KR20190126949A - Forwarding activity-related information from source electronic devices to companion electronic devices - Google Patents

Abstract

The described embodiments transfer activities from a source electronic device to a companion electronic device. The source electronic device receives activity information that describes the activity performed in the first application of the source electronic device and broadcasts an activity advertisement that includes an activity identifier for the activity. Upon receiving the activity advertisement, the companion electronic device determines whether a second application associated with the first application is available at the companion electronic device. If a second application is available, the companion electronic device obtains extended activity data from the source electronic device, configures the second application using the extended activity data, and the second application of the companion electronic device. Use to start the activity. The source electronic device may also forward the activity related information (eg, information from the copy and paste clipboard in the source electronic device) to the companion electronic device.

Description

FORWARDING ACTIVITY-RELATED INFORMATION FROM SOURCE ELECTRONIC DEVICES TO COMPANION ELECTRONIC DEVICES}

Related Applications

This application is filed on December 30, 2014, and is a partial continuing application of pending US patent application Ser. No. 14 / 586,566, entitled "Activity Continuation between Electronic Devices," and claims priority thereto. The present application is also filed on May 30, 2014 and the presently-expired US Provisional Patent Application No. 62, entitled “Activity Continuation between Electronic Devices,” to which Application No. 14 / 586,566 also claims priority. Insist on priority over / 005,781. Both of these applications are incorporated by reference.

This application is entitled “Companion Application for Activity Cooperation” and is identical to the present application by inventors Marc J. Krochmal, Christopher S. Linn, John J. Iarocci, Geoffrey Stahl, and Jacques P. Gasselin de Richebourg. And pending US patent application Ser. No. 14 / 586,511, filed dated Agent Case No. APL-P23129US1. This application is also entitled "Operating Mode Transitions based on Advertising Information" and is published on 2 September 2014 by inventors Craig P. Dooley, Akshay Mangalam Srivatsa, Anjali S. Sandesara, and Michael J. Giles. And pending US patent application Ser. No. 14 / 475,329, filed, Agent Case No. APL-P22643US1. The present application is also entitled "Predefined Wireless Pairing" and is an agent, filed September 2, 2014 by inventors Jason C. Conn, Akshay Mangalam Srivatsa, Craig P. Dooley, and Michael J. Giles. No. APL-P22642US1, pending US patent application Ser. No. 14 / 474,466. This application is further entitled, “Activity Continuation between Electronic Devices”, and inventors Christopher S. Linn, Keith Stattenfield, Christopher C. Jensen, Alexander R. Ledwith, David A. Carter, Marc J. Krochmal, John J. Iarocci, and Jonathan M. Grynspan, filed December 30, 2014, and relates to pending US patent application Ser. No. 14 / 586,566, which is Agent Control No. APL-P22791US1. Each of the above-described applications is incorporated herein by reference.

Technical Field

The disclosed embodiments relate to electronic devices. More particularly, the disclosed embodiments relate to forwarding activity-related information from a source electronic device to a companion electronic device.

Recent advances in computer technology have allowed manufacturers to produce powerful computing devices in a variety of form factors, so users can use small, portable devices such as smartphones or tablets to perform tasks that would have once required a desktop or laptop computer. Made it possible. Due to these advances, users often carry and use a number of computing devices, such as smart phones on the go, tablets during meetings, and laptops or desktop computers at work.

In some cases, the user may find himself using a device that does not fit the task being performed, or the situation in which the user is, even though the user has different devices, each with powerful computing capabilities. . For example, if a user has initiated an intended short email on a device with a small display screen, such as a smartphone, but the email is longer than expected, the size of the display screen makes it difficult to enter and edit text in the email. May suffer. Alternatively, the user may be reading a web page or watching a movie on the desktop but may have to leave the room where the desktop is located. Although the user can start the task by importing another device, this is cumbersome.

