conventional procedural programming
languages, such as the "C" programming language or similar
programming languages. The program code may execute entirely on the
user's computer, partly on the user's computer, as a stand-alone
software package, partly on the user's computer and partly on a
remote computer, or entirely on the remote computer or server. In
the latter scenario, the remote computer may be connected to the
user's computer through any type of network, including a local area
network (LAN) or a wide area network (WAN), or the connection may
be made to an external computer (for example, through the Internet
using an Internet Service Provider).
[0138] Aspects of the embodiments disclosed herein are described
with reference to flowchart illustrations and/or block diagrams of
methods, apparatus (systems) and computer program products
according to embodiments disclosed herein. It will be understood
that each block of the flowchart illustrations and/or block
diagrams, and combinations of blocks in the flowchart illustrations
and/or block diagrams, may be implemented by computer program
instructions. These computer program instructions may be provided
to a processor of a general purpose computer, special purpose
computer, or other programmable data processing apparatus to
produce a machine, such that the instructions, which execute via
the processor of the computer or other programmable data processing
apparatus, implement the functions/acts specified in the flowchart
and/or block diagram block or blocks.
[0139] These computer program instructions may also be stored in a
computer readable medium that may direct a computer, other
programmable data processing apparatus, or other devices to
function in a particular manner, such that the instructions stored
in the computer readable medium produce an article of manufacture
including instructions which implement the function/act specified
in the flowchart and/or block diagram block or blocks. The computer
program instructions may also be loaded onto a computer, other
programmable data processing apparatus, or other devices to cause a
series of operational steps to be performed on the computer, other
programmable apparatus or other devices to produce a computer
implemented process such that the instructions which execute on the
computer or other programmable apparatus provide processes for
implementing the functions/acts specified in the flowchart and/or
block diagram block or blocks.
[0140] The flowchart and block diagrams in the figures illustrate
the architecture, functionality, and operation of possible
implementations of systems, methods and computer program products
according to various embodiments disclosed herein. In this regard,
each block in the flowchart or block diagrams may represent a
module, segment, or portion of code, which comprises one or more
executable instructions for implementing the specified logical
function(s). It should also be noted that, in some alternative
implementations, the functions noted in the block may occur out of
the order noted in the figures. For example, two blocks shown in
succession may, in fact, be executed substantially concurrently, or
the blocks may sometimes be executed in the reverse order,
depending upon the functionality involved. It will also be noted
that each block of the block diagrams and/or flowchart
illustration, and combinations of blocks in the block diagrams
and/or flowchart illustration, may be implemented by special
purpose hardware-based systems that perform the specified functions
or acts, or combinations of special purpose hardware and computer
instructions.
[0141] FIG. 1 is a representation of a graphical user interface
(GUI) 100 demonstrating an e-mail interface in accordance with an
illustrative embodiment. In alternative embodiments, fewer,
additional, and/or different components may be displayed on the
GUI. The GUI 100 includes two tabs toward the top, an e-mails tab
105 and a files tab 110. The e-mails tab 105 and the files tab 110
may, in an alternative embodiment, include a number indicating the
number of e-mails or files indexed on each respective tab. In
another alternative embodiment, a number in the e-mails tab 105 or
the files tab 110 may also indicate a number of unread or new
e-mails or newly indexed files. The GUI 100 further includes
secondary tabs 115. These secondary tabs 115 can help further sort
the e-mails displayed when the e-mail tab 105 is selected. In GUI
100, the e-mail tab 105 is selected, and thus the secondary tabs
115 are displayed. The secondary tabs 115 include options for
sorting e-mails such as all, important, work, family, friends,
architect, social, promo, and more. Some of the secondary tabs 115
are default and some are user defined. If a user selects one of the
secondary tabs 115, e-mails relating to that tab are displayed. In
one embodiment, multiple secondary tabs 115 may be selected.
Accordingly, e-mails may be sorted based on multiple criteria. In
one embodiment, if two secondary tabs 115 are selected, any e-mails
that relate to either of the subjects of the tabs are displayed. In
an alternative embodiment, selecting two tabs displays only e-mails
that relate to both tabs. More than two tabs may also be selected
in various embodiments.
[0142] The GUI 100 also includes a search space 120. If a user
enters text into the search space 120, the terms entered may be
searched for among e-mails. The searching may search for the exact
characters entered into the search space 120 or may include fuzzy
searching. In an alternative embodiment, a search may be performed
in areas other than just the e-mail folder. The GUI 100 also
includes a settings and alerts icon 125. If the user selects the
settings and alerts icon 125, the user is directed to displays that
allow the user to change settings or alerts related to the system
and methods disclosed herein. For example, wherever throughout this
disclosure a feature is described as configurable by the user, the
user may be able to navigate to a GUI that allows them to configure
such a feature through the settings and alerts icon 125.
[0143] The GUI 100 also includes e-mail previews, that preview
individual e-mails. For example, e-mail previews 130, 135, and 140
are all shown on GUI 100. E-mails 130 and 140 include an attached
picture that is displayed in the preview. E-mail 130 includes
multiple photos in the preview. One is displayed more prominently
than the others. Each of e-mails 130, 135, and 140 include text
that is displayed in the preview. E-mails 130, 135, and 140 also
include a photo or avatar of the sender of the e-mail, the sender's
name, and the date and time the e-mails 130, 135, and 140 were
sent.
[0144] In this embodiment, e-mail 130 has been selected for full
viewing by the user. Such selection may occur by the user tapping
or clicking on the e-mail 130. The full view 145 shows much of the
same information as in the preview, except larger and more easily
viewable. The full view includes much better views of photos 150
and 155. Further, the user may interact with the photos 150 and 155
to cause a photo that is not displayed prominently by default, such
as photo 155, to be displayed more prominently. Also, if the e-mail
130 had more text then it currently does, the full text may be
visible in the full-view 145 but not the preview. The GUI 100 also
includes a contact info 160. The system automatically displays the
contact info 160 of the sender of the e-mail that is selected for
the full-view 145, in this case e-mail 130. The contact info 160
includes the sender's photo or avatar, name, telephone number,
groups, and e-mail history. In this case, Gary Thomas is part of
the friends and architects groups. Thus, if the user selects
secondary tabs 115 such as friends or architect, e-mails from Gary
Thomas may be displayed on the GUI 100. The groups that Gary Thomas
is a part of may be automatically selected based on the
interactions between the user and Gary, the content of the
correspondence between the user and Gary, or information from the
user's social networks. For example, if Gary Thomas was listed as a
family member of the user on the user's Facebook.TM. profile, the
system may automatically put Gary in the Family group. In an
alternative embodiment, the user may configure and determine the
groups that a contact belongs in. The e-mail history displayed in
the contact info 160 indicates the magnitude of correspondence
between Gary and the user. In this case, the user has received 23
e-mails from Gary and sent 32 e-mails to Gary.
[0145] FIG. 2 is a blown-up representation of a GUI 200
demonstrating an e-mail interface in accordance with an
illustrative embodiment. In alternative embodiments, fewer,
additional, and/or different components may be displayed on the
GUI. Note that both in FIG. 1 and FIG. 2, the e-mails displayed are
all related to one another. That is, the several e-mails form a
sort of conversation among the senders. In this instance, the
e-mail messages are displayed from oldest to newest. In this way,
the e-mails can be read along the normal flow of conversation when
the e-mails are read from top to bottom.
[0146] FIG. 3 is a block diagram illustrating a file transfer
system in accordance with an illustrative embodiment. In
alternative embodiments, fewer, additional, and/or different
components may be included in the system.
[0147] As shown in FIG. 3, an e-mail file sharing architecture may
include e-mail software 301 on a sending computer, an exchange
server on the sender side 304, a server on the recipient side 305,
and e-mail software 306 on the recipient computer. Also as shown,
sender's e-mail software 301 is able to access a file#01 302 in
sender's digital storage (the file to be sent) and generate an
e-mail message 303 with a copy (file#02) of file#01 attached.
E-mail message 303 is sent through servers 304 and 305 to the
recipient's software 306 as shown by the arrows on FIG. 3.
Recipient's software 306 receives e-mail message 307 (a copy of
message 303), which contains a file#03 (a copy of attached
file#02). The recipient machine may save a copy of file#03 locally
to a recipient computer as file#04 308. In one exemplary
embodiment, the software 301 may be Outlook.TM., the server 304 may
be an Exchange.TM. server, the server 305 may be a Gmail.TM.
server, and the software 306 is Mac-OS Mail. This embodiment is
merely for illustration. Any other server and software types may be
used in different embodiments of such a system.
