GB2484715A

GB2484715A - Communication terminal with situation based configuration updating

Info

Publication number: GB2484715A
Application number: GB1017774.9A
Authority: GB
Inventors: Franco Papeschi
Original assignee: Vodafone IP Licensing Ltd
Current assignee: Vodafone IP Licensing Ltd
Priority date: 2010-10-21
Filing date: 2010-10-21
Publication date: 2012-04-25
Also published as: GB201017774D0

Abstract

The invention concerns managing the functionalities of a mobile communications terminal (such as mobile phone, PDA, netbook, or laptop), part of a communications network, by detecting 10 a situation such as an event for or state of the terminal; determining 12 a functionality relevant to the situation; updating 13 the terminal configuration to make it dependent on the situation based on the relevant functionality. Routine acts and situations are recognised and associated with particular functionalities of the terminal. The invention provides a method 11 of learning to recognize and associate different situations with particular functionalities. Once a particular situation/functionality combination is determined, it can then be used on the terminal to enhance user experience. More specifically, by monitoring the terminal's inputs and outputs for the occurrence of the particular situation, the terminal can display the particular functionality associated with that situation in anticipation of its use by the terminal user. Updating the terminal configuration can include updating the configuration of the graphical user interface (GUI), while the detected situation can comprise: location of the terminal; registration to a remote service, such as social networks; communication data being sent or received; data indicating motion of the terminal (e.g. from accelerometers).

Description

ENHANCED COMMUNICATIONS DEVICE AND ASSOCIATED APPLICATION

FOR USE THEREWITH

Field of the Invention

The present invention relates to a means for and a method of managing functionalities of a communications device, particularly in regard to enhancing the usability of functionalities of the communications device. In particular, the communication device is a mobile telecommunications device and the present invention relates to an application for use on such a mobile communications terminal.

Background

Mobile telecommunications have become commonplace in the modem world as a principle form of communication. With this acceptance, mobile phones have developed into an important tool for users, developing from terminals whose main function was to make and receive calls, to multi-ifinctional devices additionally able to send and receive emails, video and the like.

This increase in fttnctionality however, has also resulted in an increased complexity, particularly in regard to its provision of information and ease of use for users.

There is therefore a need to better manage the ftmctionalities usable on a communications terminal.

In general, there is a need to overcome or alleviate at least one of the problems of the

prior art.

Summary of the Invention

According to one aspect the present invention provides, in a communications network including a communications terminal with a plurality of different fti.nctionalities, a method of managing the plurality of different funetionalities, the method including: detecting a situation in relation to the communication terminal, such as an event or terminal state; upon detecting the situation, determining at least one terminal functionality relevant to the situation; updating a configuration of the communication terminal based upon the at least one relevant terminal functionality so that the configuration is in dependence upon the detected situation.

Preferably the method fttrthcr includes associating a given situation with a given terminal functionality by detecting a number of coinciding occurrences of the situation and the given terminal fhnctionality.

Preferably updating of the configuration of the terminal includes updating a graphical user interface of the terminal by displaying/activating the at least one relevant terminal functionality on the graphical user interface in anticipation of its use by a user of the terminal.

In other words, by monitoring the terminal's inputs and outputs for the occurrence of a particular situation, the terminal can display the particular functionality associated with that situation in anticipation of its use by the terminal user.

Other aspects of the invention are defined in the attached claims.

Advantageously by associating the usage of different terminal ftmctionalities with particular situations, such as particular locations, time periods and/or other events it becomes possible to anticipate the likely usage of the different terminal functionalities and thereby simplify the user's access to the relevant functions and enhancing the user experience. In other words, once a particular situation/functionality combination is determined, it can then be used on the terminal to enhance the terminal's usability.

According to a thither aspect, the present invention provides a method of using a mobile communications terminal to recognise a user routine, the method including: detecting a situation in relation to the communications terminal, such as an event or terminal state; associating the detected situation with at least one time and/or location indication as a combination; and recognising the combination as a routine upon determining at least one recurrence of the combination.

This further aspect of the invention may be utilised to enhance the usability of the mobile communications terminal by in turn associating the recognised combination with a functionality either on the terminal or usable on the terminal and providing the user with automatic access to that functionality via the terminal. In this way, the event/terminal state may not only be usable to activate a functionality known to be used by the user in relation to that event/terminal state, but one which is relevant to the event/terminal state and likely to be useful to the user.

Brief Description of the Drawings

Embodiments of the invention will now be described with reference to the accompanying Figure in which: Figure 1 shows a flowchart illustrating an embodiment of the invention.