1 shows a block diagram illustrating an electronic device in accordance with some embodiments.
2 illustrates a block diagram illustrating a network environment in accordance with some embodiments.
3 shows a flow diagram illustrating a process for broadcasting an activity advertisement message, in accordance with some embodiments.
4 illustrates a flow diagram illustrating a process for storing activity information describing activities available at a companion electronic device, in accordance with some embodiments.
5 shows a flow diagram illustrating a process for requesting extended activity data and delivering the activity, in accordance with some embodiments.
6 shows a flowchart illustrating a process for responding to a request for extended activity data, in accordance with some embodiments.
7 shows a flowchart illustrating a process for determining whether a second application is available to a companion electronic device, in accordance with some embodiments.
8 shows a flow diagram illustrating a process for determining a second application using a flag, in accordance with some embodiments.
9 shows a flow diagram illustrating a process for determining whether a second application is available when an activity identifier identifies an entry in a structure that stores advertised activities, in accordance with some embodiments.
10 shows a flow diagram illustrating a process for determining the most recent activity from two or more activity advertising messages, in accordance with some embodiments.
11 illustrates a block diagram illustrating activity information in accordance with some embodiments.
12 shows a block diagram illustrating an advertised-activity table in accordance with some embodiments.
13 illustrates a block diagram illustrating an activity advertising message in accordance with some embodiments.
14 illustrates a block diagram illustrating a resumeable-activity indication in accordance with some embodiments.
15 illustrates a swim lane diagram illustrating messages exchanged between electronic devices, in accordance with some embodiments.
16 shows a block diagram illustrating electronic devices proximate to each other in accordance with some embodiments.
17 illustrates a flow diagram illustrating a process for forwarding activity related information from a source electronic device to a companion electronic device, in accordance with some embodiments.
18 illustrates a block diagram illustrating an activity related information advertisement generated by a source electronic device in accordance with some embodiments.
19 shows a flowchart illustrating a process for receiving, at a companion electronic device, activity related information from a source electronic device, in accordance with some embodiments.
20 illustrates a block diagram illustrating an activity related information availability indicator in accordance with some embodiments.
In the drawings, like reference numerals refer to the same figure elements.

The following description is provided to enable any person skilled in the art to practice and use the described embodiments, and is provided in connection with a particular application and its requirements. Various modifications to the described embodiments will be apparent to those skilled in the art, and the generic principles defined herein may be applied to other embodiments and applications without departing from the spirit and scope of the described embodiments. have. Thus, the described embodiments are not to be limited to the illustrated embodiments, but should be accorded the widest scope consistent with the principles and features disclosed herein.

In some embodiments, the electronic device (eg, electronic device 100 and / or portions thereof) of the code and / or stored in a computer readable storage medium to perform some or all of the operations described herein. Or use data. More specifically, an electronic device reads code and / or data from a computer readable storage medium and executes code and / or uses data when performing the described operations. In these embodiments, the computer readable storage medium may be any device or medium or combination thereof that stores code and / or data for use by the electronic device. For example, computer-readable storage media may be, for example, volatile or nonvolatile memory, such as semiconductor memory (eg, flash memory, random access memory (eDRAM, RAM, SRAM, DRAM, DDR, DDR2 / DDR3 / DDR4 SDRAM, etc.), etc.). ) And / or magnetic or optical storage media (eg, disk drives, magnetic tapes, CDs, DVDs). In the described embodiments, the computer readable storage medium does not comprise a non-statutory computer readable storage medium such as temporary signals.

In some embodiments, one or more hardware modules are configured to perform the operations described herein. For example, hardware modules may include one or more processor / core / central processing units (CPUs), application specific integrated circuits (ASIC) chips, field programmable gate arrays (FPGAs), cache / cache controllers, memory management units, computes. Units, embedded processors, graphics processors (GPU) / graphic cores, pipelines, and / or other programmable logic devices. When these hardware modules are activated, the hardware modules perform some or all of the operations. In some embodiments, hardware modules include one or more general purpose circuits configured by executing instructions (program code, firmware, etc.) to perform operations.

In the present description, functional blocks may be referred to in the description of some embodiments. In general, the functional blocks include one or more interrelated circuits, devices, and / or mechanisms that perform the described operations. In some embodiments, at least some of the functional blocks include general purpose processing circuits that execute program code (eg, microcode, firmware, applications, etc.) to cause the general purpose processing circuits to perform the described operations.

summary

The described embodiments transfer activities performed at the source electronic device from the source electronic device to the companion electronic device, which process is referred to as "continuing" the activity at the companion electronic device. In the described embodiments, to perform the delivery, the source electronic device transmits information describing the activity performed in the first application of the source electronic device to the companion electronic device. The companion electronic device then uses some or all of the information to configure the second application of the companion electronic device to perform the corresponding activity. In general, an activity includes one or more operations performed at least in part on the source electronic device and continued on / toward the accompanying electronic device. Examples of activities include reading and / or editing a document (eg, a word processing document, spreadsheet, presentation, or other type of document), creating an email message, email, voice message or video, drafting a note. , Accessing (browsing) a website, watching a movie, playing an audio file, or otherwise performing a corresponding action using an application or app.

