CN115333881A

CN115333881A - Method, apparatus, device and medium for managing network conference

Info

Publication number: CN115333881A
Application number: CN202210958572.5A
Authority: CN
Inventors: 彭龙腾
Original assignee: Beijing Youzhuju Network Technology Co Ltd
Current assignee: Beijing Youzhuju Network Technology Co Ltd
Priority date: 2022-08-09
Filing date: 2022-08-09
Publication date: 2022-11-11

Abstract

Methods, apparatuses, devices and media for managing a web conference are provided. In one method, the roles of the participants of a web conference are obtained. A conference link for the web conference is generated based on the roles, the conference link including invitation information for participating in the web conference, the invitation information including a conference identification for the web conference and role information for the roles of the participants. The conference link is sent to the communication addresses of the participants so that the participants participate in the web conference via the conference link. The roles of the participants can be directly considered in the stage of creating the conference link, so that the complexity of manual operation during participation in the network conference can be simplified, and the management efficiency of the network conference is improved.

Description

Method, apparatus, device and medium for managing network conference

Technical Field

Example implementations of the present disclosure relate generally to web conferencing and, in particular, to methods, apparatuses, devices, and computer-readable storage media for managing web conferencing.

Background

With the development of network technology, various conference applications have been developed. Participants of a web conference may have different roles, and participants of different roles may have different permissions in the web conference. For example, the presenter may turn on the image and sound capturing device, may live the presentation, may share the screen; the audience may listen to the lecture of the presenter but not speak, etc. Participants may participate in the network conference via the received conference link. At this time, how to distinguish different roles of participants in a more convenient and fast manner becomes a problem to be solved urgently.

Disclosure of Invention

In a first aspect of the disclosure, a method for managing a web conference is provided. In the method, roles of participants of a web conference are acquired. A conference link for the web conference is generated based on the roles, the conference link including invitation information for participating in the web conference, the invitation information including a conference identification for the web conference and role information for the roles of the participants. The conference link is sent to the communication addresses of the participants so that the participants participate in the web conference via the conference link.

In a second aspect of the disclosure, an apparatus for managing a web conference is provided. The device includes: an acquisition module configured to acquire roles of participants of a web conference; a generation module configured to generate a conference link of the web conference based on the role, the conference link including invitation information for participating in the web conference, the invitation information including a conference identifier of the web conference and role information of the role of the participant; and a sending module configured to send the conference link to the communication addresses of the participants to enable the participants to participate in the network conference via the conference link.

In a third aspect of the disclosure, an electronic device is provided. The electronic device includes: at least one processing unit; and at least one memory coupled to the at least one processing unit and storing instructions for execution by the at least one processing unit, the instructions when executed by the at least one processing unit causing the apparatus to perform a method according to the first aspect of the present disclosure.

In a fourth aspect of the present disclosure, a computer-readable storage medium is provided, having stored thereon a computer program, which, when executed by a processor, causes the processor to carry out the method according to the first aspect of the present disclosure.

It should be understood that what is described in this summary section is not intended to limit key features or essential features of implementations of the disclosure, nor is it intended to limit the scope of the disclosure. Other features of the present disclosure will become apparent from the following description.

Drawings

The above and other features, advantages and aspects of various implementations of the present disclosure will become more apparent from the following detailed description when taken in conjunction with the accompanying drawings. In the drawings, like or similar reference characters denote like or similar elements, and wherein:

FIG. 1 illustrates a block diagram of an example environment in which implementations of the present disclosure can be implemented;

fig. 2 illustrates a block diagram of a process for managing a web conference, in accordance with some implementations of the present disclosure;

fig. 3 illustrates a trajectory diagram of interactions between a server and a terminal device, according to some implementations of the present disclosure.

FIG. 4 illustrates a block diagram of a page for gathering information to create a meeting link, in accordance with some implementations of the present disclosure;

FIGS. 5A and 5B respectively illustrate block diagrams of data structures of conference links according to some implementations of the present disclosure;

FIG. 6 illustrates a block diagram of a process in which participants create and send conference requests using conference links, according to some implementations of the present disclosure;

FIG. 7 illustrates a block diagram of a data structure of a meeting request, in accordance with some implementations of the present disclosure;

FIG. 8 illustrates a block diagram of a data structure of a meeting database, in accordance with some implementations of the present disclosure;

FIG. 9 illustrates a flow diagram of a method for managing a web conference according to some implementations of the present disclosure;

fig. 10 illustrates a block diagram of an apparatus for managing a web conference in accordance with some implementations of the present disclosure; and

fig. 11 illustrates a block diagram of a device capable of implementing various implementations of the present disclosure.

Detailed Description

Implementations of the present disclosure will be described in more detail below with reference to the accompanying drawings. While certain implementations of the present disclosure are illustrated in the accompanying drawings, it is to be understood that the present disclosure may be embodied in various forms and should not be construed as limited to the implementations set forth herein, but rather are provided for a more thorough and complete understanding of the present disclosure. It should be understood that the drawings and implementations of the present disclosure are for illustration purposes only and are not intended to limit the scope of the present disclosure.

In describing implementations of the present disclosure, the terms "include," including, "and their like are to be construed as being inclusive, i.e.," including, but not limited to. The term "based on" should be understood as "based at least in part on". The term "one implementation" or "the implementation" should be understood as "at least one implementation". The term "some implementations" should be understood as "at least some implementations". Other explicit and implicit definitions are also possible below. As used herein, the term "model" may represent an associative relationship between various data. The above-mentioned association may be obtained, for example, based on various technical solutions that are currently known and/or will be developed in the future.

It will be appreciated that the data referred to in this disclosure, including but not limited to the data itself, the acquisition or use of the data, should comply with the requirements of the applicable laws and regulations and related regulations.

It is understood that before the technical solutions disclosed in the embodiments of the present disclosure are used, the user should be informed of the type, the use range, the use scene, etc. of the personal information related to the present disclosure and obtain the authorization of the user through an appropriate manner according to the relevant laws and regulations.