[0148] FIG. 4 is a block diagram illustrating a second file
transfer system in accordance with an illustrative embodiment. In
alternative embodiments, fewer, additional, and/or different
components may be included in the system.
[0149] As shown in FIG. 4, an integrated e-mail file sharing
architecture may include e-mail software 401 on a sending computer,
an e-mail server on the sender side 405, an e-mail server on the
recipient side 407, and e-mail software 408 on the recipient
computer. In an example procedure, an e-mail message 403 is
composed using client software 401 and software 401 receives an
indication that file#01 402 should be made accessible through the
message 403. Responsively, software 401 may access file#01 402 and
upload a replica or copy of file#01 to a cloud server 406. The
replica or copy is stored as file#02 on cloud server 406 and
software 401 receives access information for accessing file#02.
Responsively, software 401 sends the access information to a
cloud-based server and the server generates a document (page#01)
404 containing the access information. In other cases, the access
information may be stored in the form in which the cloud-based
server receives it. An indication of page#01 (such as a network
address, Internet address, linked file, or connection executable)
is received or generated by software 401 and, in response to the
indication being received or generated by software 401, software
401 inserts or attaches the indication (or page#01 itself) to
message 403. Message 403 is sent through servers 405 and 407 to
software 408.
[0150] If the recipient software 408 is a standard e-mail client,
then the recipient receives e-mail message 409 (which is a copy of
message 403) from server 407 and accesses the link to the
cloud-based server. The recipient computer accesses page#01 404
from the cloud-based server. In some cases, the recipient computer
may receive a message encouraging the recipient to use the
cloud-based e-mail client, along with a download link. By accessing
page#01, the recipient is furnished with the link with access
information to file#02 on the cloud storage 406. Recipient computer
may use the link to access cloud storage 406 and download file#02,
forming file#03-local copy or replica of the file#02.
[0151] If the recipient software 408 is a client implementing
embodiments disclosed herein, then the process may be repeated in
the same way, except all the process of receiving file#03 may be
automated and file#03 may be either a copy or a replica of file#02.
If file#03 is a replica, then file#01 or file#03 may be updated
when the other is edited. The updating may be accomplished through
cloud-based server 404 so that file#02 need not be stored on cloud
server 406 to maintain the connection between file#01 and file#03.
In other implementations, file#02 may continue to be stored and may
serve as a link between the replica files.
[0152] If sender software 401 is also not a cloud-based client,
then an agent process may be included as an add-on to software 401.
The agent may accomplish the uploading and attachment/insertion of
the link that would have been performed by the cloud-based client.
Then, message 403 may be sent and received in the same way as
described above. Sender composes Outlook.TM. e-mail message, then
runs the "attach file" command.
[0153] FIG. 5 is a representation of a GUI 500 demonstrating a
multi-file type view in accordance with an illustrative embodiment.
In alternative embodiments, fewer, additional, and/or different
components may be displayed on the GUI. The GUI 500 includes
e-mails tab 505 and files tab 510. These two tabs may function
similarly to the e-mails and files tabs described above with
respect to FIG. 1. In this embodiment, the files tab 510 is
selected, and therefore files, instead of e-mails, are displayed in
the GUI 500. The GUI 500 also includes secondary tabs 515, which
are similar to the secondary tabs of FIG. 1, except that here the
secondary tabs 515 can be used to sort and view files instead of
e-mails. In this embodiment, the work secondary tab 515 is
selected, so that files relating to the user's work are displayed.
The GUI 500 indicates with icon 520 which secondary tab is
selected. In this scenario, the icon 520 is a folder because there
is an actual virtual folder for work related files. The displayed
files in the GUI 500 may be stored on different devices, but can
still be located in the same work virtual folder. The space size
indicator 525 indicates that the work virtual folder contains 2.3
gigabytes of data. In an alternative embodiment, the space size
indicator 525 may also indicate a space remaining that is allotted
to the user or the user's virtual work folder.
[0154] The folders display 530 of the GUI 500 shows that there are
six folders associated with work. The folders display 530 also
shows the six individual folders 540. A folders size indicator 535
indicates that the folders contain 900 megabytes of data. The
folders 540 may be opened to display the contents. The folders 540
may be physical or virtual folders, in that they may indicate
actual physical storage locations or organizational storage
locations.
[0155] The music display 545 of the GUI 500 shows several audio
files 550. While the music display 545 shows that 123 audio files
exist, only a few are actually shown on GUI 500. The system may
display audio files that are most often played by the user, or the
system may use some other criteria to determine which audio files
are displayed. In an alternative embodiment, the system may display
random audio files. If the user wishes to view other audio files,
the user may select the music display 545 title in order to
navigate to a GUI that displays more or all of the audio files. In
an alternative embodiment, the user may be able to scroll through
the list of the audio files 550 to view additional audio files.
[0156] The documents display 555 of the GUI 500 shows several
different documents of different types. The documents size
indicator 565 indicates that the documents take up 200 megabytes of
memory. Example documents displayed in the documents display 555
include document 560 and document 570. Similar to the audio files
above, these documents may be displayed randomly from the 432 total
documents, or the documents may be displayed based on a particular
criteria, such as most recently modified or opened documents.
[0157] Photos are also displayed on the GUI 500. For example, photo
575 and photo 585. For simplicity, photo 585 does not show an
image. However, photo 585 is meant to represent a lower resolution
image than that of photo 575. There are still further lower
resolution images displayed than photo 585. Further, a magnifying
glass icon 580 is shown. In this embodiment, the magnifying glass
icon 580 represents a search function that allows a user to search
only the photos in the work virtual folder. Note that similar icons
are present for the music, documents, and other portions of the GUI
500. In this way, particularly if the photo the user desires is not
currently displayed, the user may locate a particular photo or
photos. Photos may be searched based on the photos' metadata, for
example.
[0158] The other display 590 is also displayed on the GUI 500.
There are only two files in the other display 590. For example, the
file 595 is shown here. Files that may commonly be placed in the
other display 590 are files that may not easily fit into the other
categories displayed on the GUI 500, such as folders, music,
documents, and photos.
[0159] FIG. 6 is a representation of a GUI 600 demonstrating a
photo view in accordance with an illustrative embodiment. In
alternative embodiments, fewer, additional, and/or different
components may be displayed on the GUI. The GUI 600 includes
e-mails tab 605 and files tab 610. These tabs may be similar to
tabs 105 and 110 of FIG. 1. Here, the files tab 610 is selected, so
the GUI 600 displays files. On the left-hand side of the screen,
also referred to as a workspace, various storage mediums and types
of files are listed. All of these represent locations of storage
mediums and files that have previously been indexed by the
system.
[0160] The workspace includes a places 615 section, a disks 620
section, a clouds 625 section, a top tags section 630, a search for
635 section, and a representation of current storage utilization
640. The places 615 section includes documents, photos, videos,
attachments, etc. Each of the places 615 are considered virtual
locations. For example, if a user clicked on or otherwise selected
videos, all of the videos that can be accessed by the user would be
displayed regardless of their actual physical location. However,
the videos may still be displayed in the GUI 600 with an indicator
of each video's actual physical location. Here, the photos are
selected, as indicated by the arrow 645. Accordingly, photos are
being displayed on the GUI 600.
[0161] The disks 620 section includes hard disk drives, solid state
drives, or other physical memory of the user that has been indexed
by the system. Here the disks 620 includes a Macitosh HD and an
Iphone.TM. 4S, as examples. Unlike the places 615 section, the
selections available in the disks 620 section are not considered to
be a virtual location, but rather a physical location, since the
selections are associated with actual memory on actual physical
devices. Upon selecting one of the disks 620, the system would
display every file located on that memory. In an alternative
embodiment, the system may not display software applications that
are stored on a memory. In this embodiment, the actual file
location of the displayed files is inherently displayed, since a
physical memory has been selected and the arrow 645 would then
point to one of the disks 620. In a further embodiment, the system
could also show, along with individual files displayed from the
memory, where the files are actually located in a file tree
hierarchy within the respective memory.
[0162] The clouds 625 section includes cloud storage locations
where the user may have files stored. Additionally, the user may
have access to files stored on cloud storage locations that have
been placed there by others. The system may index and display those
files as well.