In some embodiments, when transferring an activity from a source device to a companion device, the source electronic device first uses the wireless network interface (eg, Bluetooth low energy (BLE), ZigBee, etc.) to advertise the activity. Broadcast a message (also referred to as an "activity advertisement"). In some embodiments, the source electronic device generates an activity identifier for the activity performed in the first application of the source electronic device and includes the activity identifier in the activity advertisement message. The source electronic device generates an activity identifier by performing a set of operations (eg, a hash operation, etc.) using the activity information describing the activity received from the first application. Examples of activity information are described in more detail below with reference to FIG.

The companion electronic device monitors the network (eg, Bluetooth low energy network) for the activity advertisement message on the network interface corresponding to the network interface in the source electronic device that broadcasted the activity advertisement. Upon detecting the activity advertisement broadcast from the source electronic device, the companion electronic device compares the activity identifiers for the activities available at the companion electronic device to the activity identifier in the activity advertisement message. The companion electronic device uses this comparison to determine whether a second application capable of performing an activity corresponding to the activity performed in the first application is available at the companion electronic device.

In some embodiments, when determining that the second application is available, the companion electronic device may communicate via a communication channel (eg, the same wireless network interface used to receive the activity advertisement message, or different wireless and / or wired). Establish communication with the source electronic device) using a network interface. The companion electronic device then uses the communication channel to request extended activity data from the source electronic device for the activity performed in the first application. In some embodiments, upon receiving a request for extended activity data, the source electronic device provides extended activity data to the companion electronic device using the same (or different) communication channel. Generally, extended activity data includes information that can be used to configure a second application in the companion electronic device to continue activities related to the activity performed in the first application, such as document identifier, scroll position, uniform resource locator (URL), and the like. Include.

In some embodiments, the companion electronic device configures the second application to perform the activity corresponding to the activity performed in the first application of the source electronic device using the activity identifier and / or the extended activity data. The companion electronic device then begins to perform the activity in the second application of the companion electronic device. For example, after the companion electronic device configures the second application, the user may use the companion electronic device to continue working on the document the user was working on the source electronic device, or the movie the user was watching on the source electronic device. Or continue browsing the webpage that the user was browsing on the source electronic device. In some embodiments, the companion electronic device sends a notification to the source electronic device to indicate that the activity has been delivered to the second application. The notification may cause the source electronic device and / or the first application to perform a housekeeping task, such as deleting a document draft for the activity, closing an open document for the activity, and the like.

In some embodiments, in addition to the activity identifier and / or extended activity data described above, the source electronic device forwards the activity related information to the companion electronic device. For example, in some embodiments, the source electronic device forwards some or all of the contents of the copy and paste clipboard (or “clipboard”) in the source electronic device to the companion electronic device. Upon receiving activity related information, the companion electronic device provides activity related information for performing activities (eg, delivered activities or other activities) at the companion electronic device. For example, in embodiments in which some or all of the contents of the clipboard are forwarded from the source electronic device, the companion electronic device may receive some or all of the existing content of the clipboard in the companion electronic device from the clipboard. Can be overridden by the contents of In this manner, the companion electronic device may make the contents of the clipboard (ie, activity related information) from the source electronic device available to activities in the companion electronic device. For example, text, images, video, sound, files, fields, and / or other information copied to (or otherwise placed on) the clipboard within the source electronic device may be sent via the companion electronic device's clipboard, It can be made available to activities in the companion electronic device.

By performing the above-described operations for continuing the activity performed at the source electronic device at the companion electronic device, the described embodiments allow the user to continue the task seamlessly and without complex user intervention. This makes it easier for the user to perform the task on the desired electronic device, which may improve the overall experience of the user using two or more electronic devices.

Electronic devices

1 shows a block diagram illustrating an electronic device 100 in accordance with some embodiments. The electronic device 100 includes a processing subsystem 102, a memory subsystem 104, a networking subsystem 106, and a display subsystem 108.

Processing subsystem 102 is a functional block that performs a calculation operation on electronic device 100. Processing subsystem 102 includes one or more central processing units (CPUs) / CPU cores, graphics processing units (GPUs) / GPU cores, embedded processors, application specific integrated circuits (ASICs), and / or other computing mechanisms.

Memory subsystem 104 is a functional block that stores data and / or instructions for use by other functional blocks within electronic device 100 (eg, processing subsystem 102, etc.). Memory subsystem 104 is a memory circuit as well as volatile memory circuits, such as dynamic random access memory (DRAM), static random access memory (SRAM), and / or other types of memory used for storing instructions and data. Mechanisms for controlling them. In some embodiments, memory subsystem 104 includes a memory hierarchy having one or more caches coupled to memory circuits. In some of these embodiments, processing subsystem 102 also includes one or more caches that are part of the memory hierarchy.

