The present invention relates to the technical field of organizing group
electronic communications over an electronic communications network. A
common application in this field is organizing a video conference, audio
conference, or instant text electronic communication, with or without
document- or application-sharing, between two or more people who have
terminals such as computers, mobile telephones, PDAs (personal digital
assistants), or other terminals.
The invention particularly pertains to organizing a contextualized on-the-fly
conference.
Some aspects of the invention derive from the observation that the practice
of video conferencing via unified communications lines (such as My
Teamwork™ (published by Alcatel-Lucent), SkypeTM, Microsoft Office
Communicator™, Yahoo! Messenger™, Lotus Sametime™) are experiencing
tremendous popularity. This is because video conferencing makes it
possible to realize savings while avoiding costs related to transportation
and all related fees.
However, on a day-to-day basis, after reading/checking an email or email
thread via an electronic messaging or collaborative work system (such as
IBM Lotus NotesTM, Microsoft OutlookTM, Mozilla Thunderbird™), a user
sometimes wants to immediately launch a video conference (known as an
Instant Meeting Conference) with the users concerned by that email thread,
in order to update them on the subject of those emails, for example. When
doing so, he or she is required
to organize the video conferencing via the unified communication
client by identifying their respective contacts, who are assumed to be
on his or her contacts list on that client, and incorporating them
manually one contact at a time;
once the people have joined that video conference (those who
accepted his or her invitation), to remind all the participants of the
context of that video conference.
At the start of that video conference, a written and/or spoken dialog of the
following style is often observed:
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"in the attachment to his email dated January 10, Michel
mentioned ... " / "one moment please, I'm looking for the email in my
inbox " / "I don't have that email. .. " / "Okay I'll send it to you
again " / "I'm connected from another machine, I can't access my
emails ";
"have you all gotten the necessary documents?" / "do you remember
the idea that I mentioned in my very first email. .. " / "Remind us about
that idea ... ", and so on.
As a result, precious time is lost:
identifying (making sure to include the right contact) and then inviting
those contacts; and
giving context to that video conference's participants.
ObViously, this method is not conducive to the success of group electronic
communications such as collaborative work, particularly because it is
tedious (manual handling and integration) and especially time-inefficient.
One purpose of this invention is to remedy the aforementioned drawbacks.
Another object of the present invention is to improve the procedure for
beginning a conference with contacts included in an email thread.
Another object of the present invention is to offer the user an intuitive way
to launch, from an email.aninstant meeting video conference with the
contacts who are included there.
Another object of the present invention is to allow the fast, efficient
organization of conferences, without prior reservation, with work
colleagues, clients, and/or partners on a national or international level.
Another object of the present invention is to optimally encourage the
conditions needed for a fast, efficient "Instant Meeting Conference".
Another object of the present invention is to make organizing a
contextualized on-the-fly conference simple and intuitive.
3
Another object of the present invention is to combine the advantages of
information and communication environments, particularly messaging
systems, with those of a unified communications client.
Another object of the present invention is to allow the fast organizing of a
contextualized on-the-fly conference with the help of the user's normal
resources (an email client and a unified communications client).
To that end, the invention pertains, according to a first aspect, to a method
for launching a contextualized on-the-fly conference between at least two
users connected to a unified communications client and whose respective
email addresses are included in an email, which method includes the
following steps:
extracting the email addresses comprised within the email's header;
extracting a context from the email;
formatting a contextualized on-the-fly conference request with the
help of the extracted email addresses and context;
transmitting the formatted request to a conference server;
opening, for each user, an instant messaging session via the unified
communications client;
loading the extracted context in the open instant messaging session.
According to a second aspect, the invention discloses an email client
comprising:
a means of ordering a contextualized on-the-fly conference between
at least two users connected to a unified communications client and
whose respective email addresses are comprised within an email,
which means is configured to
o extract the email addresses comprised within the email's
header;
o extract a context from the email;
o format a contextualized on-the-f1y conference request with the
help of the extracted email addresses and context;
o transmit the formatted request to a conference server, upon the
receipt of said request,
4
the conference server being configured to open, for each user, an instant
messaging session via the unified communications client, and to load the
extracted context into a launched instant messaging session.
According to a third aspect, the invention pertains to a computer program
product implemented on a memory medium, which may be implemented
within a computer processing unit, and comprises instructions for
implementing the method summarized above.
Other characteristics and advantages of the invention will become more
clearly and completely apparent upon reading the description below of
preferred embodiments, which is done with reference to the attached
drawings in which:
Figure 1 schematically depicts one embodiment;
Figure 2 schematically depicts one means of ordering a
contextualized on-the-fly conference; and
Figure 3 schematically depicts the effect produced by one
embodiment.