[0163] The workspace also includes a top tags 630 section. The top
tags show tags, which are a type of metadata, that are associated
with files in the various virtual and physical locations. The top
tags 630 section displays tags that are most commonly found among
the various files indexed by the workspace. In an alternative
embodiment, the top tags 630 section may only display the top tags
for the selected location that is selected to be displayed. For GUI
600, the currently selected location is the photos, so in this
embodiment, the top tags for all photos may be displayed. In
another embodiment, the top tags 630 section may not show the most
used tags, but may rather use a different metric for determining
which tags to display. For example, the system could display the
most popular tags among all users of the system, the most popular
tags of all users over a certain time period, the most popular tags
of a similar demographic to the user, the most popular tags among
those who the user has a relationship with such as the user's
e-mail contacts, social network contacts, cloud storage contacts,
etc. The system can also display tags that were most recently used
by the user. If a user clicks on or otherwise selects one of the
tags, whatever files are being displayed are sorted according to
the selected tab. That is, only files that have the particular tag
as metadata are shown. In alternative embodiments, multiple tags
may be selected to sort displayed files in various ways.
Furthermore, the tags that are displayed and how they are used can
be configured by the user.
[0164] The workspace also includes the search for 635 section. The
search for 635 section includes tags today, yesterday, and past
week. If the user selects one of these tags, files that have been
created or added to the system index in that time frame are
displayed. In another embodiment, files that have been modified
within the time frame are displayed. Other time ranges may also be
used in alternative embodiments. In still other embodiments, the
search for 635 section may include other types of tags, such as
names of users who may have authored, edited, sent, commented on,
or opened a file. By providing other types of tags here, the user
could sort and filter documents in even further ways. The tags in
the search for 635 section are all configurable by the user or may
be automatically generated by the system.
[0165] The workspace also includes the representation of current
storage utilization 640. The representation of current storage
utilization 640 demonstrates how much available and how much full
memory the user has. Here, the representation of current storage
utilization 640 demonstrates a total storage usage across all of
the user's available storage mediums listed in the workspace. In an
alternative embodiment, the representation of current storage
utilization 640 may be configured to display usage of only certain
storages, such as cloud storages or the user's iPhone.TM. 4S.
[0166] The photos as selected in the workplace are displayed in
display area 650. The photos displayed include, for example, photos
675 and 680. Each photo in the present embodiment is displayed with
a file title as well. The file title may indicate the name of the
file. In other embodiments, the file title may also indicate other
information, such as the actual physical location where the file is
stored, the status of the device where the file is stored, and
virtual locations the document is a part of, characteristics of the
file, user input information about the file, tags regarding the
file, and/or any other metadata relating to the file. Here, the
user has positioned a pointer from a motion translation device over
the photo 675. As a result, the system has highlighted the photo
675 by placing an additional box around it. In this way, the user
knows which photo will be selected if the user makes an input to
select a photo, such as with a mouse click.
[0167] The GUI 600 also includes a scroll bar 685. The scroll bar
685 allows the user to change the resolution of the photos he or
she is viewing. In other words, if the user adjusts the scroll bar
685, the photos displayed in the display area 650 are enlarged or
reduced depending on which direction the scroll bar 685 is
scrolled. Consequently, if the photos are enlarged, some photos may
be removed from the display area 650 because they can no longer all
fit in the display area 650. Similarly, if the size of the pictures
is reduced, more photos may be displayed in the display area 650.
In an alternative embodiment, the scroll bar 685 may instead be
used to cycle through photos that are displayed in the display area
650. In other words, if the user adjusts the scroll bar 685, the
photos in the display area 650 will change.
[0168] Navigation arrows 655 are also shown on the GUI 600. The
navigation can be used by the user to navigate to different
displays. For example, if the user interacts with the left facing
arrow, the system will display whatever was displayed previous to
the GUI 600. If the user then wishes to return to the GUI 600, the
user can interact with the right facing arrow. If instead the user
wishes to navigate to a GUI that was displayed two pages before the
GUI 600, the user may interact with the left facing arrow
twice.
[0169] A folder hierarchy 660 is also shown on the GUI 600. The
folder hierarchy 660 indicates the current folder location that is
being displayed, and allows the user to navigate to related parent
folders of the currently displayed folder. Here, the folder
hierarchy 660 has three sections, a left, middle, and right
section. Each section may, in other embodiments, have text and/or
an icon within the section indicating the location or function
described herein. The left section may represent an original or
home display. If the user clicks or otherwise interacts with the
left section, the display will be returned to such an original or
home display. The middle section represents a first hierarchical
layer of what is currently being displayed. In this case, the first
layer is places. As such, if the user interacts with the middle
section, the GUI may display documents from all of the places as
shown in the workspace on the left of the GUI 600. The right
section indicates the current display on the GUI 600. If the user
interacts with the right section, nothing will change on the
current display. In this case, the right section merely serves to
remind the user of the current location that is being displayed. In
another embodiment, interacting with the right section may reset
any filters, searches, or modifications that have adjusted what is
displayed in the display area 650. Such adjustments may be from the
user's use of the scroll bar 685, the search for 635 section, the
top tags 630 section, or others. In other words, in this
embodiment, interacting with the right section of the folder
hierarchy 660 leads to resetting the display of the currently
displayed location.
[0170] Sorting sub-tabs 665 are also displayed on the GUI 600. The
sorting sub-tabs 665 include creation date, recently changed, size,
name, and favorite. Additionally, a tabs sub-tab is displayed. The
tabs sub-tab may be used to configure which tabs are displayed in
the sorting sub-tabs 665. Next to the tabs sub-tab is a pin icon.
The user may interact with the pin icon to hide or show the
sub-tabs 665. The sub-tabs 665 can be interacted with by the user
to sort and filter what is shown in the display area 650. In this
embodiment, the creation date sub-tab is selected. Accordingly, the
photos displayed in the display area 650 are photos that have been
created most recently. In another embodiment, the photos displayed
in the display area may be those that have been created the longest
ago.
[0171] FIG. 7 is a representation of a GUI 700 demonstrating a
photo view with a search menu displayed in accordance with an
illustrative embodiment. In alternative embodiments, fewer,
additional, and/or different components may be displayed on the
GUI. The GUI 700 is similar to the GUI 600 in FIG. 6, except that a
search field 705 is being interacted with by a user. The GUI 700
includes the search field 705. Here, no text has been entered by
the user into the search field 705 yet, so a default text of
"SEARCH" is still displayed in the search field 705. However, the
user has activated a cursor in the search field 705. This causes an
auto fill menu 725 to be displayed. The auto fill menu 725 displays
suggestions for potential search results that the user may desire.
In this embodiment, results such as result 710 and 715 are
displayed. Here the user has positioned a pointer over the result
715. As a result, the system displays a preview 720 of the file
represented by the result 715. The preview 720 may include
extracted content of the file and/or metadata of the file.
[0172] FIG. 8 is a representation of a GUI 800 demonstrating an
e-mail interface with a sorted contact list in accordance with an
illustrative embodiment. In alternative embodiments, fewer,
additional, and/or different components may be displayed on the
GUI. The GUI 800 further displays an embodiment for viewing and
writing e-mails in accordance with an illustrative embodiment. The
GUI 800 includes an e-mails tab 805 and a files tab 810. Here, the
e-mails tab 805 is selected.
[0173] The GUI 800 also includes various sections of contacts, such
as the recent contacts 820 section, the lobster 825 section, the
family 830 section, and the friends 840 section. Here, the recent
contacts 815 are displayed, and for example include contact 820.
Here, only a name, e-mail address, and photo or avatar is shown.
However, alternative embodiments may show more or less information
relating to a contact. The lobster 825 contacts are not displayed
on the GUI 800. A downward facing arrow to the left of the lobster
825 indicates that the contacts are hidden. If the user interacts
with the downward facing arrow, the contacts will be displayed and
the downward facing arrow will be displayed as an upward facing
arrow, similar to those of family 830 and friends 840. If the
upward facing arrow of family 830 or friends 840 is interacted
with, those groups of contacts will not be displayed on the GUI
800. In this embodiment, recent contacts 815 cannot be hidden.
However, in other embodiments recent contacts 815 may be hidden.
Additionally, the groups of contacts displayed may be configured
automatically by the system or manually by the user. Contact 835 is
an example contact in the family 830 contacts section. Contact 845
is an example contact in the friends section.
[0174] In the GUI 800, the contact 820 is selected as evidenced by
an arrow 850, and therefore only messages from contact 820 are
shown in the GUI 800. For example, previews 875 and 880 of messages
from contact 820 are shown, as well as full e-mail 890. The
messages can be sorted or organized on the GUI 800 in several ways.
For example, the messages may be sorted or organized with message
type buttons 855. The user can select to display only one or more
message types. Here, the message types the user may select include
e-mails, Skype.TM. messages, Facebook.TM. chats, and iMessages.
Other options may be provided. The e-mails may also be sorted
utilizing sub-tabs 860, which include newest, oldest, important,
archived, and deleted. Here, the newest sub-tab is selected as
evidenced by an arrow 865.