In some embodiments, memory subsystem 104 is coupled to one or more nonvolatile high capacity mass storage devices (not shown). For example, memory subsystem 104 may be coupled to a magnetic or optical drive, a solid state drive, or other type of mass storage device. In these embodiments, memory subsystem 104 may be used by electronic device 100 as a fast-access storage for often-used data, while mass-storage devices may store less frequently used data. Used for.

Networking subsystem 106 is a functional block that includes one or more devices that are configured to couple to and communicate with (ie, perform network operations) through a wired and / or wireless network. For example, networking subsystem 106 may include a Bluetooth ™ networking system, a cellular networking system (eg, 3G / 4G networks such as UMTS, LTE, etc.), a universal serial bus (USB) networking system, IEEE 802.11, 802.15 Networking systems (eg, Zigbee, Wi-Fi networking systems, etc.), Ethernet networking systems, and / or other networking systems based on the standards described in, and the like. Networking subsystem 106 is coupled to each supported networking system, communicates through it, processors, controllers, radios / antennas, sockets / plugs used to process data and events therefor. , And / or other devices. In the description below, the mechanisms used to couple to, communicate over, and process data and events for each network system are collectively referred to as an "interface" or "network interface" for the network system. do.

Display subsystem 108 is a functional block that includes one or more devices configured to display information on a visual interface to electronic device 100. For example, in some embodiments, display subsystem 108 includes display screens used to display graphics processors (GPUs), graphics cards, and / or information.

In some embodiments, communication paths (including one or more buses, wires, and / or connections), as indicated by the arrows of the lines between the components, may be functional blocks within the electronic device 100 (processing subs). System 102, memory subsystem 104, etc.). Communication paths are used to transmit commands, data, event notifications, and / or other information between components.

Although specific components are used to describe the electronic device 100, in some embodiments different components and / or subsystems may exist in the electronic device 100. For example, electronic device 100 may include one or more additional processing subsystems 102, memory subsystem 104, and the like. Additionally, one or more of the subsystems may not be present in the electronic device 100, or some or all of the functions of the subsystem may be integrated into other subsystems. Moreover, in some embodiments, electronic device 100 may include one or more additional subsystems not shown in FIG. 1. For example, electronic device 100 may include, but is not limited to, a data collection subsystem, an audio and / or video subsystem, an alarm subsystem, a media processing subsystem, and / or an input / output (I / O) subsystem. It is not limited.

The electronic device 100 may be or include any device that performs computational operations. For example, electronic device 100 may be a desktop computer, laptop computer, wearable computing device, tablet computer, smartphone, server, network device, toy, audio-visual equipment (eg, receiver, set top box, Apple TV, etc.), Automobiles (eg, vehicle interface systems, navigation systems, head-up displays, etc.), consumer electronics, controllers, and the like, and / or combinations thereof. (Apple TV is a registered trademark of Apple Inc., Cupertino, California).

Network environment

2 illustrates a block diagram illustrating a network environment in accordance with some embodiments. As can be seen in FIG. 2, the network environment 200 includes a source electronic device 202, a companion electronic device 204, and a second source electronic device 206 (collectively referred to as “electronic device”). do. In some embodiments, each of the electronic devices is an electronic device similar to electronic device 100, that is, has a subsystem similar to electronic device 100. However, this is not essential; The described embodiments can use any electronic device capable of performing the operations described herein.

Source electronic device 202 and second source electronic device 206 are electronic devices that participate in an exchange of communication with companion electronic device 204 in connection with an activity delivery operation. In some embodiments, the source electronic device 202 (and / or the second source electronic device 206) is an electronic device recognized by the companion electronic device 204 and thus is allowed to participate in an activity delivery operation. For example, both the source electronic device 202 and the companion electronic device 204 may have been registered with a service provider using the same account, and thus may recognize each other through information stored within each electronic device. For example, in some embodiments, source electronic device 202 and companion electronic device 204 participate in a preliminary pairing operation, such as a predefined pairing (and recognize each other through the information obtained thereby). ), Which is named "Predefined Wireless Pairing", incorporated by reference as described above, and on the same date as the present application by inventors Jason C. Conn, Akshay Mangalam Srivatsa, Craig P. Dooley, and Michael Giles. As described in pending US patent application Ser. No. APL-P22642USP1, filed at No. xx / xxx, xxx. In some embodiments, source electronic device 202 and companion electronic device 204 may include an inter-device identification factor (encryption key, certificate) such that source electronic device 202 and companion electronic device 204 subsequently recognize each other. Etc.) may participate in the exchange.