Figure 1 shows a plurality of users 21, 31, 41, equipped, respectively, with
a user terminal 2, 3, 4. A desktop computer, laptop computer, or
smartphone mobile terminal are examples of user terminals 2, 3, 4.
As indicated in Figure 1, each of the user terminals 2, 3, 4 comprises an
email client 22, 32, 42 and a unified communications client 23, 33, 43.
The email client 22, 32, 42 (IBM Lotus Notes™, Microsoft Outlook™,
Mozilla Thunderbird™, EudoraTM, Pocket OutlookTM, IceDoveTM, Palm
VersaMail™ for example) makes it possible to send electronic messages (or
emails), with or without attachments, via a communications network
(commonly the Internet or an intra net network shared by the user terminals
2,3,4) to an email inbox of at least one recipient 21,31,41 chosen by the
sender 21,31,41. To do so, the email client 22,32,42 is connected to an
email server 1. Thus, the email client 22, 32, 42 additionally makes it
possible to receive and read emails that are transmitted to it from the email
server 1 (link A in Figure 1).
5
It should be noted that the email server 1 may comprise multiple co-located
or distributed servers.
It should also be noted that the email client 22, 32, 42 may also be a
webmail client, which particularly makes it possible to check/send an email
from a web interface accessible via a web browser.
The unified communications client 23, 33, 43 (My Teamwork™ (published
by Alcatel-Lucent), Microsoft Office Communicator™. Yahoo! Messenger™,
SkypeTM, or Lotus Sametime™ for example) generally offers a plurality of
services comprising
means for real-time communications between users 21, 31, 41, such
as videophony, fixed and mobile telephony, video conferencing,
audioconferencing, instant messaging; and
collaborative work tools such as presence management (connected,
communicating, busy, disconnected, for example), and sharing and
management of documents (files) and applications (a whiteboard, for
example).
The unified communications clients 23, 33, 43 respectively used by the
users 21, 31, 41 are preferentially identical or at least compatible. In other
words, the unified communications clients 23, 33, 43 make it possible to
establish at least one mode of communication (text, audio, video, or a
combination thereof) and to share data or applications between the users
21, 31, 41. To that end, the unified communications clients 23, 33, 43 are
connected to at least one conference server 5.
Now with reference to Figure 2, an email or email thread window 10
comprises, generally,
a plurality of graphical user interface components 11-13 of commands
(buttons: " Reply", "Reply All", "Forward", or "Delete", for example,
menus: "File", "Edit", for example), groups (of tabs, for example),
navigation ("Minimize", "Close" or "Scrollbar", for example);
a header 50 of the email (or email thread) including a "From:" field
51, which indicates an email address "address1" of a sender; a "TO:"
field 52, which indicates at least one email address of a recipient
6
address2-address4; a "CC" (carbon copy) field 53, which also
indicates at least one email address of a recipient address5address6;
a "subject" field 54, which indicates the subject of the
email or email thread; an "Attachments" field 55, which indicates - if
any exist - one or more attachments PJ 1-PJ4 to the email;
an email body 60 including one or more email content(s) 61-64; and
a means of ordering 20 a contextualized on-the-fly conference.
The email content 61-64 may particularly comprise,
informational content, such as, for example:
o a sender's signature 611;
o a confidentiality message 612, 632;
o elements 623, 633, 643 comprising, by way of example, the
fields "From:", "To:", "CC:", "Subject", "Importance:", "Sent
on:");
messages 610, 620, 640 that may be classified into
o informative messages 610, 640 (relevant or useful with regard
to the e-mail subject), written by senders; and
o uninformative messages 620, such as an automatic reply
programmed by the sender and/or the email server 1 or a blank
message (as with a forwarded email, for example).
In particular, the means for ordering 20 the contextualized on-the-fly
conference make it possible
to invite all users whose email addresses are present in the fields of
the header 50 (particularly, the "From" field 51, the "To" field 52, and
the "CC" field 53) to a conference via the unified communications
client 23, 33, 43; and
to automatically create the context for that conference.
To do so, the means for ordering 20 the contextualized on-the-fly
conference is configured to:
extract email addresses comprised within the "From" field, the "To"
field 52, and the "CC" field 53 of the header 50;
7
"A survey of
Linguisticae
extract, from the email, a context made up of at least the "subject"
field 54, attachments PJ 1-PJ4, and informative messages 610, 640
with the dates they were sent comprised within the elements 623,
633, 643;
format a contextualized on-the-fly conference request using the
extracted data;
transmit the formatted request to the conference server 5 (link B in
Figure 1) in view of inviting, via their unified communications clients
23, 33, 43, the owners of the extracted email addresses.