[0175] Draft e-mail section 870 provides the user an opportunity to
respond to a selected e-mail. Draft e-mail section 870 allows the
user to enter text for an e-mail, add attachments, to an e-mail,
format the text of the e-mail, and add recipients to the
e-mail.
[0176] Here, preview 875 has been selected as evidenced by an arrow
885 by the user and is shown as the full e-mail 890. The preview
875 includes only contact information for the sender and some of
the text of the e-mail. The full e-mail 890 shows the contact
information, a more complete contact information 897, photos such
as photo 895, and the full text of the e-mail.
[0177] Additionally, the user for the GUI 800 has positioned a
pointer over preview 880. As a result, the system has displayed a
context menu over a portion of the preview 880. Further, it is
worth noting that the preview 880 is offset in the GUI 800 from the
other preview e-mails. This may indicate that the preview 880 is a
part of an e-mail conversation relating to the preview directly
above it.
[0178] The context menu includes six icons. Starting from the left,
a pin icon can be interacted with to determine whether or not the
e-mail remains on the GUI 800 display. The first left facing arrow
may be interacted with by the user to direct the display to the
first e-mail in an e-mail conversation. The second left facing
arrow may be interacted with to direct the display to the previous
e-mail in an e-mail conversation. Interacting with the right facing
arrow may direct the display to the next e-mail in an e-mail
conversation. In an alternative embodiment, the right facing arrow
may be interacted with to direct the display to the final or most
recent e-mail in an e-mail conversation. The icon second from the
right is a download icon. When interacted with by the user, the
e-mail and/or any attachments in the e-mail will be downloaded. The
last icon is an X icon. If interacted with, that e-mail will be
closed or hidden from view. In an alternative embodiment,
interacting with the X icon will delete the e-mail.
[0179] FIG. 9 is a representation of a GUI 900 demonstrating an
e-mail interface with a sorted contact list and an e-mail
correspondence chain in accordance with an illustrative embodiment.
In alternative embodiments, fewer, additional, and/or different
components may be displayed on the GUI. The GUI 900 is similar to
the GUI 800 shown in FIG. 8, with a few differences, one of which
is that e-mails from multiple contacts are displayed in the GUI
900.
[0180] Further, the GUI 900 includes alert numbers 905 and 910. The
alert number 905 indicates that the user has three unread or new
messages from contact Jane Wilson. The alert number 910 indicates
that the user has one unread or new message from contact Steve
Jones.
[0181] The full view e-mail in the GUI 900 includes a conversation
preview, made up of preview messages 915, 920, and 925. Each of the
preview messages 915, 920, and 925 represent a different message
that has been sent in a conversation relating to the full view
e-mail that is displayed in the GUI 900. Here preview messages 915
and 925 are messages sent by the user, thus designated with "YOU."
The preview message 920 was sent by another contact, whose name
would be displayed where "NAME" is shown on the GUI 900. If a user
interacts with any of the preview messages 915, 920, and 925, that
particular preview message will be displayed and can be reviewed by
the user in detail.
[0182] FIG. 10 is a representation of a GUI 1000 demonstrating a
single photo view in accordance with an illustrative embodiment. In
alternative embodiments, fewer, additional, and/or different
components may be displayed on the GUI. The GUI 1000 includes an
e-mails tab 1005 and a files tab 1010. On the GUI 1000, the files
tab 1010 is selected. Further, the GUI 1000 here shows a large view
of a photo 1030. The GUI 1000 may be a result of the selection of a
photo from FIG. 6, which is why the photo's virtual folder is
selected as evidenced by the arrow 1015. A view selector 1020 is
also shown on the GUI 1000. The different sections of the view
selector 1020 may be interacted with to change how the photos are
viewed. For example, interacting with the view selector may return
to a view like the one depicted in FIG. 6. Another section of the
view selector 1020 may be interacted with to show a list of photo
previews that displays significantly more metadata about the photos
than is shown in FIG. 6.
[0183] The photo that is being displayed on the GUI 1000 may also
be changed utilizing arrows 1035 and 1040. The user may move
forward or backward in a sequence of photos using the arrows 1035
and 1040. The GUI 1000 also shows tags related to the photo 1030,
such as tag 1055. Additionally, the user may add new tags to a
photo with add your tag 1060.
[0184] The GUI 1000 also displays comments relating to the photo
1030, such as comment 1045. The user, who in this embodiment is
named Eric Miller, may also comment on the photo 1030 using comment
dialog 1050.
[0185] FIG. 11 is a representation of a GUI 1100 demonstrating an
electronic files view with reminders in accordance with an
illustrative embodiment. In alternative embodiments, fewer,
additional, and/or different components may be displayed on the
GUI. The GUI 1100 includes an e-mails tab 1105 and a files tab
1110. On the GUI 1100, the files tab 1110 is selected. Here, the
Google.TM. Drive is selected in the workspace as evidenced by an
arrow 1115. The GUI 1100 includes large file previews, such as
previews 1120 and 1125, as well as listed documents, such as
document 1140.
[0186] Preview 1120 is shown as a single page preview. Preview 1125
displays only the first page of the file as preview, but indicates
that the file has multiple pages. In an alternative embodiment,
this may indicate that there are several copies of the file
throughout the user's devices, or that there are multiple versions
of the file. Each preview is also displayed with a name, such as
name 1130.
[0187] Above the listed documents are sorting tabs 1135. Sorting
tabs 1135 include creation date, recently changed, kind, size, name
and favorite. The user may interact with the sorting tabs 1135 to
manipulate which files are displayed in the listed documents. If
any of the listed documents are interacted with, they may be shown
as a large file preview. The listed documents also includes
reminder notes, such as reminder 1145. The user may make such
reminder notes either for himself or for other users who have
access to the files with the reminders through a cloud storage.
Additionally, reminders may also have been created by someone other
than the user here, and therefore the user may be viewing reminders
created by others. The list of documents also includes a checkbox
1150 and a favorite star 1155. The favorite star 1155 can be
toggled on and off so the user can designate or undesignated a file
as a favorite. The checkbox 1150 may be utilized by the user when
the user wishes to perform the same action on several files. To do
this, multiple files may be checked, or selected, and the action
can then be carried out on all the files that have been
checked.
[0188] FIG. 12 is a representation of a GUI 1200 demonstrating a
dynamic birds-eye view of a user's data in accordance with an
illustrative embodiment. In alternative embodiments, fewer,
additional, and/or different components may be displayed on the
GUI.
[0189] The GUI 1200 demonstrates a state of a dynamic view of all
of the user's data, which may be termed a birds-eye view. The
birds-eye view assists the user to understand the structure of all
of the data in his entire network. In addition, this dynamic view
presents any history of file changes to the user.
[0190] The GUI 1200 includes an e-mails tab 1205 and a files tab
1210. Here the Macintosh HD is selected from the workspace as
evidenced by an arrow 1215. Here, the search term "#GREEN" has been
entered into the search field 1220. Hence, any of the documents
represented in the birds-eye view are related to the search term.
However, in other embodiments, a dynamic display like the one in
FIG. 12 may be displayed without search terms being entered. For
example, if there were no search term entered in GUI 1200 but all
else was the same, the various displays in the GUI 1200 would
represent all of the files on the user's Macintosh HD, and not just
the files associated with a search term.
[0191] The groups of files, or amalgamations, shown in the GUI 1200
all represent different things. For example, group 1225 represents
all photos on the user's Macintosh HD that relate to the search
term. If the group 1225 is selected, the photos may be displayed
and examined in greater detail. The relative size and prominence of
the group 1225 conveys information to the user. Here, it may convey
that the user has more pictures than music or video. In another
embodiment, the relative prominence of group 1225 may be an
indicator that the user accesses photos more often than music or
video files. Similarly, groups 1230, 1240, and 1255 may also be
relatively sized based on quantity of files or preference of the
user. In another embodiment, the relative sizes of the groups may
indicate a relevance to the search term or terms. The groups may
also be displayed using different colors. This can make the display
more pleasant to look at, or the colors may indicate certain
properties or relevance of files. The groups 1240 and 1255 indicate
groups of files that correspond to certain hashtags. Groups such as
group 1230 represents groups of files that correspond to certain
contacts of the user.
[0192] In another example, groups 1235 and 1250 are displayed.
Here, all files relevant to the search term from the year 2013 are
represented by group 1235. Group 1235 is displayed more prominently
than the other year groups (here 2011 and 2012) because of a
relevance factor. That is, the system considers the year 2013 to be
more relevant than past years to the user, thus group 1235 is
displayed more prominently. Group 1250 is displayed with a medium
amount of prominence because it may also be considered relevant to
the user, since it contains files from last week. However, group
1250 is still intentionally smaller than group 1235 to indicate the
relatively smaller group of files that are from last week than are
from the entire year 2013. Also displayed on the GUI 1200 is a
search dialog 1245. The search dialog 1245 offers an alternative to
the search field 1220. Any searches performed using the search
dialog 1245 may be dynamically displayed. That is, if a user
searches for something, the user may visibly see groups change
shape, move, be added, disappear, or change color depending on the
relevance of files in each group to the search performed.
