Endorsement indications in communication environments

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-2016269333-A1
Application number	US-201514737805-A
Country	US
Kind code	A1
Filing date	Jun 12, 2015
Priority date	Mar 11, 2015
Publication date	Sep 15, 2016
Grant date	—

Abstract

Communication services enable two or more users to communicate electronically using multiple modes of communication. Conversations between groups of users are common, where one or more communications may be exchanged repeatedly over a period of time. In some scenarios, a communication desired to be conveyed by a participant in a conversation may be a simple endorsement, such as receipt acknowledgment and various levels of social activity actions and/or gestures, which may be useful for other participants of the conversation to see as well. Provision of endorsement indications in communication environments may enable the participant to select an endorsement for a communication or a conversation without explicitly replying to the communication or conversation, where an endorsement indication based on the selected endorsement may be transmitted and displayed to the other participants of the conversation through an endorsement module of the communication service.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1 . A computing device to provide endorsement indications in a communication environment, the computing device comprising:
a memory configured to store instructions; and one or more processors coupled to the memory that are configured to execute a communication service, wherein the communication service comprises:
a communication module configured to facilitate exchange of one or more communications within a conversation; and
an endorsement module configured to:
enable a recipient of an exchanged communication to select an endorsement for the exchanged communication through a communication user experience associated with the recipient that displays the one or more exchanged communications within the conversation;
transmit an endorsement indication based on the selected endorsement to a sender and one or more other recipients of the exchanged communication over a designated communication channel; and
enable display of the endorsement indication through communication user experiences associated with the sender and the one or more other recipients of the exchanged communication.

2 . The computing device of claim 1 , wherein the exchanged communication is one or more of an email exchange, a meeting invite, a shared contact card, a shared task, a text message exchange, an online conference, an audio communication, a video communication, an application sharing session, a desktop sharing session, and a data sharing session.

3 . The computing device of claim 1 , wherein the endorsement is one or more of a receipt acknowledgement and a social activity action.

4 . The computing device of claim 3 , wherein the social activity action is one of a like, a dislike, and a mention.

5 . The computing device of claim 4 , wherein the like and dislike social activity actions include one or more respective levels of like and dislike.

6 . The computing device of claim 1 , wherein the endorsement indication includes one or more of the recipient, the selected endorsement, the exchanged communication, a group associated with the exchanged communication, and a time elapsed from the selection of the endorsement.

7 . The computing device of claim 1 , wherein the designated communication channel is a control messaging channel in a transport layer of the communication service.

8 . A method executed on a computing device to provide endorsement indications in a communication environment, the method comprising:
enabling a recipient of an exchanged communication to select an endorsement for the exchanged communication through a communication user experience associated with the recipient that displays one or more exchanged communications within a conversation; transmitting an endorsement indication based on the selected endorsement to a sender and one or more other recipients of the exchanged communication over a designated communication channel; and enabling display of the endorsement indication through communication user experiences associated with the sender and the one or more other recipients of the exchanged communication.

9 . The method of claim 8 , further comprising:
enabling the display of the endorsement indication as one of a message and a notification.

10 . The method of claim 8 , further comprising:
enabling the sender and the one or more other recipients to preview the selected endorsement for the exchanged communication through the displayed endorsement indication.

11 . The method of claim 8 , further comprising:
enabling the sender and the one or more other recipients to navigate to the exchanged communication through selection of the displayed endorsement indication.

12 . The method of claim 8 , further comprising:
enabling display of an endorsement count for the exchanged communication in a communication list view through the communication user experiences associated with the sender, the recipient, and the one or more other recipients.

13 . The method of claim 12 , further comprising:
in response to detecting one of a hover over and a user selection of the displayed endorsement count, providing an endorser list for the exchanged communication that indicates the sender, the recipient, or the one or more other recipients that selected endorsements for the exchanged communication.

14 . The method of claim 12 , further comprising:
in response to a determination that the endorsement count for the exchanged communication is less than N, replacing the endorsement count with identifiers of the sender, the recipient, or the one or more other recipients that selected endorsements for the exchanged communication, wherein N is a predetermined integer.

15 . The method of claim 8 , further comprising:
enabling display of an endorsement count for the conversation in a conversation list view through the communication user experiences associated with the sender, the recipient, and the one or more other recipients.

16 . The method of claim 8 , further comprising:
providing one or more endorsement options for recipient selection based on past recipient interactions with the exchanged communication through the communication user experience associated with the recipient.

17 . The method of claim 16 , wherein the one or more endorsement options provided for recipient selection include a receipt acknowledgement, a like, an unlike, a dislike, an undislike, a mention, and a revoke mention.

18 . The method of claim 8 , further comprising:
aggregating one or more other endorsement indications for the exchanged communication with the endorsement indication.

19 . A computer readable memory device with instructions stored thereon to provide endorsement indications in a communication environment, the instructions comprising:
providing endorsement options for an exchanged communication for recipient selection through a communication user experience associated with the recipient that displays one or more exchanged communications within a conversation; enabling the recipient to select an endorsement for the exchanged communication from the endorsement options; transmitting an endorsement indication based on the selected endorsement to a sender and one or more other recipients of the exchanged communication over a designated communication channel; and enabling a display of the endorsement indication through communication user experiences associated with the sender and the one or more other recipients of the exchanged communication.

20 . The computer readable memory device of claim 19 , wherein transmitting the endorsement indication to the sender and the one or more other recipients of the exchanged communication over the designated communication channel comprises:
distributing the endorsement indication to one of individual mailboxes or shared mailboxes.

Assignees

• Microsoft Technology Licensing Llc

Inventors

• Kumar Santosh
• Desouza Sana Giselli Panontini
• Teixeira Alisson
• Gupta Amit
• Kwan Cindy
• Singh Sangya
• Sundaram Naresh
• Gehrke Johannes
• Cook Jason
• Mbabazi Victoria
• Murphy Ryan
• Pazuchanics Skye

Classifications

• G06Q10/40

  Business processes related to social networking or social networking services · CPC title

• G06F3/0482 Primary

  Interaction with lists of selectable items, e.g. menus · CPC title

• G06F3/04842

  Selection of displayed objects or displayed text elements (G06F3/0482 takes precedence) · CPC title

• H04L51/22

  Electricity · mapped topic

• H04L51/16 Primary

  Electricity · mapped topic