Detailed Description

According to a first embodiment of the invention, a system such as an application program is provided on a communications terminal which is configured to operate in conjunction with the normal processing of the communications device. The application may be implemented in hardware and/or software. The application may also be pre-stored on the communications device, or be downloadable thereto. The communications device may be any device capable of storing and processing an application program, including a portable computing device such as a mobile phone, PDA (personal digital assistant), netbook, laptop and the like. The application may also be at least partially implemented remotely (e.g. some data processing may be performed remotely and passed to the communications terminal).

With reference to Figure 1, in this first embodiment of the invention, when activated, the application is configured to monitor one or more data channels associated with the communications device (10). For instance, the application may be configured to monitor the output and/or input ports of the communications device for certain data, such as: > data indicating the terminal's location (such as UPS communication data or network LAU data); > data manually entered by the user to indicate their location, such as in terms of a description of a place (e.g. "my office", "in Paris"); > data gathered by crowd-sourcing "labelling" activities from other users' terminals to indicate their location (e.g. "Ulasto"), where the other users can be associated with the current user's location; > data indicating the communications device is logged onto a particular site (such as a work network or a social networking site); > communication data relating to sent/received SMS messages, MMS messages, phone calls and emails; > data indicating time, in terms of hour, day of the week, week number, month and/or year; > data indicating the usage of a peripheral (e.g. headphones) connected to the device; > data indicating the terminal is in motion (e.g. from an accelerometer); and > data indicating that the user is using third party services, such as their travel card (e.g. the London OysterTM card), cycle hire account or music streaming account (e.g. Last.fmTM, SpotifyTM). This data could be determined at the moment of "connecting" to the service and would provide additional information on the user's

S

pattern of usage of these services. Manual authorisation may need to be granted by the user to collect such data.

This monitored data can then be used to determine any routines of the user, such as routine acts relating to a "situation" of the user or an "event".

The routines may be pre-spccified and/or learnt by the application through the recognition of data patterns corresponding to repeated user situations/events. For instance, travel card usage in the morning on work days could be associated with the user on his way to work. Subsequently logging onto a work network could similarly be associated with the user being at his workplace. Similarly, the regular attendance at a particular location on a Friday evening may be designated as corresponding to the user visiting their favourite pub.

Further, data can be gathered in relation to these data patterns, for instance locations that the user regularly enters and departs a transport network (e.g. raillbus network).

Similarly, where the user uses a cycle hire scheme, the locations that the user regularly collects and deposits cycle hire bikes can be determined. This data can then be used to enhance the recognised data patterns. This data can also be used for other purposes, including user profiling In a preferred embodiment of the invention, in dependence upon the detected routine, the application is then configured to display relevant options (i.e. functionalities of the terminal). For instance, depending upon the detected event/situation, the terminal could be configured to display work emails, personal emails and/or display different terminal applications/functionalities. More specifically, if the application monitoring the data determines that the user has gone to their favourite pub, the application will then decide whether there are any functionalities relevant to this location. For instance, it may have been previously determined (or pre-designatcd) that the user likes to play a certain game on their terminal when at the pub. Therefore using the association between the pub location and the game, the terminal may be configured to display the game on the screen.

As a further example, Further, the application may recognise certain communication patterns of the user, such as the user checking work email in the morning, and accordingly display the user's work email account most prominently on the GUI each morning in anticipation of the user's normallrecognised activity. It is to be appreciated that as an alternative, in response to the recognised pattern, this embodiment may be used to activate a relevant functionality or service. For example, a private email account may be activated when a "home" associated routine is detected.

In a still further example, where the application has determined the locations that the user enters and exits a transport system, and the times of the day/week, in dependence thereon, the application may extract travel information from a third party source and display this information on the terminal screen for ease of reference by the user. In this way the user may be informed of any likely problems with their journey, thereby allowing them to take an alternative route if necessary.

Therefore, in effect, this embodiment of the invention is able to dynamically update the configuration of the graphical user interface of the user's mobile terminal in dependence upon their situation.

It is to be appreciated that whilst the application implementing the invention is ideally located on the terminal itself, the application is able to obtain information and even download relevant ftinctionalitics from remote sources.