Furthermore, groups can be customized and configured by the user or
can be automatically generated by the system.
[0193] The groups displayed on the GUI 1200 can be interacted with
by the user in a unique way. Each of the groups is displayed as a
physical object that can be moved and has mass, speed, inertia,
acceleration, magnetic, gravity, and/or other physical forces. The
groups will therefore move and interact according to physical laws.
A user may interact with the groups by dragging, moving, etc. the
groups around the GUI 1200. The groups themselves also interact
with each other. For example, a very small group may be pulled
toward a larger group through a gravity force. Groups can change
behavior, trajectory, color, and shape while a user moves a pointer
or finger, types a search query, gets search results, moves items,
scrolls through lists, or does other actions. A search can be
performed by dragging a group or groups to the search dialog 1245.
A search term can be removed from the search by dragging it out of
the search dialog 1245. In one embodiment, the system is constantly
estimated each group's importance to the user, and the physical
size of the group indicates the relative importance calculation of
that group to the user. Other facets of a group may also be used to
indicate importance, such as position, shape, content, and dynamic
effects of a group.
[0194] For example, the groups may interact in ways similar to how
physical objects might interact. For example, if a user drags a
group by touching and swiping a group through a touchscreen, any
groups that the dragged group comes into contact with may be bumped
and moved on the display. In other words, no two groups may occupy
the same coordinate space on the GUI 1200, so if one bumps into
another one will have to yield. In this regard, when two groups
collide, the relative inertia, mass, and velocity of the groups may
be taken into account. In other words, if a smaller group bumps a
larger group, the larger group may be considered to have a larger
mass than the smaller group. Thus, the smaller group would be able
to transfer inertia to the larger group that either causes the
larger group to move only slowly, while causing the smaller group
to bounce off the larger group with much more velocity. In an
alternative embodiment, where the user is dragging a group as
described above, the system may give the group super powers. That
is, the user dragging a group may give the group virtually
unlimited mass, causing any group in its path to bounce off of it
and out of the way. In this way, if a user wants to place a group
in a particular place, they cannot be stopped from doing so.
[0195] In another example, certain groups may be subject to certain
magnetic forces. For example, one group may subjected to a force
between itself and a first type of groups, but not a second type of
groups. For example, a photos group may be pulled toward other
groups that contain other audio and/or visual media, such as
videos, podcasts, music, and the like. In this way, by programming
in a magnetic force between similar group types, the similar groups
can be displayed together because of the magnetic forces acting
upon them, as shown in one example in FIG. 12. The system may also
include negative magnetic forces. That, is some groups may also be
programmed to repel each other. For example, a GUI may include
groups related to personal photos and work photos. In order to
prevent the two from mixing or being associated with each other, a
repelling magnetic force may be programmed in.
[0196] Regarding mixing, the user may combine groups using the GUI
1200. For example, a user may specify that one group envelope
another to create a larger group representing the files of both the
original two groups.
[0197] In an embodiment where a user may drag different groups
around the GUI 1200, a user may slow down and stop the movement of
the group before releasing it. In this case, the group may not move
after release, but for other forces acting on it, such as
gravitational or magnetic forces. In another embodiment, the user
may not slow down or stop the movement of a group being dragged
before releasing the group. In this case, the moving group may
maintain its inertia unless acted on by other forces. For example,
the group may crash into other groups, cause the group to bounce
and/or the other groups to move on the GUI 1200.
[0198] Regarding searching, a user may search by either typing into
the search dialog 1245 or dragging other groups to the search
dialog 1245. For example, if the user wishes to see group
representations of files that only relate to the hashtag "sea," the
group 1255 may be dragged by the user to the search dialog 1245.
Once the group 1255 has been placed in the search dialog 1245, the
group 1255 may no longer be subjected to the forces it would
otherwise be subjected to. That is, the group 1255 is stuck in the
search dialog 1245. The system will perform the search by changing
the relative sizes of the other remaining groups displayed on the
GUI 1200 to indicate files that are relevant to the hashtag "sea."
The changing of the sizes may be demonstrated immediately, or may
be animated as a transition over time. Regardless of how quickly
the groups change size to indicate the search results, the forces
present between groups may change, and the groups will react
accordingly. For example, if a group gets bigger, it may push other
groups out of the way, while exerting a larger gravitational force
on the other groups. If a group gets smaller, the gravitational
force exerted on other groups may be reduced. The changes in
gravitational forces based on search results may cause the groups
to actually move on the GUI 1200 after the search is performed.
[0199] Although circles are used to represent groups in FIG. 12,
other shapes may be used in other embodiments. In such embodiments,
the shape of a group may impact how the groups physically interact.
For example, a circle bouncing off a circle in the GUI 1200 may not
happen in the exact same way as a circle bouncing off of a
triangle, the bounce angle may be different due to the different
shape.
[0200] FIG. 13 is a representation of a GUI 1300 demonstrating a
multi-level view including a hierarchical tree structure in
accordance with an illustrative embodiment. In alternative
embodiments, fewer, additional, and/or different components may be
displayed on the GUI. The GUI 1300 includes an e-mails tab 1305 and
a files tab 1310. Here the files tab 1310 is selected. Further, the
Macintosh HD is selected from the workspace. In the workspace, a
pointer has been directed by a user to the attachments/dropbox
location 1315. As a result, the system has displayed a highlighted
box around the attachments/dropbox location 1315. Further, in the
workspace, certain locations also indicate how many files are
physically stored at each location. For example, the Macintosh HD
has 241 files stored on it's hard drive. In an alternative
embodiment, such a number may indicate something different, such as
files indexed from this location within the last week or month.
[0201] The GUI 1300 also includes a search analysis section 1320.
This section indicates trends, data, and/or statistics regarding
the search results. For example, 44 of the search results are
associated with the tag "GREEN" and eleven of the search results
are from files from the year 2012. In alternative embodiments,
other statistics may also be displayed, such as size of files,
author of files, sender of files, number of versions or changes
from original, or importance.
[0202] A search term "REDCAT" has been entered into a search dialog
1325. Accordingly, each one of the files or file representations in
the GUI 1300 are related to the search term. A file tree hierarchy
1330 is shown in the GUI 1300. The file tree hierarchy 1330 shows a
navigable hierarchy that shows folders and sub-folders where
relevant search results are located. Each level of the hierarchy
also includes an indicator 1335 of how many relevant search results
are in each folder. The folders displayed here can represent
physical or virtual folders. A search results section 1340 may show
the contents of a folder selected from the file tree hierarchy
1330. In another embodiment, the system may automatically populate
the search results 1340 with various relevant search results 1360,
such as photo 1350 and document 1365. The search results 1360 may
also be modified or sorted using a drop down menu 1345. Here it is
indicated that the results have been modified.
[0203] There are also subsections of the search results 1360. Here,
the subsections include media and document type results, though
other types may be included in other embodiments such as contacts
and messages. The media results also include a show all button
1347. By interacting with the show all button 1347, all of the
media results may be displayed. In the alternative, if the user
would like to view more results, an arrow 1355 may be interacted
with to scroll through the different media results that are not
currently displayed.
[0204] Here, document 1365 has been selected from among the search
results. Accordingly in preview section 1375, a preview 1380 of the
document 1365 is displayed. Further information 1390 about the
previewed file is also displayed. If a user has previously made a
reminder regarding the file, the reminder is also displayed. Here,
reminder 1385 is displayed along with the preview 1380. At
collaborators 1395, the system may display who has collaborated on
the file with the user. However, in this embodiment, nobody has
collaborated on the file.
[0205] FIG. 14 is a representation of a GUI 1400 demonstrating a
multi-level view including a document preview in accordance with an
illustrative embodiment. In alternative embodiments, fewer,
additional, and/or different components may be displayed on the
GUI. The GUI 1400 shows an alternative display to the GUI 1300 of
FIG. 13. The GUI 1400 includes an e-mails tab 1405 and a files tab
1410. Here the files tab 1410 is selected. The workspace of GUI
1400 also demonstrates how the status of a device or location might
be indicated. At location 1445, external HD for films, there is an
indication that the location is offline. Here search results are
shown as folders, such as folders 1415, 1420, and 1425, and
documents, such as documents 1430 and 1435. Here the documents in
the search results including the documents 1430 and 1435 include an
extracted first page preview. The selected document, document 1430,
also has text from the document displayed as preview 1440, which
may be easier to read than the first page preview.