For example, in response to receiving an active request from a user, a prompt message is sent to the user to explicitly prompt the user that the requested operation to be performed would require the acquisition and use of personal information to the user. Thus, the user can autonomously select whether to provide personal information to software or hardware such as an electronic device, an application program, a server, or a storage medium that performs the operations of the disclosed technical solution, according to the prompt information.

As an optional but non-limiting implementation manner, in response to receiving an active request from the user, the prompt information is sent to the user, for example, a pop-up window may be used, and the prompt information may be presented in text in the pop-up window. In addition, a selection control for providing personal information to the electronic equipment by the user's selection of "agree" or "disagree" can be carried in the pop-up window.

It is understood that the above notification and user authorization process is only illustrative and not limiting, and other ways of satisfying relevant laws and regulations may be applied to the implementation of the present disclosure.

Example Environment

A variety of conference applications have been developed, and an application environment of the conference application will be described first with reference to fig. 1. FIG. 1 illustrates a block diagram of an example environment 100 in which implementations of the present disclosure can be implemented. As shown in fig. 1, a server for providing a network conference service can be accessed by a plurality of participants via respective terminal devices. Specifically, participants 110, 120, 122, \ 8230;, and 124 may access server 150 in network 130 via respective terminal devices 140, 142, 144, \8230;, and 146, respectively. Here, participants 110, 120, 122, \ 8230, and 124 may have different roles. For example, participant 110 may be a presenter in a web conference, and participants 120, 122, \8230, and 124 may be viewers, and so on.

Technical solutions for assigning different roles to different participants have been proposed so far. For example, a conference link may be sent to the participants, and after the participants connect to the server via the conference link, the administrator may assign the corresponding roles according to the identities of the participants. For another example, different passwords may be set for participants having different roles, and the participants may manually input the respective passwords to obtain the corresponding roles. Specifically, when a participant enters a moderator password, a moderator role may be assigned to the participant; and when a participant enters a guest password, the participant may be assigned a guest role. However, the above operation involves an additional manual execution process, and thus it is desirable that the above process can be simplified so as to manage the web conference in a simpler and more efficient manner.

Managing summary procedures for web conferences

In order to solve the deficiencies in the above technical solutions, according to an exemplary implementation manner of the present disclosure, a method for sending different conference links to participants with different roles and further managing a web conference is provided. In the method, the roles of the participants of the web conference may be first acquired. Roles herein refer to roles that participants play in a web conference, and may include, for example and without limitation: a presenter, a viewer, a guest, an administrator, an assistant, etc. A conference link for the web conference may be generated based on the roles of the participants and sent to the participants. At this time, the participants can participate in the network conference according to the designated role only by using the conference link.

An overview of one exemplary implementation according to the present disclosure is described with reference to fig. 2, which fig. 2 shows a block diagram 200 of a process for managing a web conference according to some implementations of the present disclosure. As shown in fig. 2, respective conference links may be generated based on different roles. For example, based on the role 210 of the participant 110 (i.e., the presenter), the conference link 214 may be generated. The conference link 214 may include invitation information for participating in the network conference, and the invitation information may include conference identification of the network conference and role information for the participants' roles 210. Further, a conference link 214 may be sent to the communication address 212 of the participant 110 so that the participant 110 may access the server 150 via the conference link 214 to participate in the web conference.

As another example, based on the roles 220 (i.e., viewers) of the participants 120, a meeting link 224 can be generated. A conference link 224 may be sent to the communication address 222 of the participant 120 so that the participant 120 may access the server 150 via the conference link 224 to participate in the web conference. According to one exemplary implementation of the present disclosure, the communication address may have various forms, including, for example, but not limited to: a phone number, an email address, an instant messaging account, a conferencing application account, etc.

With example implementations of the present disclosure, the corresponding conference link may be sent to the communication addresses of the participants. Since the conference link now already includes information about the participant's role, the participants can participate in the conference in accordance with the predetermined role directly based on the conference link. For example, participant 110 may use conference link 214 to join the web conference in a presenter role, and participant 120 may use conference link 224 to join the web conference in a viewer role. At this time, when joining the network conference, the participants do not need to manually input a password for specifying their own roles, and the administrator of the network conference does not need to manually assign roles based on the participant identifications. In this way, it is possible to simplify the process of managing the web conference and improve the management efficiency, thereby managing the web conference in a simpler and more efficient manner.

Managing detailed procedures for web conferencing

Having described an overview of managing netmeetings with reference to fig. 2, more details of an exemplary implementation according to the present disclosure are described below with reference to fig. 3. Fig. 3 illustrates a trajectory diagram 300 of interactions between server 150 and terminal device 140, according to some implementations of the present disclosure. It will be understood that fig. 3 only describes the interaction between the terminal devices of the participants having different roles and the server 150 providing the web conference service with the participant 110 (having the presenter role) as a specific example, and the interaction between the terminal devices of the other participants and the server 150 is similar.

According to one exemplary implementation of the present disclosure, a web conference may be held in a variety of scenarios. For example, in a presentation scenario, the presentation of the presenter may be live to the audience; in a performance scene, the performance of actors can be live broadcast to the audience; in a training environment, a trainee's lesson may be live to the trainee, and so on. As shown in fig. 3, the server 150 may obtain (310) relevant information for the participant. For example, the relevant information may be obtained via the page shown in FIG. 4 to create a meeting link. Fig. 4 illustrates a block diagram 400 for gathering information to create a conference link, according to some implementations of the present disclosure. As shown in fig. 4, information acquisition page 410 may be utilized to obtain information related to the web conference.

According to one exemplary implementation of the present disclosure, the various information shown in fig. 4 may be provided by an administrator of the web conference. In the presentation scenario, a function of creating a web conference in the conference application may be invoked by the organizer of the presentation, and then various information of the web conference may be set. For example, a participant ID (e.g., alice) may be provided, a role (e.g., a presenter) may be designated for the participant, and a communication address (e.g., a mobile phone number "123 \8230;" and/or an email address "Alice @. Further, the start time of the web conference may be specified, and the maximum number of times of use of the conference link may be set, and the like.