The following table illustrates some additional example combinations that the application on a communications terminal may be configured to implement: Event/Situation Functionality Regular SMS messaging with friend X Display suggestion in the recognised time on way home from work (e.g. between period for the event to send SMS to friend X 5pm and 6pm) Regular use of headset/stored music Display music player on screen of device for between Sam and 9am on weekdays ease of opening by user Recognise that the user has added a new Display suggestion for unique ringtone contact to their address book selection or a link to a ringtone shop Recognise that the user regular uses a Display the camera application on the camera installed on the device on device's screen on the weekends for ease of weekends access Recognise that the location of the user Automatically open the maps application for as "Paris" and that the user, upon use upon recognising that the user is in Paris previous visits has used a map application Recognise that the user is at a festival Automatically open a webpage relating to by virtue of co-location with other users the festival, such as a webpage listing the for whom the festival location can be acts with their stage locations and times.

clearly determined Recognise that the user regularly logs Activate the social networking site on into a social networking site on Saturday mornings on the terminal, ready for Saturday mornings use by the user The expression "functionalities" is intended to cover the standard operations of a communications terminal (such as SMS and email messaging) as well as applications installed on the terminal for varying purposes.

The embodiment just described displays functionalities based upon events/situations as they are detected. That is, it has a database of different fianctionalities that are considered relevant to the user when a certain event happens or when the user is located in a certain place.

In an alternative embodiment of the invention, the application is configured to anticipate certain events/situations and display functionalities based upon what the application predicts will be relevant to the user. In this embodiment of the invention, a database of known/determined patterns of events and their related functionalities is used. The associations between the events and the terminal functionalities in this database may be pre-specified. Alternatively or in addition, the mobile terminal may also be configured to recognise patterns of functionality usage dependent upon particular locations or activities.

The embodiments of the invention that have been described are to be taken as illustrative of the invention and not limitative.

For instance, although the embodiments have been described as facilitating the user by displaying the relevant functionality, in an alternative the application may otherwise prioritise the relevant functionality, such as by being configured to: (i) automatically perform the functionality (e.g. the application may recognise that the user regularly logs onto a social network site during a particular time period each day.

To make the user's task simpler, upon recognising this pattern, the application according to the invention may be configured to automatically log into the site at the commencement of the time period; or (ii) perform an action related to the functionality (e.g. the application may recognise when the user is not busy and/or when the user most frequently initiates communications. Upon recognising this situation, the application may be configured to display a "new message" screen (e.g. for email, SMS or MMS) enabling the user to easily initiate a communication if required.

Claims

Claims 1. In a communications network including a communications terminal with a plurality of different functionalities, a method of managing the plurality of different functionalities, the method including: detecting a situation in relation to the communications terminal, such as an event or terminal state; upon detecting the situation, determining at least one terminal functionality relevant to the situation; updating a configuration of the communication terminal based upon the at least one relevant terminal functionality so that the configuration is in dependence upon the detected situation.
2. The method of claim 1 further including recognising a detected situation as a repeated situation indicating a predetermined routine of a user of the terminal which is associated with the at least one relevant terminal functionality.
3. The method of any one preceding claim further including associating a given situation with a given terminal functionality by detecting a number of coinciding occurrences of the situation and the given terminal functionality.
4. The method of any one preceding claim wherein the updating step includes updating a configuration of the graphical user interface of the communications terminal.
5. The method of claim 4 wherein updating the configuration of the graphical user interface comprises displaying the at least one relevant terminal functionality on the graphical user interface in anticipation of its use by a user of the terminal.
6. The method of any one preceding claim further including monitoring at least one output and/or input associated with the communications terminal in order to detect the situation.
7. The method of claim 6 wherein the monitoring is performed to detect one or more of the following situations: a) a location of the communications terminal; b) the communications terminal being registered on a particular remote service, such as a social network service; c) communication data being sent/received; and d) data indicating the terminal is in motion.
8. An application program configured for use on a communications terminal with a plurality of different functionalities, the application program for managing the plurality of different functionalities and being configured to: detect a situation in relation to the communications terminal such as an event or terminal state; upon detecting the situation, determine at least one terminal fttnctionality relevant to the situation; and update a configuration of the communication terminal based upon the at least one relevant terminal functionality so that the configuration is in dependence upon the detected situation.
9. The application program of claim 8 fttrther configured to recognise a detected situation as a repeated situation indicating a predetermined routine of a user of the terminal which is associated with the at least one relevant terminal functionality.
10. The application program of claim 8 or 9 being further configured to associate a given situation with a given terminal functionality by detecting a number of coinciding occurrences of the situation and the given terminal functionality.
11. The application program of any one of claims 8 to 10 being further configured to monitor at least one output and/or input associated with the communications terminal in order to detect the situation.
12. The applicationprogram of anyone of claims 8 toll being further conflguredto update a configuration of the graphical user interface of the communications terminal.
13. The application program of any one of claim 12 being further configured to update the configuration of the graphical user interface by displaying the at least one relevant terminal functionality on the graphical user interface in anticipation of its use by a user of the terminal.
14. An application program substantially as herein described with reference to the accompanying drawing.
15. A method substantially as herein described with reference to the accompanying drawing.