[0206] FIG. 15 is a representation of a GUI 1500 demonstrating the
contents of a specific device's storage in accordance with an
illustrative embodiment. In alternative embodiments, fewer,
additional, and/or different components may be displayed on the
GUI. The GUI 1500 includes an e-mails tab 1505 and a files tab
1510. Here, the files tab 1510 is selected. The GUI 1500 shows
another alternative embodiment to the GUIs 1300 and 1400 for
displaying search results. Here the preview on the right side of
the GUI 1500 is similar to previous embodiments. However, the
results are displayed as a list of documents and including metadata
regarding the documents. The search results include documents 1525
and 1530. Here, a priority icon 1520 is associated with the
document 1525. This indicates that the user has noted that the
document 1525 is a priority. Further, although not visible in FIG.
15, the priority icon 1520 and other priority icons may be color
coded in order to determine relative priority for different
documents. A check mark icon 1535 also appears next to certain
documents in the search results. Such a check mark icon 1535
indicates that the document has been backed-up on the user's cloud
storage. If the original file is on cloud storage, then a check
mark may indicate that the document has been backed up in a second
location.
[0207] FIG. 16 is a representation of a GUI 1600 demonstrating a
multi-level view including a document preview and an icon based
tagging section in accordance with an illustrative embodiment. In
alternative embodiments, fewer, additional, and/or different
components may be displayed on the GUI. FIG. 17 is a representation
of a GUI 1700 demonstrating an e-mail interface with a sorted
contact list, an e-mail correspondence chain, and an icon based
tagging section in accordance with an illustrative embodiment. In
alternative embodiments, fewer, additional, and/or different
components may be displayed on the GUI. Both the GUI 1600 and the
GUI 1700 display combinations of elements and functionalities
discussed previously with respect to other figures. The GUI 1600
and the GUI 1700 demonstrate alternative embodiments to the
previously discussed figures.
[0208] FIG. 18 is a block diagram illustrating various computing
and electronic storage devices that may be used in accordance with
an illustrative embodiment. In alternative embodiments, fewer,
additional, and/or different components may be included in the
system. FIG. 18 includes a personal computing device 1800, a
portable storage device 1897, a network 125, a cloud storage system
1830, a tablet device 1840, and a mobile electronic device 1865.
The personal computing device 1800 includes a processor 1815 that
is coupled to a memory 1805. The personal computing device 1800 can
store and recall data and applications in the memory 1805. The
processor 1815 may also display objects, applications, data, etc.
on a display/interface 1810. The display/interface 1810 may be a
touchscreen, a game system controller, a remote control, a
keyboard, a mouse, a trackpad, a microphone, a camera, a set of
buttons, a standard electronic display screen, a television, a
computer monitor, or any combination of those or similar
components. The processor 1815 may also receive inputs from a user
through the display/interface 1810. The processor 1815 is also
coupled to a transceiver 1820. With this configuration, the
processor 1815, and subsequently the personal computing device
1800, can communicate with other devices, such as the cloud storage
system 1830 through a connection 1887 and the network 1825.
Although FIG. 18 shows one personal computing device 1800, an
alternative embodiment may include multiple personal computing
devices.
[0209] The tablet device 1840 includes a processor 1855 that is
coupled to a memory 1845. The processor 1855 can store and recall
data and applications in the memory 1845. The processor 1855 may
also display objects, applications, data, etc. on a
display/interface 1850. The display/interface 1850 may be a
touchscreen as most tablets have, but may also include or
incorporate a keyboard, a game system controller, a remote control,
a mouse, a trackpad, a microphone, a camera, a set of buttons, a
standard electronic display screen, a television, a computer
monitor, or any combination of those or similar components. The
processor 1855 may also receive inputs from a user through the
display/interface 1850. The processor 1855 is also coupled to a
transceiver 1860. With this configuration, the processor 1855, and
subsequently the tablet device 1840, can communicate with other
devices, such as the personal computing device 1800 through a
connection 1895 and the network 1825.
[0210] The mobile electronic device 1865 includes a processor 1875
that is coupled to a memory 1885. The processor 1875 can store and
recall data and applications in the memory 1885. The processor 1875
may also display objects, applications, data, etc. on a
display/interface 1880. The display/interface 1880 may be a
touchscreen, a game system controller, a keyboard, a remote
control, a mouse, a trackpad, a microphone, a camera, a set of
buttons, a standard electronic display screen, a television, a
computer monitor, or any combination of those or similar
components. The processor 1875 may also receive inputs from a user
through the display/interface 1880. The processor 1875 is also
coupled to a transceiver 1870. With this configuration, the
processor 1875, and subsequently the viewer electronic device 1865,
can communicate with other devices, such as the tablet device 1840
through a connection 1890 and the network 1825. Although FIG. 18
shows only one mobile electronic device 1865, an alternative
embodiment may include multiple mobile electronic devices.
[0211] FIG. 18 also includes the cloud storage system 1830. The
cloud storage system 1830 may include a number of servers that may
have memory and processors. The cloud storage system 1830 is
connected to the network through a connection 1835 and may
communicate with other devices such as the mobile electronic device
1865.
[0212] FIG. 18 also includes the portable storage device 1897. This
portable storage device 1897 may be a removable USB drive for
example. Since such a portable memory does not have a processor,
the portable storage device 1897 must be connected to a computing
device for the information and files stored on the portable storage
device 1897 can be read by such devices. Accordingly, in this
embodiment, the portable storage device 1897 is plugged into the
personal computing device 1800, which can read the data from the
portable storage device 1897 and communicate its contents or data
related to its contents to any of the other devices that have
access to the network 1825.
[0213] The devices shown in the illustrative embodiment may be
utilized in various ways. For example, any of the connections 1887,
1890, 1895, and 1835 may be varied. Any of the connections 187,
190, 195, and 135 may be a hard wired connection. A hard wired
connection may involve connecting the devices through a USB
(universal serial bus) port (like connection 1899), serial port,
parallel port, or other type of wired connection that can
facilitate the transfer of data and information between a processor
of a device and a second processor of a second device. In another
embodiment, any of the connections 1887, 1890, 1895, and 1835 may
be a dock where one device may plug into another device. While
plugged into a dock, the client-device may also have its batteries
charged or otherwise be serviced. In other embodiments, any of the
connections 1887, 1890, 1895, and 1835 may be a wireless
connection. These connections may take the form of any sort of
wireless connection, including but not limited to Bluetooth
connectivity, Wi-Fi connectivity, or another wireless protocol.
Other possible modes of wireless communication may include
near-field communications, such as passive radio-frequency
identification (RFID) and active (RFID) technologies. RFID and
similar near-field communications may allow the various devices to
communicate in short range when they are placed proximate to one
another. In an embodiment using near field communication, two
devices may have to physically (or very nearly) come into contact,
and one or both of the devices may sense various data such as
acceleration, position, orientation, velocity, change in velocity,
IP address, and other sensor data. The system can then use the
various sensor data to confirm a transmission of data over the
internet between the two devices. In yet another embodiment, the
devices may connect through an internet (or other network)
connection. That is, any of the connections 1887, 1890, 1895, and
1835 may represent several different computing devices and network
components that allow the various devices to communicate through
the internet, either through a hard-wired or wireless connection.
Any of the connections 1887, 1890, 1895, and 1835 may also be a
combination of several modes of connection. The network 1825 may
also include similar components described above with respect to the
connections 1887, 1890, 1895, and 1835. In addition, the network
1825 may include intermediate servers, routing devices, processors,
data traffic management services, and wired or un-wired
connections.
[0214] To operate different embodiments of the system or programs
disclosed herein, the various devices may communicate using the
software systems and methods disclosed herein. Software
applications may be manually installed on the devices or downloaded
from the internet. Such software applications may allow the various
devices in FIG. 18 to perform some or all of the processes and
functions described herein. Additionally, the embodiments disclosed
herein are not limited to being performed only on the disclosed
devices in FIG. 18. It will be appreciated that many various
combinations of computing devices may execute the methods and
systems disclosed herein. Examples of such computing devices may
include smart phones, personal computers, servers, laptop
computers, tablets, blackberries, RFID enabled devices, video game
console systems, smart TV devices, or any combinations of these or
similar devices.
[0215] In one embodiment, a download of a program to the mobile
electronic device 1865 involves the processor 1875 receiving data
through the transceiver 1870 through connection 1890 and the
network 1825. The network 1825 may be connected to the internet.