With example implementations of the present disclosure, multifaceted information associated with a web conference may be obtained via the information gathering page 410, thereby creating respective conference links for the various participants. It will be appreciated that information collection page 410 is only one specific example for obtaining web conference related information. Alternatively and/or additionally, the above information may be obtained based on other means. For example, public information (e.g., start time and maximum number of uses of link) for the web conference may be obtained first. Then, the roles and communication addresses of the respective participants, etc. may be acquired in a separate page. Alternatively and/or additionally, the relevant information of each participant can be stored in the database in advance, and a conference link including the corresponding role information can be created for each participant by importing the database, and then the corresponding conference link can be sent to the communication address of each participant.

Having described the process of obtaining participant-related information with reference to fig. 4, the steps of generating and sending a conference link are described below with reference back to fig. 3. In fig. 3, a conference link may be generated (312) based on the obtained information related to the web conference. For the participant 110, the generated conference link 214 may include invitation information for participating in the web conference, and the invitation information may include conference identification of the web conference and role information for the role of the participant. In the following, further details regarding the conference link are described with reference to fig. 5A and 5B.

Fig. 5A illustrates a block diagram 500A of a data structure of a conference link, according to some implementations of the present disclosure. In fig. 5A, conference link 510 may include server address 520 of server 150 for providing the web conference service and invitation information 530. This server address 520 may serve as an identification of the conference link 510 to determine at the end device 140 of the participant 110: conference link 510 is a special link for participating in a web conference.

Here, invitation information 530 may include meeting identification 532 and role information 534. It will be appreciated that fig. 5A is merely a schematic illustration of a simple data structure, and that respective widths may be set for the respective fields in fig. 5A, and the conference link 510 may be generated based on the acquired information. Specifically, a server address may be added at a location corresponding to the server address 520, a meeting identification 532 (e.g., "MEET 01") may be specified for the web meeting, and role information 534 may be determined based on the role obtained in the information collection interface 410 shown in fig. 4.

According to an exemplary implementation of the present disclosure, the conference link may include more information, and further optional configuration of the invitation information is described with reference to fig. 5B. Fig. 5B illustrates a block diagram 500B of a data structure of a conference link, according to some implementations of the present disclosure. For example, the invitation information may further include a start time 542 of the web conference. In this manner, the start time 542 may facilitate determining time information for the conference when a late participant joins the conference. Further, to improve the security of the conference link 510, the invitation information 530 in the conference link 510 may be encrypted to generate encrypted invitation information 540. At this time, the conference identifier 532, the role information 534, and the start time 542 are in an encrypted form, so that the security during data transmission can be improved, and the risk of data leakage can be reduced.

According to an example implementation of the present disclosure, the encrypted invitation information 540 may be signed and a signature 550 included in the conference link 510. The signing operation may be performed based on a variety of algorithms that are currently known and/or will be developed in the future, e.g., the signing may be performed based on the Base64 algorithm and/or other algorithms. At this point, the signature 550 may be used for verification by the endpoint device 140 of the participant 110 to determine whether the received conference link 510 is indeed from the server 150 and has not been tampered with by other malicious devices. In this way, the security of the web conference can be further improved.

According to one exemplary implementation of the present disclosure, a meeting identifier, participant identifiers of participants, and role information may be recorded in a meeting database. Here, the meeting database may be located at the server 150, or may be located elsewhere accessible by the server 150. The meeting database may store miscellaneous information about the meeting and may be used to verify that the meeting request is a legitimate meeting request upon receipt of the meeting request from a participant 110.

Having described the process of generating the conference link 510 with reference to fig. 5A and 5B, the following process is described hereinafter returning to fig. 3. As shown in fig. 3, server 150 may send (314) conference link 214 to end device 140 so that participants 110 may participate in the web conference via conference link 214. At end device 140, participant 110 may copy (316) the received conference link. The participant 110 may then paste (318) the meeting link in the meeting application to cause the meeting application to generate (320) a meeting request. It will be appreciated that the meeting request herein may include participant identification and a meeting invitation. Further, end device 140 may send (322) a conference request to server 150.

Further operational steps at the end devices 140 of the participants 110 are described below with reference to fig. 6, which fig. 6 illustrates a block diagram 600 of a process in which participants create and send conference requests using conference links according to some implementations of the present disclosure. As shown in fig. 6, in the event that meeting link 214 has been received at end device 140, participant 110 may perform a copy/paste operation as indicated by arrow 610. In particular, if the conferencing application 610 is not installed at the terminal device 140, the conference link may direct the participant 110 to a download address where the conferencing application 610 is downloaded. Alternatively and/or additionally, the conference application 610 may be launched directly at the terminal device 140 if the conference application 610 is already installed at the terminal device 140. At this point, a meeting request 620 may be generated by the meeting application 610.

According to an example implementation of the present disclosure, the meeting request 620 may include both participant identification and invitation information. Alternatively and/or additionally, to enhance security during transmission, the meeting request 620 may be generated based on participant identification and encrypted invitation information. Describing more detail with respect to generating meeting request 620 with reference to fig. 7, fig. 7 shows a block diagram 700 of a data structure of meeting request 620 in accordance with some implementations of the present disclosure. As shown in fig. 7, the conference request 620 may include a participant identification 710 and encrypted invitation information 540. At this point, the participant identification 710 may indicate to the server 150: which participant is requested to participate in the network conference, and the encrypted invitation information 540 may carry a variety of information related to the conference: conference identification 532, role information 534, and start time 544.

According to an exemplary implementation of the present disclosure, a predetermined width may be defined for each field shown in fig. 7, and a variety of information may be respectively filled in corresponding positions in the conference request 620 by the predetermined width. It will be appreciated that although fig. 7 describes a data structure of the conference request 620 with encrypted invitation information 540 as an example of the invitation information, alternatively and/or additionally, the conference request 620 may include the unencrypted invitation information 530 shown in fig. 5A.

Returning to fig. 3 describing the subsequent operation of end device 140, in fig. 3, end device 140 may send (322) generated conference request 620 to server 150. In other words, the server 150 may receive a conference request 620 from the terminal devices 140 of the participants 110 to request participation in the web conference. Server 150 may then verify whether received conference request 620 is a legitimate request to join the web conference. In particular, server 150 may extract (324) encrypted invitation information 540 from meeting request 620 in order to validate meeting request 620.

