Methods and systems for managing an electronic calendar

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-9058595-B2
Application number	US-49940606-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Aug 4, 2006
Priority date	Aug 4, 2006
Publication date	Jun 16, 2015
Grant date	Jun 16, 2015

Abstract

Methods and systems for managing an electronic calendar are described. One exemplary method includes displaying a calendar on a display device, the calendar having at least one time range, and displaying an invitation, before it is accepted, on the calendar in the at least one time range with other events which are already accepted. Another exemplary method includes displaying a calendar on a display device and displaying a list of user-selectable calendars comprising an invitation calendar which presents invitations which have not yet been accepted or declined on the invitation calendar. Other methods are described, and machine readable media and systems are also described.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1. A machine readable non-transitory storage medium containing executable program instructions which cause a data processing system to perform operations comprising:
displaying a calendar view which includes a list of user-selectable calendars on a display device, the calendar view being configured with at least one area corresponding to a time range;
displaying, within the calendar view, an invitation calendar control to control the visibility of an invitation calendar that displays all invitations within the calendar view prior to accepting or declining the invitations and separately controllable from any other user-selectable calendars in the list of user-selectable calendars;
receiving a notification having an invitation for an event within the time range; and
displaying the invitation, before it is accepted or declined, within the invitation calendar on the area of the calendar view in response to a user input selecting the invitation calendar control, wherein the notification is indicated on the display device to invite a user to select the invitation calendar control if the invitation is not visible within the calendar view, and
wherein the invitation, if accepted, will display within a different user-selectable calendar of the list of user-selectable calendars.

2. A medium as in claim 1 wherein the at least one time range comprises one of at least a portion of a day, a week, a plurality of weeks, a month, and a plurality of months, and wherein the operations further comprise:
receiving a user input, via the invitation calendar control, to display the invitation within the invitation calendar, before it is accepted or declined, on the calendar view along with other events, already accepted, and displayed in association with other calendars of the list of user-selectable calendars on the calendar view.

3. A medium as in claim 1 , wherein the notification is automatically converted for the display of the invitation on the calendar view.

4. A medium as in claim 1 , the operations further comprising:
displaying a user interface to allow a user to accept or decline the invitation.

5. A medium as in claim 4 wherein the user interface comprises an accept icon and a decline icon displayed on the invitation on the calendar view.

6. A medium as in claim 4 wherein the operations further comprise displaying the invitation in a first state within the invitation calendar on the calendar view before accepting or declining the invitation; and wherein accepting the invitation causes the invitation to be displayed on the calendar view associated with a different user-selectable calendar and in a second state to show it is accepted.

7. A medium as in claim 4 wherein the invitation is presented differently on the calendar view than other events, already accepted, on the calendar view.

8. A medium as in claim 7 wherein the invitation is visually distinguishable from the other events and the time span of the invitation is shown on the calendar view in the same manner as the time spans of the other events which are shown on the calendar view and wherein accepting the invitation causes an acceptance message to be sent to a source of the invitation.

9. The medium as in claim 1 , wherein the operations further comprise removing the invitation from the area of the calendar view in response to a second user input un-selecting the invitation calendar control to not visible, wherein the invitation remains not accepted or declined.

10. The medium as in claim 1 , wherein the displaying the invitation includes displaying multiple invitations,
wherein the invitation visibility input controls the visibility of the multiple invitations without accepting or declining the invitations, and
wherein the multiple invitations, if accepted, become associated with one or more other calendars in the list of user-selectable calendars.

11. A machine implemented method comprising:
displaying a calendar view on a display device, the calendar view being configured with at least one area corresponding to a time range and displaying at least one calendar from a list of user-selectable calendars;
receiving a notification having an invitation for an event of the time range;
receiving user commands to set an invitation calendar control to control the visibility of an invitation calendar that displays all invitations prior to accepting or declining the invitations, wherein each of the one or more invitations has not been accepted or declined and wherein the one or more invitations include the invitation in the notification;
displaying the invitation, before it is accepted or declined, on the area of the calendar view, if the invitation calendar control is set to visible by a first user command; and
wherein the invitation calendar is separately controllable from any other user-selectable calendars and controls the visibility of all invitations recited by the machine.

12. A method as in claim 11 wherein the at least one time range comprises one of at least a portion of a day, a week, a plurality of weeks, a month, and a plurality of months, and wherein the method further comprises:
receiving a user command to display the invitation within the invitation calendar, before it is accepted or declined, on the calendar view along with other events, already accepted and displayed in association with other calendars of the list of user-selectable calendars, on the calendar view.

13. A method as in claim 11 , wherein the notification is automatically converted for the display of the invitation on the calendar view.

14. A method as in claim 11 , the method further comprising:
displaying a user interface to allow a user to accept or decline the invitation.

15. A method as in claim 14 wherein the user interface comprises an accept icon and a decline icon displayed on the invitation on the calendar view.

16. A method as in claim 14 wherein the method further comprises accepting the invitation causes the invitation to be removed from the invitation calendar and causes the invitation to be displayed on the calendar view associated with a different user-selectable calendar and in a form to show it is accepted.

17. A method as in claim 14 wherein the invitation is presented differently on the calendar view than other events, already accepted, on the calendar view.

18. A method as in claim 17 wherein the invitation is visually distinguishable from the other events and the time span of the invitation is shown on the calendar view in the same manner as the time spans of the other events which are shown on the calendar view and wherein accepting the invitation causes an acceptance message to be sent to a source of the invitation.

19. The machine implemented method of claim 11 , further comprising removing the invitation from the area of the calendar view in response to receiving a second user command input un-selecting the invitation calendar control to not visible, wherein the invitation remains not accepted or declined.

20. A data processing system comprising:
means for displaying a calendar view on a display device, the calendar view being configured with at least one area corresponding to a time range and displaying at least one calendar from a list of user-selectable calendars;
means for receiving a notification having an invitation for an event of the time range;
means for receiving commands to set an invitation calendar control to control the visibility of an invitation calendar that displays all invitations received by the data processi

Assignees

• Coffman Patrick L
• Christie Gregory
• Colom Manuel
• Apple Inc

Inventors

• Coffman Patrick L
• Christie Gregory
• Colom Manuel

Classifications

• G06Q10/1093 Primary

  Calendar-based scheduling for persons or groups · CPC title

• G06Q10/109 Primary

  Time management, e.g. calendars, reminders, meetings or time accounting · CPC title