The processor 1875 may store the data (like the program) in the
memory 1885. The processor 1875 can execute the program at any
time. In another embodiment, some aspects of a program may not be
downloaded to the viewer electronic device 1865. For example, the
program may be an application that accesses additional data or
resources located in a server, or even the cloud storage system
1830 which may include one or more servers. In another example, the
program may be an internet-based application, where the program is
executed by a web browser and stored in a server that is part of
the network 1825 or the cloud storage system 1830. In the latter
example, temporary files and/or a web browser may be used on the
mobile electronic device 1865 in order to execute the program,
system, application, etc. In additional embodiments, the tablet
device 1840 and the personal computing device 1800 may use, store,
or download software applications and web based programs in a
similar way.
[0216] The configuration of the personal computing device 1800, the
portable storage device 1897, the tablet device 1840, the mobile
electronic device 1865, the network 1825, and the cloud storage
system 1830 is merely one physical system on which the disclosed
embodiments may be executed. Other configurations of the devices
shown exist to practice the disclosed embodiments. Further,
configurations of additional or fewer devices than the ones shown
in FIG. 18 may exist to practice the disclosed embodiments.
Additionally, the devices shown in FIG. 18 may be combined to allow
for fewer devices or separated where more than the five devices
shown exist in a system.
[0217] FIG. 19 is a flow diagram illustrating a method 1900 of
displaying representative information of files and e-mails on a GUI
utilizing a two tab display in accordance with an illustrative
embodiment. In alternative embodiments, fewer, additional, and/or
different operations may be performed. Also, the use of a flow
diagram is not meant to be limiting with respect to the order of
operations performed. In an operation 1905, the system determines
the presence of electronic files, such as documents, photos,
videos, messages, and contacts, on a several electronic devices of
a user. Such devices could include a laptop, desktop computer,
external hard drive, tablet, smart phone, etc. The system may also
determine the presence of electronic files that the user has
control of in cloud storage mediums. The index of all these
electronic files may be stored on one of the user's devices or a
cloud storage medium that the user's devices can access.
[0218] In an operation 1910, representative information of the
electronic files that has been indexed is displayed in a single
window configuration. The electronic files are displayed on a first
tab in the single window. In this embodiment, the electronic files
displayed on the first tab do not include messages and contacts.
However, in other embodiments, messages and contacts may be
displayed.
[0219] In an operation 1915, a second tab is also displayed in the
single window configuration. In an operation 1920, an input is
received from the user to navigate to the second tab in the single
window. The input may be through a touchscreen, traditional mouse,
track pad, or other user input device. In an operation 1920, e-mail
files that have been indexed in the operation 1905 are displayed in
the second tab. Accordingly, the method 1900 allows for indexing of
electronic files, and a two tab display of information representing
those files. The two tabs each display information regarding
different types of electronic files. The two tabs can be switched
back and forth quite easily from a single interaction or input from
the user.
[0220] FIG. 20 is a flow diagram illustrating a method 2000 of
determining files a user has access to and displaying
representative information of the files on a GUI in accordance with
an illustrative embodiment. In alternative embodiments, fewer,
additional, and/or different operations may be performed. Also, the
use of a flow diagram is not meant to be limiting with respect to
the order of operations performed. In an operation 2005, a presence
of electronic files on user devices is determined and the files are
indexed. This operation may be performed similarly to operation
1905 of FIG. 19, discussed above.
[0221] In an operation 2010, the system further determines and
indexes any electronic files that have been shared with the user or
that the user has access to. For example, if a document is shared
with the user on a cloud storage medium, the system can determine a
presence of the document and index the document. In another
example, the system may determine photos that have been shared with
the user through photo sharing websites such as Flickr.TM. or
Facebook.TM.. In an additional example, even if a file has not been
shared with the user, its presence may still be determined by the
system as relevant to the users. For example, if a photo has not
been shared with the user, but the user has been tagged in the
photo in an online social network, then the system may determine
the photo relevant and index it. In an operation 2015,
representative information of the indexed files is displayed. The
representative information includes both location information and
descriptive information. That is, information on where a file is
located and what a file is are both displayed.
[0222] FIG. 21 is a flow diagram illustrating a method 2100 of
determining the status of various electronic devices and displaying
that status on a GUI in accordance with an illustrative embodiment.
In alternative embodiments, fewer, additional, and/or different
operations may be performed. Also, the use of a flow diagram is not
meant to be limiting with respect to the order of operations
performed. In an operation 2105, a status of various electronic
devices is determined. For example, a status of an electronic
device may be a connection status, an online status, an offline
status, a passive status, an active status, a connected status, an
unconnected status, a currently operational status, a currently
non-operational status, or a set in a lower functional mode status.
For example, a lower functional mode may be a sleep, hibernate, or
screen saver type mode. In another example, a lower functional mode
may indicate that a device is locked or not logged into. In another
example, a lower functional mode may indicate that a mobile device
is on, but that most of the inputs are currently disabled and a
display is turned off (for example, when someone darkens their
phone while it is in his or her pocket or handbag).
[0223] In an operation 2110, the status of each electronic device
is displayed. The status of each device may be indicated on a GUI.
In an operation 2115, the status of each device is displayed along
with representative information of electronic files. In other
words, for an electronic file stored on an electronic device, the
system will display a status along with the file whether the device
where that file is stored is online or offline.
[0224] FIG. 22 is a flow diagram illustrating a method 2200 of
extracting data from an electronic file and displaying a preview of
the file on a GUI in accordance with an illustrative embodiment. In
alternative embodiments, fewer, additional, and/or different
operations may be performed. Also, the use of a flow diagram is not
meant to be limiting with respect to the order of operations
performed. In an operation 2205, data is extracted from an
electronic file. In an operation 2210, the extracted data is used
to generate a visual preview of the electronic file. For example,
if the file is a document, a smaller version of the first page of
the document may be used as a preview. In another example, if the
file is a photo, a thumbnail of the photo can be generated to use
as a preview. In an operation 2215, the visual preview generated
from the extracted data is actually displayed on a GUI.
[0225] FIG. 23 is a flow diagram illustrating a method 2300 of
receiving an input from a user and displaying a context menu on a
GUI in accordance with an illustrative embodiment. In alternative
embodiments, fewer, additional, and/or different operations may be
performed. Also, the use of a flow diagram is not meant to be
limiting with respect to the order of operations performed. In an
operation 2305, the system receives an input from a motion
translation device. In an operation 2310, when a pointer is located
over representative information of a file and a further input is
received such as a mouse click, a context menu relating to the
electronic file is displayed.
[0226] FIG. 24 is a flow diagram illustrating a method 2400 of
receiving an input from a user an opening an electronic file to be
displayed on a GUI in accordance with an illustrative embodiment.
In alternative embodiments, fewer, additional, and/or different
operations may be performed. Also, the use of a flow diagram is not
meant to be limiting with respect to the order of operations
performed. In an operation 2405, the system receives an input from
a motion translation device. In an operation 2410, when a pointer
is located over representative information of a file and a further
input is received such as a mouse click, the electronic file is
opened from an online device. In other words, a file is opened from
a device that is currently accessible. The system may open the file
with a predetermined primary application or a predetermined
secondary application. For example, a Microsoft Word.TM. document
may be opened and viewed in Word.TM. or Google.TM. Docs. The system
may have a predefined preference for Microsoft Word.TM., but if
that application is not available, the system can attempt to open
the file with other applications.
[0227] FIG. 25 is a representation of a GUI 2500 demonstrating a
tagging system and a context menu in accordance with an
illustrative embodiment. In alternative embodiments, fewer,
additional, and/or different components may be displayed on the
GUI. The GUI 2500 is similar to the GUI 1400 discussed above with
respect to FIG. 14, with some differences that will be noted here
(and the difference that FIG. 25 only shows a portion of the view
shown in the GUI 1400).
[0228] The GUI 2500 includes a search dialog 2505. Here, the search
dialog 2505 has the search term "REDCAT" entered. Accordingly,
results shown, such as folder 2510 and document 2515 are related to
the search term. In the top tags section of the GUI 2500, different
tag indicators are displayed. For example, tag 2530 and 2535 are
shown on the GUI 2500. The different tag symbols, including the
tags 2530 and 2535 are each shown with a different pattern to so
that the tags can be easily identified elsewhere. In other
embodiments, other visual aspects could be used to indicate the
different tags, such as different colors, different icons, or
different text as shown in the tags below the tags 2530 and
2535.
[0229] In the search results, the folder 2510 is associated with
the tag 2530, as indicated by tag indicator 2520. The pattern
within the tag indicator 2520 and the tag 2530 are the same,
indicating that the tag 2530 applies to the folder 2510. Similarly,
the tag indicator 2525 associated with the document 2515 matches
the patter of the tag 2535. Accordingly, the document 2515 is
associated with the tag 2535.