According to one exemplary implementation of the present disclosure, the meeting request 620 may be validated based on multifaceted information. A decryption operation may first be performed with respect to the encrypted invitation information 540 in the received conference request 620. If the decryption fails, this indicates that the conference request 620 is not a legitimate request, at which point the authentication fails and the server 150 may send an error message to the terminal device 140. For example, the error message may indicate: the conference link is invalid and retries after confirmation.

Alternatively and/or additionally, if it is determined that the encrypted invitation information 540 was successfully decrypted, the meeting identifier, role information, start time may be extracted from the decrypted information. Further, the conference request 620 may be verified based on the above information. According to one exemplary implementation of the present disclosure, the start time of the extraction may be verified (326). Specifically, it may be compared whether the relationship between the start time and the current time satisfies a predetermined condition. If the relationship between the two does not satisfy a predetermined condition, the meeting request 620 is verified as failed; otherwise the conference request 620 is verified as successful.

In this manner, by comparing the start time and the current time, a portion of potentially invalid meeting requests may be filtered out in advance. At this point, only the qualified meeting request 620 may undergo follow-up processing, i.e., only the qualified meeting request may initiate a follow-up operation to search the meeting database. In this way, invalid access to the conference database caused by a large number of invalid conference requests can be avoided, and the condition that the access of the conference database is overloaded is further reduced.

According to an exemplary implementation of the present disclosure, the predetermined condition may define: the start time is before the current time and the difference is greater than 12 hours (or other value). Assuming that the start time exceeds 12 hours earlier than the current time, the web conference may be considered to have ended and the conference request 620 may be determined to be an invalid request. At this time, the server 150 may return error information to the terminal device 140: the network conference specified by the conference link has ended.

For another example, the predetermined condition may define: the start time is after the current time and the difference is greater than half an hour (or other value). Assuming that the start time is more than half an hour later than the current time, the web conference may be deemed to have not started and the conference request 620 may be determined to be an invalid request at the current time. At this time, the server 150 may return prompt information to the terminal device 140: the conference link specifies that the web conference has not yet started and please retry within a predetermined start time of half an hour.

For another example, the predetermined condition may define: the start time is before the current time and the difference satisfies a predetermined range (e.g., 0 to 12 hours or other range). Assuming that the start time falls within the above range, the network conference may be considered in progress, and the conference request 620 may be determined to be a valid request, i.e., the verification regarding the start time is successful.

According to an example implementation of the present disclosure, if the conference request 620 has been confirmed as a valid request based on the start time, the conference database may be queried (328) further based on the participant identification 710 and the conference identification 532 in the conference request 620 to further confirm whether the participant 110 is eligible to participate in the web conference. At this point, the extracted conference identification and participant identification may be compared to a conference database. More information about the meeting database is described below with reference to fig. 8, which fig. 8 shows a block diagram 800 of a data structure of the meeting database in accordance with some implementations of the present disclosure. As shown in fig. 8, the meeting database may include a plurality of fields. For example, conference identification 810 may represent an identifier that uniquely distinguishes individual network conferences. Although only the unique meeting identifier "MEET01" is shown in the meeting database shown in fig. 8, the meeting database may include more meeting identifiers in the case where there are multiple web meetings.

According to an example implementation of the present disclosure, the conference database may include participant identifications 820 to document the individual participants allowed to participate in the network conference "MEET 01". The extracted conference identification and participant identification may be compared to information in

fields

810 and 820 of the conference database to determine whether participant 110 is eligible to participate in the network conference. Assuming that the extracted conference identification and participant identification are "MEET01" and "ALICE," respectively, when the conference database includes the above information (i.e., the extracted conference identification and participant identification match the conference database), it may be determined that participant 110 is a legitimate participant of network conference "MEET01," and it may be determined that conference request 620 has been successfully authenticated. In turn, a conference connection may be established between the terminal devices 140 of the participants 110 and the server 150 to transmit various data related to the network conference. For another example, assume that the extracted conference identifier and participant identifier are "MEET01" and "CHARLIE", respectively, but that "CHARLIE" does not exist in the conference database. At which point it may be determined that participant 110 is not a legitimate participant.

Alternatively and/or additionally, the meeting database may further include roles 830 for participants 110. At this time, the three data of the participant identification 710, the conference identification 532, and the role information 534 extracted from the conference request 620 may be compared with the related information in the conference database. If any of the three data does not match the entries in the meeting database, then meeting request 620 can be considered an invalid illegal request. In this way, it is possible to verify with higher reliability whether the conference request 620 is valid, thereby reducing the risk that an illegal user steals a conference link originally sent to other users to participate in the web conference.

Alternatively and/or additionally, to facilitate preventing conference links from being invoked multiple times by a large number of participants, a respective maximum number of uses may be set for each conference link. As shown in fig. 8, the meeting database may further include a maximum number of uses 840 and a number of previous uses 850. Before establishing the conference connection, it may first be compared whether the number of uses of the conference link has reached a threshold. Assuming that the conference identification and the participant identification extracted from the received conference request 620 are "MEET01" and "ALICE", respectively, the number of previous uses 850 can be determined from the conference database to be "0". This indicates that the current conference request 620 is the first request from the participant 110. Since the maximum number of uses 840 is "1," the conference connection may be allowed to be established.

For another example, if the conference identifier and the participant identifier extracted from the received conference request 620 are "MEET01" and "BOB", respectively, since the number of previous uses 850 is "1". This indicates that the current conference request 620 is a second request from the participant 110. At this point, an error message may be sent to the terminal device 140 of the participant 110: the number of times of using the conference link exceeds the upper limit, and the network conference can not be participated. With the exemplary implementation of the present disclosure, by setting an upper limit for the number of uses, it is possible to avoid a situation in which a conference link leaks and causes a large number of illegal users to attempt to participate in a web conference. In this way, the impact of an illegal access on the server 150 can be reduced.