Preferentially, the context (or framework) of the instant meeting conference
comprises:
a subject extracted from the "subject" field 54;
senders, defined by email addresses extracted from the "From" field
51 for from the elements 623, 633, 643 and respectively associated
o with their informative messages 610, 640, extracted from the
body 60 of the email; and
o with their attachments PJ 1-PJ4 to their informative messages
610,640.
In one variant or in a combination, the means of ordering 20 is equipped
- with a means of semantic analysis ("opinion mining tools", such as
scanning means);
ontology metadata (such as those of WordNet®, SentiWordNet®,
ConceptNet®); and/or
means of extracting named entities (Nadeau D. et ai,
named entity recognition and classification",
Investigationes, January 2007).
making it possible
to identify the informative messages 610, 640 from among the
messages 610,620,640; and then
- to perform a semantic analysis of the informative messages 610, 640,
and to provide a semantic summary of those messages. This
8
semantic analysis makes it possible to extract the relevant
information comprised within the informative messages 610, 640 by
eliminating from them, for example, the niceties (the messages that
open and close a message, salutations, thanks).
The subject extracted from the "subject" field 54 serves as a title for the
conference launched by the conference server 5. The extracted subject may
particularly be edited by deleting from it, for example, expressions like
"Fwd:" (generally used to designate a forwarded email, for example) or
"Re:" (generally used to designate a reply email).
In one variant, the subject of the conference launched by the conference
server 5 is deduced semantically (cloud of tags. frequency of use of a e certain term/concept) from the informative messages 610, 640 and/or from
the attachments PJ 1-PJ4. Preferentially, this subject is deduced from the
most recent exchanges in that email thread.
The request transmitted to the conference server 5 (link 8 of Figure 1)
comprises
email addresses extracted from the header 50 of the email;
a conference subject, extracted from the "subject" field 54 or deduced
semantically from the email content 61-64, and
attachments PJ1-PJ4 and informative messages 610. 640 (preferably
dated) or a semantic summary thereof, associated with their
respective sender email addresses.
After that request has been received by the conference server 5. that server
does the work of (Iinks.Q1. C2 and C3 in Figure 1):
opening an instant messaging session to all participants using their
email addresses; and
launching the sharing, between the participants, of the informative
messages 610, 640 and attachments PJ 1-PJ4, extracted from the
email thread (in other words, putting the conference into context).
The result is the triggering of a conference that is
9
instant: an Instant Meeting Conference, meaning one without prior
reservations;
automatically placed in context: the subject of the email, the
informative messages 610, 640 comprised within the exchanged
emails and the attachments are automatically loaded in an instant
messaging session.
Furthermore, the conference server 5 is configured to resolve the email
addresses comprised within a conference request. In other words, the
conference server 5 is operative to find, within the means of unified
communications 23, 33, 43, the identifiers of the users who own the email
addresses comprised within the conference request.
e By way of example, illustrated by Figure 3, assuming that a user 41
launched, from his or her email client, a contextualized on-the-fly
conference on the subject of an email thread in which the email addresses
of the users 21 and 31 (and particularly his or her own) appear, an incontext
instant messaging session 70 is opened by the conference server 5
for the three users 21,31, and 41.
The instant messaging session 70, managed by the unified communications
agent 23, 33, 43 that particularly supports other modes of communication
(audio, video, for example), incorporates the informative messages 610,
640 extracted from the email's body 60 with their respective attachments
PJ1 (doc-v1.0) and PJ2 (doc-v1.1). The user 41 - who triggered that
conference - is designated the leader of the conference.
In one embodiment, the contextualized on-the-fly conference request is sent
to a storage server, other than the conference server 5, configured to store,
for at least the duration of the conference, the attachments to the email
thread. The instant meeting conference request is then transferred to the
conference server 5 which, in turn, launches an instant messaging session
referring to the attachments stored in the storage server.
The means for ordering 20 a contextualized on-the-fly conference may take
the form of a graphical user interface component that calls on the
aforementioned functions, within an electronic messaging client (Microsoft
Outlook, IBM Lotus Notes, for example), a webmail client accessible via a
10
web browser, or installed software providing an interface suitable for mobile
terminals (whether touchscreen or not).