[0230] Further, a pointer 2545 is shown on the GUI 2500.
Accordingly, the outline of the tag 2535 appears different than the
other tags because the pointer 2545 is located over the tag 2535.
Although here the outline of the tag 2535 is different, the tag
2535 could change in other ways to indicate the pointer is over the
tag 2535. Further, the presence of the pointer 2545 over the tag
2535 also causes the system to display the tag dialog box 2540. The
tag dialog box 2540 could also be referred to as a context menu.
That is, the content of what is shown in the tag dialog box 2540 is
dependent on the context of how and where the box is displayed
(here, the context relates specifically to the tag 2535). Although
here the tag dialog box 2540 is automatically displayed based on
the presence of the pointer 2545 over the tag 2535, in other
embodiments a user may need a further input such as a mouse click
to cause the tag dialog box 2540 to be displayed.
[0231] The tag dialog box 2540 indicates that tag info is being
displayed. The tag dialog box 2540 further displays an "X" which if
interacted with by the user causes the tag dialog box 2540 to close
and cease being displayed on the GUI 2500. The tag dialog box 2540
also includes descriptive words relating to the tag. Here, the tag
is related to "fishing documents." Accordingly, the document 2515
is classified as a fishing document. A user may interact with the
descriptive words to redefine or further define the tag 2535.
[0232] FIG. 26 is a flow diagram illustrating a method 2600 of
generating tags associated with electronic files in accordance with
an illustrative embodiment. In alternative embodiments, fewer,
additional, and/or different operations may be performed. Also, the
use of a flow diagram is not meant to be limiting with respect to
the order of operations performed. In an operation 2605, the system
determines a presence of electronic files of different types that
are stored on multiple devices as disclosed herein. The electronic
files may be many various types of files and the multiple
electronic devices may be many various types of devices as
disclosed herein.
[0233] In an operation 2610, the system determines metadata of the
electronic files. As disclosed herein, metadata may include data
such as the size of a file, date created, date modified, version,
author, creator, location data, and many other various data related
to the electronic files. In an operation 2615, the system generates
tags for the electronic files based on the determined metadata. As
disclosed herein, the generating of the tags may be automatic by
the system or may be manually done by the user.
[0234] FIG. 27 is a flow diagram illustrating a method 2700 of
displaying search results related to a tag search in accordance
with an illustrative embodiment. In alternative embodiments, fewer,
additional, and/or different operations may be performed. Also, the
use of a flow diagram is not meant to be limiting with respect to
the order of operations performed. In an operation 2705, the system
receives a search input that includes a tag. The search input may
be input by a user by entering text, or, for example, the user may
simply click on a tag on a GUI and the system understands this
interaction to indicate a search input of that tag. In an
alternative embodiment, the system may receive a search input
including text, but the system can determine that the text is
similar to a tag.
[0235] In an operation 2710, the system identifies electronic files
associated with the tag. In an operation 2715, the system displays
on a GUI representative information of the electronic files
identified that are associated with the tag. The system may display
the electronic files on any number of GUIs as disclosed herein.
Furthermore, the system may determine particular electronic files
of which to display the representative information of more
prominently based on an importance level of that electronic file's
associated tags.
[0236] FIG. 28 is a flow diagram illustrating a method 2800 of
utilizing a watchdog tag in accordance with an illustrative
embodiment. In alternative embodiments, fewer, additional, and/or
different operations may be performed. Also, the use of a flow
diagram is not meant to be limiting with respect to the order of
operations performed. In an operation 2805, the system receives a
watchdog input. The watchdog input is defined here to mean that a
user interacts with a tag in way that indicates to the system that
the user wishes to designate that tag as a watchdog tag.
[0237] In an operation 2810, the system designates a watchdog tag
in response to the watchdog input from the user. In an operation
2815, the system identifies during a baseline search electronic
files related to the watchdog tag. In this embodiment, the baseline
search is performed relatively soon after the system has designated
the watchdog tag, so that the baseline of electronic files
associated with the watchdog tag can be established as soon as
possible after the system receives the watchdog input from the
user.
[0238] In an operation 2820, the system identifies electronic files
during a follow up search any electronic files associated with the
watchdog tag. In an operation 2825, the system determines a
difference between the results of the baseline search and the
follow up search results. In an operation, 2830, the system sends a
notification to the user regarding the determined different between
the baseline search results and the follow up search results. In an
alternative embodiment, the system may not determine a difference
between the baseline search results and the follow up search
results. In that case, a notification would not be sent to the user
because there would be no difference to notify the user of. In
another alternative embodiment, the system may determine whether
differences between the baseline search results and the follow up
search results have reached a certain predetermined threshold
before notifying the user. In this way, the system may avoid
sending annoying or useless notifications to a user regarding
trivial changes and differences between the baseline search results
and the follow up search results. Instead, the system would only
send notifications to the user when the changes and differences
between the two results were enough. Such changes may relate to a
total number of electronic files changed, or the metric may rather
be a certain percentage of a single electronic file must be changed
to meet the predetermined threshold for notification.
[0239] FIG. 29 is a flow diagram illustrating a method 2900 of
displaying electronic files with high importance tags in accordance
with an illustrative embodiment. In alternative embodiments, fewer,
additional, and/or different operations may be performed. Also, the
use of a flow diagram is not meant to be limiting with respect to
the order of operations performed. In an operation 2905, the system
determines that a tag is of high importance. The system may make
this determination according to various systems and methods as
already described herein in detail.
[0240] In an operation 2910, the system displays on a GUI an
electronic file associated with the tag of high importance more
prominently than an electronic file that is not associated with the
tag of high importance. The display may be in accordance with
various systems and methods as disclosed herein. For example, a
more prominently displayed electronic file may include a preview of
the file, while a less prominently displayed file may not include a
preview.
[0241] FIG. 30 is a flow diagram illustrating a method 3000 of
indexing tags associated with electronic files in accordance with
an illustrative embodiment. In alternative embodiments, fewer,
additional, and/or different operations may be performed. Also, the
use of a flow diagram is not meant to be limiting with respect to
the order of operations performed. In an operation 3005, the system
generates an index of tags related to various electronic files in
accordance with systems and methods disclosed herein. In an
operation 3010, the system stores the index on a single one of a
plurality of electronic devices. For example, the system may store
the index in a cloud storage system, a user's laptop, or a user's
smart phone. Advantageously, this allows a user to search tags of
various electronic files, even if the electronic files themselves
are being stored on an electronic device that is not currently
available.
[0242] FIG. 31 is a flow diagram illustrating a method 3100 of
moving files according to an optimal storage utilization of an
electronic device in accordance with an illustrative embodiment. In
alternative embodiments, fewer, additional, and/or different
operations may be performed. Also, the use of a flow diagram is not
meant to be limiting with respect to the order of operations
performed. In an operation 3105, a current storage utilization
level of a first device is determined by the system. The current
storage utilization level represents an amount of storage that is
being used by a particular electronic device. In other embodiments,
the system may determine and utilize current storage utilization
levels of multiple devices combined or all of the devices of a user
combined. In another alternative embodiment, the system may utilize
a current storage utilization level that indicates an average
storage utilization level of multiple devices.
[0243] In an operation 3110, the system determines that the current
storage utilization level of the first device exceeds an optimal
storage utilization level. Such an optimal storage utilization
level may be a default level set by the system. The default level
may be tailored to a specific device. For example, a tablet may
have a default optimal storage utilization level of 65% or less,
while an external hard drive may have a default optimal storage
utilization level of 95% or less. In an alternative embodiment, the
user may set and determine the optimal storage utilization levels
for all or some of the user's devices.
[0244] In an operation 3115, the system determines that a first
file on the first device is associated with a tag of a particular
importance level. In an operation 3120, the file is moved from the
first device to the second device. In an alternative embodiment,
the electronic file being associated with a tag of a particular
importance level would cause the system to not relocate the file,
and instead relocate a file that is not associated with the
tag.
[0245] In an illustrative embodiment, any of the operations
described herein can be implemented at least in part as
computer-readable instructions stored on a computer-readable medium
or memory. Upon execution of the computer-readable instructions by
a processor, the computer-readable instructions can cause a
computing device to perform the operations.
[0246] The foregoing description of illustrative embodiments has
been presented for purposes of illustration and of description. It
is not intended to be exhaustive or limiting with respect to the
precise form disclosed, and modifications and variations are
possible in light of the above teachings or may be acquired from
practice of the disclosed embodiments. It is intended that the
scope of the invention be defined by the claims appended hereto and
their equivalents.
* * * * *