Returning to fig. 3, a conference link may be established 330 between server 150 and terminal device 140. Further, the information in the meeting database may be updated (332) based on whether the participant 110 has joined the network meeting. For example, the meeting database may include status information for the participants (as shown by state 860 in FIG. 8). In the event that a conference connection has been established, the status of the participants in the conference database may be updated to "online". Assuming the login status of participant 110 is "offline", server 150, after successfully verifying conference request 620, may establish a conference connection between terminal device 150 and server 150 and update the status 860 of the row of "ALICE" from "offline" to "online", as shown in FIG. 8. In this manner, the meeting database can provide status information about the various participants of the network meeting "MEET01" to facilitate managing the various participants in a centralized manner.

The process of establishing a conference connection between the terminal device 140 and the server 150 in order to have the participant 110 participate in the conference "MEET01" has been described above. There may be differences in conference connections for different roles. In the context of the present disclosure, a role may include at least any one of: presenter, audience, guest, administrator, assistant. At this time, each role has a pre-designated participation right in the network conference, for example, including but not limited to: live broadcast authority, share screen authority, speaking authority, authority to operate the object of the shared screen, authority to add the participant, authority to delete the participant.

In a presentation scenario, the participation right of the presenter may be higher than that of the audience. For example, a presenter may have live rights, shared screen rights, and talk rights. In other words, the presenter may turn on his own image capture device and audio capture device to live the relevant image and audio data to the other conference participants. Further, the presenter may share the screen content of the terminal device 140 in order to present an object such as a presentation document to other participants. As another example, during a network conference, the image and audio capture devices of the terminal devices of the viewers will be disabled, and the viewers will only be allowed to view and listen to the lecture of the presenter. For another example, when inviting guests to participate in question and answer, guests may be allowed to have participation rights such as live broadcast.

According to one exemplary implementation of the present disclosure, an administrator may be allowed to add new participants to a web conference. For example, an administrator may be allowed to generate a new conference link for a new participant and send the conference link. An administrator may be allowed to update the participation rights of a participant and/or delete the participant from the network conference. For example, if a guest is found to have no dialect, the participation right of the guest may be temporarily adjusted to the participation right of the viewer. Alternatively and/or additionally, the conference connection between the guest terminal device and the server 150 may be disconnected in order to delete the guest from the web conference. As another example, the assistant may assist the presenter in manipulating objects of the shared screen, such as adjusting pages of a presentation document, and so forth.

With the exemplary implementation of the present disclosure, different roles may be allowed to have respective participation rights. In this way, on one hand, it can be ensured that each role can have respective access rights, and thus participate in the network conference in a manner closer to the real conference. On the other hand, the normal order of the network conference can be maintained by modifying the participation right when some participants are found to be out of the way.

It will be appreciated that although the process of managing a web conference has been described above with the participant 110 having the presenter role as an example. Similar processing may be performed for participants having other roles. For example, for a participant 120 having a spectator role, the role information in the invitation information in the generated conference link may indicate "spectator". Upon receiving the meeting link, participant 120 may copy the meeting link and paste the meeting link in the meeting application. At this point, the conferencing application will automatically generate a conference request that includes the participant 120 corresponding thereto, where the conference request may include the participant identification of the participant 120 and the received invitation information.

Further, the conference application may send the generated conference request to the server 150 for verification of the conference request by the server 150. If the conference request is verified as successful, a conference connection may be established between the endpoint devices 140 of the participants 120 and the server 150, and participation rights corresponding to "spectators" may be granted to the participants 120. In other words, the image capture device, the audio capture device, and the like in the terminal device 140 may be disabled accordingly so that the participant 120 can only watch and listen to the presentation of the presenter.

In the above-described technical solution for managing a network conference, the roles of the participants may be directly considered in the session of creating the conference link, and the role information is embedded into the conference link. In this way, when the terminal devices of the participants connect to the server 150, conference connections with different participation rights can be established directly based on the embedded role information. Therefore, the complexity of manual operation during participation in the network conference can be simplified, and the management efficiency of the network conference is improved.

Example procedure

According to one exemplary implementation of the present disclosure, a method for managing a web conference performed at a server providing the web conference is provided. Fig. 9 illustrates a flow diagram of a method 900 for managing a web conference according to some implementations of the present disclosure. Specifically, at block 910, the roles of the participants of the web conference are obtained. At block 920, a conference link for the web conference is generated based on the role, the conference link including invitation information for participating in the web conference, the invitation information including a conference identification for the web conference and role information for the roles of the participants. At block 930, the conference link is sent to the communication addresses of the participants to cause the participants to participate in the web conference via the conference link.

According to an exemplary implementation of the present disclosure, the invitation information further includes: a start time of the web conference, and generating the conference link comprises: generating invitation information based on the conference identifier, the role information and the start time; performing an encryption operation with respect to the invitation information to generate encrypted invitation information; and generating a conference link based on the encrypted invitation information and an address of a server for providing the web conference.

According to an exemplary implementation of the present disclosure, the method 900 further includes: performing a signing operation on the encrypted invitation information to generate a signature of the invitation information; and adding a signature to the meeting link such that the meeting link is verified via the signature; and recording the meeting identifier, the participant identifiers of the participants, and the role information in a meeting database.

According to an exemplary implementation of the present disclosure, the method 900 further comprises: receiving a conference request for requesting participation in the network conference from a terminal device of a participant, the conference request including encrypted invitation information; verifying the conference request based on the encrypted invitation information; and establishing a conference connection between the terminal devices of the participants and the server in response to the conference request being verified as successful.

According to one exemplary implementation of the present disclosure, verifying the conference request includes: responsive to determining that the encrypted invitation information was successfully decrypted, extracting the meeting identifier, the role information, and the start time; and determining that the meeting request is verified as failed in response to determining that the relationship between the start time and the current time does not satisfy the predetermined condition.

According to an exemplary implementation of the present disclosure, verifying the conference request further comprises: in response to determining that the relationship between the start time and the current time satisfies a predetermined condition, comparing the extracted meeting identification and participant identification with a meeting database; and responsive to determining that the extracted conference identification and participant identification match the conference database, determining that the conference request is verified as successful.

According to one exemplary implementation of the present disclosure, establishing the conference connection further comprises: the status of the participants in the meeting database is updated to "online".