In one embodiment, the means of ordering 20 a conference offers a plurality
of options, such as:
editing the email addresses extracted from the header 50: adding a
new address (that of a conference interpreter, for example), deleting
an email address (that of the team's manager, for example);
including email addresses comprised within the "BCC" (Blind Carbon
Copy) field;
ignoring the content 61-64 of the email thread dated more than 6
months ago, for example;
ignoring attachments whose size is greater than a certain value or
certain type, for example;
displaying the date when the emails whose content is shared between
the users 21, 31 41 in the instant messaging session 70 were sent;
inviting only users whose presence state, in the unified
communications client 23, 33, 43, is "available";
only launching the conference when at least n users are deemed
"available" according to the presence server of the unified
communications client 23, 33, 43;
scheduling that conference in my calendar (will start at 2: 10 p.m.
today, for example);
ignoring the group email addresses (one distribution email address,
for example);
grouping, in the instant messaging session 70, the informative
messages 610, 640 as well as the attachments by user. By way of
example, if the informative messages 610, 640 extracted from the
email body 60 include two messages - M1 with an attachment PJ 1,
and M2 with no attachment - respectively sent on 25-11-2008 and 2904-
2009, by the user 21, then load, in the instant messaging session
70, the message M1 with the attachment PJ 1, and the message M2,
both associated with the user 21.
Advantageously, the users 21, 31 invited to a contextualized on-the-fly
conference can attend it only via the unified communications client 23, 33,
11
regardless of whether they can or can't access their email inboxes.
Preferably, in such a case, the shared data is loaded in the user terminal's
volatile memory or in a secure session.
The method just described exhibits a certain number of advantages. In
particular, it makes it possible:
for the user to be able to organize a conference instantly in just one
click that incorporates all users whose email addresses are present in
the header 50 of an email;
to reduce the participants' reaction time, by recreating the context of
the conference (the subject of the conference, the attachments PJ1PJ4
and the informative/relevant messages 610, 640 of the email)
brought in from the email exchanges between them.

"We claim:
1. A method for launching a contextualized on-the-fly conference
between at least two users (21, 31, 41) connected to a unified
communications client (23, 33, 43) and whose respective email addresses
are included in an email, which method includes the following steps:
extracting the email addresses comprised within the email's header
(50);
extracting a context from the email;
formatting a contextualized on-the-fly conference request with the
help of the extracted email addresses and context;
transmitting the formatted request to a conference server (5);
opening, for each user, an instant messaging session via the unified
communications client (23, 33, 43);
loading the extracted context in the open instant messaging session
(70).
2. A method according to claim 1, characterized in that extracting
context from an email comprises a step of extracting at least one
attachment to the email, associated with an extracted email address.
3. A method according to anyone of the claims 1 to 2,
characterized in that extracting a context from the email comprises a step
of extracting at least one informative message (610, 640) from the body
(60) of the email, associated with an extracted email address.
4. A method according to anyone of the claims 1 to 3,
characterized in that extracting a context from the email comprises a step
of extracting the subject (54) of the email.
5. A method according to claims 1 and 3, characterized in that the
step of loading the context comprises a step of the conference server
launching the sharing, in the launched session, of at least one extracted
informative message (610, 640).
6. A method according to claims 1 and 2, characterized in that the
step of loading the context comprises a step of the conference server
launching the sharing, in the launched session, of at least one extracted
attachment.
13
7. A method according to claim 1, characterized in that the email
addresses are extracted from the "From" field (51), the "To" field (52), and
the "CC" field (53) of the email's header.
8. A method according to claim 1, characterized in that the
conference server (5) is operative to resolve the email addresses of the
users.
9. A method according to anyone of the claims 1 to 8,
characterized in that the email is an email thread.
10. A method according to anyone of the claims 1 to 9,
characterized in that the subject of the conference is deduced semantically
from the informative messages (610,640).
11. An email client comprising
a means of ordering (20) a contextualized on-the-fly conference
between at least two users connected to a unified communications
client and whose respective email addresses are comprised within an
email, which means is configured to
o extract the email addresses comprised within the email's
header;
o extract a context from the email;
o format a contextualized on-the-fly conference request with the
help of the extracted email addresses and context;
o transmit the formatted request to a conference server, upon the
receipt of said request,
the conference server being configured to open, for each user, an instant
messaging session via the unified communications client, and to load the
extracted context into a launched instant messaging session.
12. An email client according to claim 11, characterized in that the
conference server is operative to resolve the email addresses of the users.
14
13. A computer program product implemented on a memory medium,
which may be implemented within a computer processing unit, and
comprises instructions to implement a method according to one of the
claims 1 to 10.
Date 23 October 2012
To,
The Controller of Patents
The Patent Office at New Delhi
15
JAYAPA~
IN/PA-1345
Agent for the Applicant