Managing dynamically schedulable meetings

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-2016140508-A1
Application number	US-201414546939-A
Country	US
Kind code	A1
Filing date	Nov 18, 2014
Priority date	Nov 18, 2014
Publication date	May 19, 2016
Grant date	—

Abstract

Management of a dynamically schedulable meeting is provided. An application such as a calendar application detects a request to schedule the dynamically schedulable meeting. The request includes a time range and meeting attendees. Events on a calendar are analyzed to locate a timeslot for the dynamically schedulable meeting within the time range. The timeslot is identified. In response to a failure to identify the timeslot, other dynamically schedulable meetings are re-scheduled to generate the timeslot. The dynamically schedulable meeting is scheduled at the timeslot.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1 . A computing device to manage a dynamically schedulable meeting, the computing device comprising:
a memory; a processor coupled to the memory and the display device, the processor executing a calendar application, wherein the calendar application is configured to:
detect a request to schedule the dynamically schedulable meeting;
analyze events associated with attendees of the dynamically schedulable meeting on a calendar to locate a timeslot for the dynamically schedulable meeting within an acceptable time range of the dynamically schedulable meeting;
identify the timeslot;
in response to a failure to identify the timeslot, re-schedule other dynamically schedulable meetings to generate the timeslot; and
schedule the dynamically schedulable meeting at the timeslot.

2 . The computing device of claim 1 , wherein the calendar application is further configured to:
detect the request to include the time range and the attendees selected by a meeting organizer.

3 . The computing device of claim 1 , wherein the calendar application is further configured to:
detect one or more dynamically schedulable locations in the request; and identify an available subset from the one or more dynamically schedulable locations within the time range.

4 . The computing device of claim 3 , wherein the calendar application is further configured to:
detect an available dynamically schedulable location from the available subset at the timeslot, wherein travel time of the attendees to the available dynamically schedulable location is accommodated while selecting the available dynamically schedulable location; and schedule the dynamically schedulable meeting at the available dynamically schedulable location.

5 . The computing device of claim 3 , wherein the calendar application is further configured to:
select an available location for the available subset at the timeslot, wherein the available location is within a closest distance to locations of a majority of the attendees at the timeslot; and schedule the dynamically schedulable meeting at the available location.

6 . The computing device of claim 1 , wherein the calendar application is further configured to:
schedule the dynamically schedulable meeting for a dynamically schedulable group that includes the attendees, wherein the attendees provide a high level trust privilege to allow re-schedule operations of the events associated with the attendees.

7 . The computing device of claim 6 , wherein the calendar application is further configured to:
detect a subset of the events that conflict with the dynamically schedulable meeting, wherein the subset of the events is associated with a minimum number of the attendees; and re-schedule the subset of the events associated with the attendees.

8 . The computing device of claim 6 , wherein the calendar application is further configured to:
assign a weight value to each of the attendees based on a role within an organization associated with each of the attendees; order the attendees in an weight list based on the weight value of the attendees; detect a subset of the events that conflict with the dynamically schedulable meeting, wherein the subset of the events is associated with a minimum number of the attendees that are in the bottom of the weight list; and re-schedule the subset of the events associated with the attendees.

9 . The computing device of claim 1 , wherein the calendar application is further configured to:
execute one of: a meeting accept operation, a meeting decline operation, or a meeting pin operation associated with the dynamically schedulable meeting and a subset of the events that conflict with the dynamically schedulable meeting to schedule the dynamically schedulable meeting at the timeslot.

10 . The computing device of claim 1 , wherein the calendar application is further configured to:
manage a history of changes to a subset of the events that conflict with the timeslot of the dynamically schedulable meeting, wherein the history is analyzed to predict a meeting stability level used to prioritize a list of available slots for the dynamically schedulable meeting.

11 . The computing device of claim 1 , wherein the calendar application is further configured to:
process the request with one or more scheduling rules to conform the time range to the one or more scheduling rules, wherein the one or more rules include: a work week schedule constriction and a break time schedule constriction, a rhythm of business rule, a dependency rule, and a stability rule.

12 . A method executed on a computing device to manage a dynamically schedulable meeting, the method comprising:
detecting a request to schedule the dynamically schedulable meeting, wherein the request includes an acceptable time range and one or more attendees in a dynamically schedulable group selected by a meeting organizer; analyzing events associated with the one or more attendees on a calendar to locate a timeslot for the dynamically schedulable meeting within the time range of the dynamically schedulable meeting; identifying the timeslot; in response to a failure to identify the timeslot, re-scheduling other dynamically schedulable meetings to generate the timeslot; and scheduling the dynamically schedulable meeting at the timeslot.

13 . The method of claim 12 , further comprising:
detecting the request to include an occurrence of the dynamically schedulable meeting; and treating each instance of the occurrence separately as a dynamically schedulable meeting and resolving conflicts according to one or more specifications of the occurrence defining an acceptable time range for each instance of the occurrence.

14 . The method of claim 12 , further comprising:
in response to a failure to identify a timeslot within the acceptable time range, placing the dynamically schedulable meeting into a waiting list; in response to a cancellation of one or more events that result in providing a timeslot for the dynamically schedulable meeting or in an opportunity to execute an automated re-scheduling, scheduling the dynamically schedulable meeting at the timeslot and removing from the waiting list.

15 . The method of claim 12 , further comprising:
receiving a decline reply from a declining attendee of the one or more attendees of the dynamically schedulable meeting; and analyzing a role of the declining attendee in relation to the dynamically schedulable meeting.

16 . The method of claim 15 , further comprising:
in response to determining that the role includes an essential role, re-scheduling the dynamically schedulable meeting to a new timeslot.

17 . The method of claim 15 , further comprising:
in response to determining that the role includes a trivial role, removing the declining attendee from the dynamically schedulable meeting.

18 . A system to manage a dynamically schedulable item, the system comprising:
a server comprising a memory and a processor coupled to the memory, the processor executing a calendar application, wherein the calendar application is configured to:
detect a request to schedule the dynamically schedulable item, wherein the dynamically schedulable item includes one from a set of: a meeting, an appointment, and a task;
analyze events associated with the one or more attendees on a calendar to locate a timeslot for the dynamically schedulable item within a time range of the dynamically schedulable item;
identify the timeslot;
in response to a failure to identify the timeslot, re-schedule o

Assignees

• Microsoft Technology Licensing Llc

Inventors

• Ossia Yoav
• Adar Yehuda Arkin
• Greenwald Eli
• Zvi Raanan
• Zusman Dimitry
• Datsenko Dima
• Didi Ran

Classifications

• G06Q10/1093 Primary

  Calendar-based scheduling for persons or groups · CPC title

• G06Q10/1095 Primary

  Physics · mapped topic