According to an exemplary implementation of the present disclosure, verifying the conference request further comprises: determining a number of times a conference link is used; and responsive to determining that the number of times is not greater than the threshold number of times, determining that the conference request is verified as successful.

According to an exemplary implementation of the present disclosure, verifying the meeting request further comprises: in response to determining that the number of times is above the threshold number of times, determining that the meeting request is verified as failed.

According to an exemplary implementation of the present disclosure, the method 900 is performed at a server; the roles include at least any one of: presenter, audience, guest, administrator, assistant; and the role has a pre-designated participation right in the network conference, wherein the participation right comprises at least any one of the following items: the method comprises the following steps of live broadcasting authority, sharing screen authority, speaking authority, authority for operating objects in a shared screen, authority for adding participants, authority for deleting participants and participation authority for updating the participants.

According to one exemplary implementation of the present disclosure, a method performed at a participant's terminal device for managing a web conference is provided. In the method, a conference link is received, the conference link including invitation information for participating in the web conference, the invitation information including a conference identification of the web conference and role information of roles of participants. The network conference is participated based on the conference link.

According to an exemplary implementation of the present disclosure, the conference link further comprises an address of a server for providing the web conference.

According to one exemplary implementation of the present disclosure, participating in a web conference comprises: in response to determining that the conference link includes the address of the server, generating a conference request for requesting participation in the web conference based on the conference link, the conference request including invitation information; sending a conference request to a server of the network conference; and in response to receiving a response from the server to the conference request, establishing a conference connection for participating in the network conference between the terminal devices of the participants and the server.

According to one exemplary implementation of the present disclosure, the method is performed at a terminal device, and generating the conference request comprises: a meeting request is generated based on participant identifications of the participants and the invitation information.

According to an exemplary implementation of the present disclosure, the conference link further comprises a signature for verifying the conference link, and generating the conference request further comprises: responsive to successfully verifying the conference link based on the signature, the invitation information is extracted from the conference link.

Example apparatus and devices

According to one exemplary implementation of the present disclosure, an apparatus for managing a web conference deployed at a server providing the web conference is provided. Fig. 10 illustrates a block diagram of an apparatus 1000 for managing a web conference according to some implementations of the present disclosure. The apparatus 1000 comprises: an obtaining module 1010 configured to obtain roles of participants of the web conference; a generating module 1020 configured to generate a conference link of the web conference based on the role, the conference link including invitation information for participating in the web conference, the invitation information including a conference identifier of the web conference and role information of the role of the participant; and a sending module 1030 configured to send the conference link to the communication addresses of the participants so that the participants participate in the web conference via the conference link.

According to an exemplary implementation of the present disclosure, the invitation information further includes: the start time of the web conference, and the generating module 1020 includes: an invitation information generation module configured to generate invitation information based on the conference identifier, the role information, and the start time; an encryption module configured to perform an encryption operation with respect to the invitation information so as to generate encrypted invitation information; and a link generation module configured to generate a conference link based on the encrypted invitation information and an address of a server for providing the web conference.

According to an exemplary implementation of the present disclosure, the apparatus 1000 further includes: a signing module configured to perform a signing operation on the encrypted invitation information to generate a signature of the invitation information; and an adding module configured to add a signature to the conference link such that the conference link is verified via the signature; and a recording module configured to record the meeting identifier, the participant identifier of the participant, and the role information in a meeting database.

According to an exemplary implementation of the present disclosure, the apparatus 1000 further comprises: a receiving module configured to receive a conference request for requesting participation in the network conference from a terminal device of a participant, the conference request including the encrypted invitation information; an authentication module configured to authenticate the conference request based on the encrypted invitation information; and an establishing module configured to establish a conference connection between the terminal devices of the participants and the server in response to the conference request being verified as successful.

According to an exemplary implementation of the present disclosure, a verification module includes: an extraction module configured to extract the meeting identifier, the role information, and the start time in response to determining that the encrypted invitation information was successfully decrypted; and a first verification module configured to determine that the conference request is verified as failed in response to determining that a relationship between the start time and the current time does not satisfy a predetermined condition.

According to an exemplary implementation of the present disclosure, the verification module further comprises: a comparison module configured to compare the extracted meeting identification and participant identification with a meeting database in response to determining that a relationship between the start time and the current time satisfies a predetermined condition; and a second verification module configured to determine that the conference request is verified as successful in response to determining that the extracted conference identification and participant identification match the conference database.

According to an exemplary implementation of the disclosure, the establishing module further comprises: an update module configured to update the status of the participants in the meeting database to "online".

According to an exemplary implementation of the present disclosure, the second authentication module further includes: a number determination module configured to determine a number of times the conference link is used; and a success verification module configured to determine that the conference request is verified as successful in response to the determination number not being higher than the threshold number.

According to an exemplary implementation of the present disclosure, the second authentication module further includes: a failure verification module configured to determine that the conference request is verified as failed in response to the determination number being above a threshold number.

According to an exemplary implementation of the present disclosure, the apparatus 1000 is deployed at a server; the roles include at least any one of: presenter, audience, guest, administrator, assistant; and the role has pre-designated participation right in the network conference, wherein the participation right comprises at least one of the following items: the method comprises the following steps of live broadcasting authority, sharing screen authority, speaking authority, authority for operating objects in a shared screen, authority for adding participants, authority for deleting participants and participation authority for updating the participants.

According to one exemplary implementation of the present disclosure, an apparatus for managing a web conference, deployed at a participant's terminal device, is provided. The device includes: the conference link comprises invitation information used for participating in the network conference, and the invitation information comprises conference identification of the network conference and role information of roles of participants. A participation module configured to participate in the web conference based on the conference link.

According to one exemplary implementation of the present disclosure, the participation module includes: a generation module configured to generate a conference request for requesting participation in the web conference based on the conference link in response to determining that the conference link includes the address of the server, the conference request including invitation information; a sending module configured to send a conference request to a server of the web conference; and an establishing module configured to establish a conference connection for participating in the network conference between the terminal devices of the participants and the server in response to receiving a response of the server to the conference request.

