Technologies for following participants in a video conference

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-9942519-B1
Application number	US-201715438105-A
Country	US
Kind code	B1
Filing date	Feb 21, 2017
Priority date	Feb 21, 2017
Publication date	Apr 10, 2018
Grant date	Apr 10, 2018

Abstract

Systems, methods, and computer-readable storage media for enabling participant following in an electronic conference. An example method can involve generating a graphical interface for an electronic conference including a group of participants, the graphical interface displaying an active participant in a first display region and a panel of respective graphical participant representations in a second display region. The method can further involve receiving, via the graphical interface, an input requesting to move at least one of the respective graphical participant representations out of the panel in the second display region to a location in the first display region of the graphical interface, and based on the input, updating the graphical interface to display the at least one of the respective graphical participant representations in the first display region.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1. A method comprising:
generating a graphical interface for an electronic conference comprising a group of participants, the graphical interface displaying an active participant in a first display region and a panel of respective graphical participant representations in a second display region, the panel having a length based on a number of the graphical participant representations;
receiving an input via the graphical interface, the input requesting to move at least one of the respective graphical participant representations out of the panel in the second display region to a location in the first display region of the graphical interface thereby reducing the length of the panel; and
based on the input, updating the graphical interface to display the at least one of the respective graphical participant representations in the first display region and to remove the at least one of the graphical participant representations from the panel;
wherein when the panel length is longer than the second display region only a portion of the panel is displayable in the second display region, and the panel is moveable to adjust the portion; and
wherein when the panel is moved, the movement does not affect a position of the at least one of the graphical participant representations that was removed from the second display region and is being displayed in the first display region.

2. The method of claim 1 , wherein the panel concurrently displays the respective graphical participant representations, and wherein the respective graphical participant representations correspond to a subset of the group of participants in the electronic conference.

3. The method of claim 2 , wherein a number of participants in the subset of the group of participants is based a size restriction of the panel, wherein the size restriction is based on at least one of a size of the graphical interface and a width of the panel.

4. The method of claim 1 , wherein the panel concurrently displays respective graphical participant representations corresponding to a subset of the group of participants in the electronic conference, wherein one or more of the respective graphical participant representations concurrently displayed in the panel are selected based on participant activity in the electronic conference, the method further comprising:
based on the participant activity, dynamically changing at least one of a first respective graphical participant representation presented as the active participant or a second respective graphical participant representation from the respective graphical participant representations concurrently displayed in the panel.

5. The method of claim 1 , wherein the location comprises a persistent location within the first graphical region and outside of the panel, and wherein updating the graphical interface comprises instructing the graphical interface to place the at least one of the respective graphical participant representations in the persistent location for persistent display within the first display region.

6. The method of claim 5 , further comprising updating the graphical interface to remove the at least one of the respective graphical participant representations from the persistent location only in response to a user input request to remove the at least one of the respective graphical participant representations from at least one of the persistent location or the first display region.

7. The method of claim 1 , wherein the electronic conference comprises at least one of voice, video, and messaging, and wherein the respective graphical participant representations comprise at least one of thumbnails, icons, image feeds, and video feeds.

8. The method of claim 1 , further comprising:
in response to a second input via the graphical interface, updating the graphical interface to display a content item in a second location in the first display region, wherein the content item comprises at least one of a document, a media item, a software object, and a file.

9. The method of claim 1 , further comprising:
receiving a second input via the graphical interface, the second input requesting to move a respective one of the at least one of the respective graphical participant representations out of the location in the first display region and back to the panel in the second display region;
based on the second input, updating the graphical interface to display the respective one of the at least one of the respective graphical participant representations in the panel; and
updating state data maintained for the graphical interface, the state data defining a state of the graphical interface, the state comprising at least one of a first configuration of the panel and a second configuration of the first display region.

10. A system comprising:
one or more processors; and
at least one computer-readable storage medium having stored therein instructions which, when executed by the one or more processors, cause the one or more processors to:
establish one or more electronic conferences comprising respective participants communicating via respective client devices;
for each of the one or more electronic conferences, obtain respective video feeds from the respective client devices;
for each of the one or more electronic conferences, provide the respective video feeds to the respective client devices;
receive, from each of the respective client devices, data indicating a respective state of a conference view at the respective client device, the respective state identifying one or more video feeds that were moved in the conference view from a panel displaying a subset of the respective video feeds to a primary display region; and
when the system detects a new conference view for a respective one of the participants, propagate, to the new conference view, the respective state of the conference view corresponding to the respective one of the participants to update the new conference view for that respective one of the participants.

11. The system of claim 10 , wherein a number of video feeds in the subset of the respective video feeds is based on a size restriction associated with at least one of a size of the conference view and a width of the panel, wherein the width of the panel is less than a combined width of all of the respective video feeds.

12. The system of claim 10 , wherein detecting the new conference view for the respective one of the participants comprises determining that the respective one of the participants has joined an electronic conference from a different client device or joined a different electronic conference, and wherein propagating the respective state to update the new conference view comprises updating the new conference view to display, in a respective persistent location outside of a respective panel which concurrently displays a second subset of video feeds, the one or more video feeds that were moved in the conference view from the panel to the persistent location outside of the panel.

13. The system of claim 10 , the at least one computer-readable storage medium storing additional instructions which, when executed by the one or more processors, cause the one or more processors to:
based on the respective state of the conference view, synchronizing customized conference views of respective participants across at least one of different client devices and different electronic conferences.

14. A non-transitory computer-readable storage medium comprising:
instructions stored therein which, when executed by one or more processors, cause the one or more processors to:
generate a graphical interface for an electronic con

Assignees

• Cisco Tech Inc

Inventors

• Pan Grant
• Yang Mingfeng
• Ding Jason

Classifications

• G06F3/04845

  for image manipulation, e.g. dragging, rotation, expansion or change of colour · CPC title

• H04L65/1093 Primary

  by adding participants; by removing participants · CPC title

• H04N7/157 Primary

  defining a virtual conference space and using avatars or agents (computer conference optimisation or adaptation H04L12/1827) · CPC title

• H04N5/44591

  Electricity · mapped topic

• H04N21/4316

  for displaying supplemental content in a region of the screen, e.g. an advertisement in a separate window · CPC title