According to one exemplary implementation of the disclosure, the apparatus is deployed at a terminal device, and the generating module includes: a request generation module configured to generate a meeting request based on participant identifications of the participants and the invitation information.

According to an exemplary implementation of the disclosure, the conference link further comprises a signature for verifying the conference link, and the generating module further comprises: an extraction module configured to extract invitation information from the conference link in response to successfully verifying the conference link based on the signature.

Fig. 11 illustrates a block diagram of a device 1100 capable of implementing multiple implementations of the present disclosure. It should be understood that the computing device 1100 illustrated in FIG. 11 is merely exemplary and should not be construed as limiting the functionality or scope of the implementations described herein in any way. The computing device 1100 shown in fig. 11 may be used to implement the methods described above.

As shown in fig. 11, computing device 1100 is in the form of a general purpose computing device. Components of computing device 1100 may include, but are not limited to, one or more processors or processing units 1110, memory 1120, storage device 1130, one or more communication units 1140, one or more input devices 1150, and one or more output devices 1160. The processing unit 1110 may be a real or virtual processor and can perform various processes according to programs stored in the memory 1120. In a multi-processor system, multiple processing units execute computer-executable instructions in parallel to improve the parallel processing capability of computing device 1100.

Computing device 1100 typically includes a number of computer storage media. Such media may be any available media that is accessible by computing device 1100 and includes, but is not limited to, volatile and non-volatile media, removable and non-removable media. The memory 1120 may be volatile memory (e.g., registers, cache, random Access Memory (RAM)), non-volatile memory (e.g., read Only Memory (ROM), electrically Erasable Programmable Read Only Memory (EEPROM), flash memory), or some combination thereof. Storage device 1130 may be a removable or non-removable medium and may include a machine-readable medium, such as a flash drive, a magnetic disk, or any other medium that may be capable of being used to store information and/or data (e.g., training data for training) and that may be accessed within computing device 1100.

The computing device 1100 may further include additional removable/non-removable, volatile/nonvolatile storage media. Although not shown in FIG. 11, a magnetic disk drive for reading from or writing to a removable, non-volatile magnetic disk (e.g., a "floppy disk") and an optical disk drive for reading from or writing to a removable, non-volatile optical disk may be provided. In these cases, each drive may be connected to a bus (not shown) by one or more data media interfaces. The memory 1120 may include a computer program product 1125 having one or more program modules configured to perform the various methods or acts of the various implementations of the disclosure.

The communication unit 1140 enables communication with other computing devices over a communication medium. Additionally, the functionality of the components of computing device 1100 may be implemented in a single computing cluster or multiple computing machines, which are capable of communicating over a communications connection. Thus, the computing device 1100 may operate in a networked environment using logical connections to one or more other servers, network Personal Computers (PCs), or another network node.

The input device 1150 may be one or more input devices such as a mouse, keyboard, trackball, or the like. Output device(s) 1160 may be one or more output devices such as a display, speakers, printer, etc. Computing device 1100 can also communicate with one or more external devices (not shown), such as storage devices, display devices, etc., communication devices with one or more devices that enable a user to interact with computing device 1100, or communication with any devices (e.g., network cards, modems, etc.) that enable computing device 1100 to communicate with one or more other computing devices, as desired, via communication unit 1140. Such communication may be performed via input/output (I/O) interfaces (not shown).

According to an exemplary implementation of the present disclosure, a computer-readable storage medium having stored thereon computer-executable instructions is provided, wherein the computer-executable instructions are executed by a processor to implement the above-described method. According to an exemplary implementation of the present disclosure, there is also provided a computer program product, tangibly stored on a non-transitory computer-readable medium and comprising computer-executable instructions, which are executed by a processor to implement the method described above. According to an exemplary implementation of the present disclosure, a computer program product is provided, on which a computer program is stored, which when executed by a processor, performs the above described method.

Various aspects of the present disclosure are described herein with reference to flowchart illustrations and/or block diagrams of methods, apparatus, devices and computer program products implemented in accordance with the disclosure. It will be understood that each block of the flowchart illustrations and/or block diagrams, and combinations of blocks in the flowchart illustrations and/or block diagrams, can be implemented by computer-readable program instructions.

These computer-readable program instructions may be provided to a processing unit of a general purpose computer, special purpose computer, or other programmable data processing apparatus to produce a machine, such that the instructions, which execute via the processing unit of the computer or other programmable data processing apparatus, create means for implementing the functions/acts specified in the flowchart and/or block diagram block or blocks. These computer-readable program instructions may also be stored in a computer-readable storage medium that can direct a computer, programmable data processing apparatus, and/or other devices to function in a particular manner, such that the computer-readable medium storing the instructions comprises an article of manufacture including instructions which implement the function/act specified in the flowchart and/or block diagram block or blocks.

The computer readable program instructions may be loaded onto a computer, other programmable data processing apparatus, or other devices to cause a series of operational steps to be performed on the computer, other programmable apparatus or other devices to produce a computer implemented process such that the instructions which execute on the computer, other programmable apparatus or other devices implement the functions/acts specified in the flowchart and/or block diagram block or blocks.

The flowchart and block diagrams in the figures illustrate the architecture, functionality, and operation of possible implementations of systems, methods and computer program products according to various implementations of the present disclosure. In this regard, each block in the flowchart or block diagrams may represent a module, segment, or portion of instructions, which comprises one or more executable instructions for implementing the specified logical function(s). In some alternative implementations, the functions noted in the block may occur out of the order noted in the figures. For example, two blocks shown in succession may, in fact, be executed substantially concurrently, or the blocks may sometimes be executed in the reverse order, depending upon the functionality involved. It will also be noted that each block of the block diagrams and/or flowchart illustration, and combinations of blocks in the block diagrams and/or flowchart illustration, can be implemented by special purpose hardware-based systems which perform the specified functions or acts, or combinations of special purpose hardware and computer instructions.

The foregoing has described implementations of the present disclosure, and the above description is illustrative, not exhaustive, and is not limited to the implementations disclosed. Many modifications and variations will be apparent to those of ordinary skill in the art without departing from the scope and spirit of the described implementations. The terminology used herein was chosen in order to best explain the principles of various implementations, the practical application, or improvements to the technology in the marketplace, or to enable others of ordinary skill in the art to understand various implementations disclosed herein.

Claims

1. A method for managing a web conference, comprising:

acquiring roles of participants of the network conference;

generating a conference link for the web conference based on the role, the conference link including invitation information for participating in the web conference, the invitation information including a conference identification for the web conference and role information for the roles of the participants; and

sending the conference link to the communication addresses of the participants to enable the participants to participate in the network conference via the conference link.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the invitation information further comprises: a start time of the web conference, and generating the conference link comprises:

generating the invitation information based on the conference identifier, the role information and the start time;

performing an encryption operation on the invitation information to generate encrypted invitation information; and

generating the conference link based on the encrypted invitation information and an address of a server for providing the web conference.

3. The method of claim 2, further comprising:

performing a signing operation on the encrypted invitation information to generate a signature of the invitation information; and

adding the signature to the conference link such that the conference link is verified via the signature; and

recording the meeting identifier, participant identifiers of the participants, and the role information in a meeting database.

4. The method of claim 3, further comprising:

receiving a conference request for requesting participation in the network conference from a terminal device of the participant, the conference request including the encrypted invitation information;

verifying the conference request based on the encrypted invitation information; and

establishing a conference connection between the terminal devices of the participants and the server in response to the conference request being verified as successful.

5. The method of claim 4, wherein verifying the conference request comprises:

in response to determining that the encrypted invitation information was successfully decrypted, extracting the meeting identifier, the role information, and the start time; and

in response to determining that the relationship between the start time and the current time does not satisfy a predetermined condition, determining that the meeting request is verified as failed.

6. The method of claim 5, wherein verifying the conference request further comprises: in response to determining that the relationship between the start time and the current time satisfies the predetermined condition,

comparing the extracted meeting identification and the participant identification with the meeting database; and

in response to determining that the extracted meeting identification and participant identification match the meeting database, determining that the meeting request is verified as successful.

7. The method of claim 6, wherein establishing the conference connection further comprises: updating the status of the participant in the meeting database to "online".

8. The method of claim 6, wherein verifying the conference request further comprises:

determining a number of times the conference link is used; and

in response to determining that the number of times is not above a threshold number of times, determining that the conference request is verified as successful.

9. The method of claim 8, wherein verifying the meeting request further comprises: in response to determining that the number is above the threshold number, determining that the meeting request is verified as failed.

10. The method of claim 1, wherein the method is performed at the server; the roles include at least any one of: presenter, audience, guest, administrator, assistant; and the role has pre-specified participation rights in the network conference, the participation rights including at least any one of: the method comprises the following steps of live broadcasting authority, sharing screen authority, speaking authority, authority for operating objects in a shared screen, authority for adding participants, authority for deleting participants and participation authority for updating the participants.

11. An apparatus for managing a web conference, comprising:

an obtaining module configured to obtain roles of participants of the web conference;

a generation module configured to generate a conference link for the web conference based on the role, the conference link including invitation information for participating in the web conference, the invitation information including a conference identification of the web conference and role information of the role of the participant; and

a sending module configured to send the conference link to the communication addresses of the participants to enable the participants to participate in the network conference via the conference link.

12. The apparatus of claim 11, wherein the invitation information further comprises: a start time of the web conference, and the generating module comprises:

an invitation information generation module configured to generate the invitation information based on the conference identifier, the role information, and the start time;

an encryption module configured to perform an encryption operation on the invitation information so as to generate encrypted invitation information; and

a link generation module configured to generate the conference link based on the encrypted invitation information and an address of a server for providing the web conference.

13. The apparatus of claim 12, further comprising:

a signature module configured to perform a signature operation on the encrypted invitation information so as to generate a signature of the invitation information; and

an addition module configured to add the signature to the conference link such that the conference link is verified via the signature; and

a recording module configured to record the meeting identifier, participant identifiers of the participants, and the role information in a meeting database.

14. The apparatus of claim 13, further comprising:

a receiving module configured to receive a conference request for requesting participation in the network conference from a terminal device of the participant, the conference request including the encrypted invitation information;

a verification module configured to verify the conference request based on the encrypted invitation information; and

an establishing module configured to establish a conference connection between the terminal devices of the participants and the server in response to the conference request being verified as successful.

15. The apparatus of claim 14, wherein the authentication module comprises:

an extraction module configured to extract the meeting identifier, the role information, and the start time in response to determining that the encrypted invitation information was successfully decrypted; and

a first verification module configured to determine that the meeting request is verified as failed in response to determining that a relationship between the start time and a current time does not satisfy a predetermined condition.

16. The apparatus of claim 15, wherein the authentication module further comprises:

a comparison module configured to compare the extracted meeting identification and the participant identification to the meeting database in response to determining that the relationship between the start time and the current time satisfies the predetermined condition; and

a second verification module configured to determine that the meeting request is verified as successful in response to determining that the extracted meeting identification and participant identification match the meeting database.

17. The apparatus of claim 16, wherein the second authentication module further comprises:

a number determination module configured to determine a number of times the conference link is used;

a successful verification module configured to determine that the meeting request is verified as successful in response to determining that the number of times is not above a threshold number of times; and

a failure verification module configured to determine that the conference request is verified as failed in response to determining that the number is above the threshold number.

18. The apparatus of claim 11, wherein the apparatus is deployed at the server; the roles include at least any one of: presenter, audience, guest, administrator, assistant; and the role has a pre-specified participation right in the network conference, wherein the participation right comprises at least any one of the following items: the method comprises the following steps of live broadcasting authority, sharing screen authority, speaking authority, authority for operating objects in a shared screen, authority for adding participants, authority for deleting the participants and participation authority for updating the participants.

19. An electronic device, comprising:

at least one processing unit; and

at least one memory coupled to the at least one processing unit and storing instructions for execution by the at least one processing unit, the instructions when executed by the at least one processing unit causing the electronic device to perform the method of any of claims 1-10.

20. A computer-readable storage medium, on which a computer program is stored which, when executed by a processor, causes the processor to carry out the method according to any one of claims 1 to 10.