Within the network environment 200, the companion electronic device 204 uses a wireless communication signal 208 (illustrated using a zigzag line labeled “communication signal 208” in FIG. 2) to the source electronic device ( 202 and the second source electronic device 206. In some embodiments, communication signal 208 is formatted and exchanged in accordance with a corresponding wireless protocol—for example, via a wireless network protocol such as Bluetooth, Zigbee, an 802.11-based protocol, and / or other wireless network protocol. (Broadcast, send / receive, etc.). In some embodiments, some or all of the communication signal 208 is communicated as a wired communication signal, such as, for example, a wired Ethernet, wired LAN, wired WAN, or the like.

In some embodiments, the activity delivery operations described herein are sufficiently close to each other so that the communication signal 208 (and thus the integrated message) sent by each electronic device can be received by other electronic devices. Depends on source electronic device 202 and companion electronic device 204. In other words, the source electronic device 202 and the companion electronic device 204 are "close to" each other, thus enabling message exchange between the electronic devices. Thus, as used herein, “close” refers to the distance (s) in which messages broadcast / sent from a given electronic device can be received by one or more other electronic devices. This distance is broadened by radio equipment (antennas, receivers / transmitters, etc.) and electronic conditions within the electronic device, and factors such as environmental conditions (such as electromagnetic interference), intermediary objects (furniture, walls, clothes / bags, etc.). It depends on the specific radio protocol / signal used to cast / transmit. For example, in some embodiments, the communication signal 208 is exchanged using a protocol having an expected range of 30 meters between the source electronic device 202 and the companion electronic device 204, thus allowing devices to communicate with each other. Devices are "close" when within about 30 meters (but note that the expected range may be significantly changed by the factors described above).

16 shows a block diagram illustrating electronic devices proximate to each other in accordance with some embodiments. As can be seen in FIG. 16, companion electronic device 204 is within range 1602 for a wireless signal (eg, communication signal 208) for source electronic device 202, which is associated with companion electronic device 204. It means that it can receive the wireless signal transmitted from the source electronic device 202. In addition, the source electronic device 202 is within range 1604 for a wireless signal (eg, communication signal 208) for the companion electronic device 204, such that the source electronic device 202 is accompanied by the companion electronic device 204. Means that the wireless signal transmitted from the Rx can be received. Thus, as described above, the source electronic device 202 and the companion electronic device 204 are in close proximity to each other, thus enabling communication (and corresponding operations) of the messages described herein. However, neither the source electronic device 202 nor the companion electronic device 204 is within the range 1606 of the wireless signal for the electronic device 1600, which is the source electronic device 202 or the companion electronic device 204. None of them are close to the electronic device 1600. It should be noted that the ranges 1602-1606 of FIG. 16 are shown using an irregular shape, thereby illustrating that the wireless signal from the electronic devices has an irregular range in accordance with the electronic device (antenna arrangement, etc.), the factors described above, and the like. do.

In some embodiments, messages, data, and the like communicated between electronic devices are encrypted. In these embodiments, some or all of the electronic devices use a shared key, keys derived from the shared key, and / or a disposable key to perform corresponding encryption and decryption operations. For example, as described above, in some embodiments, source electronic device 202 and companion electronic device 204 participate in a predefined pairing, which is a name of the invention, which is incorporated by reference as described above. Is “Predefined Wireless Pairing,” pending US under Agent Case No. APL-P22642USP1, filed on the same date as the present application by inventors Jason C. Conn, Akshay Mangalam Srivatsa, Craig P. Dooley, and Michael Giles. As described in patent application xx / xxx, xxx. In some embodiments, source electronic device 202 and companion electronic device 204 may obtain one or more encryption keys that source electronic device 202 and companion electronic device 204 obtain while participating in a predefined pairing. Use to encrypt and decrypt messages exchanged for activity delivery operations.

Although various electronic devices are shown in FIG. 2, in some embodiments different arrangements of electronic devices are used to perform some or all of the operations described herein. For example, in some embodiments, the second source electronic device 206 is not present. In general, the described embodiments include sufficient devices to switch activities between the electronic devices described herein.

Broadcast activity advertising message

3 shows a flow diagram illustrating a process for broadcasting an activity advertising message, in accordance with some embodiments. More specifically, during the process shown in FIG. 3, an electronic device, such as source electronic device 202, broadcasts an activity advertisement message. Note that the operations shown in FIG. 3 are shown as a general example of the operations performed by some embodiments. The operations performed by some embodiments include different operations and / or operations performed in a different order. Additionally, while certain mechanisms are used in the description of the operations (eg, source electronic device 202, etc.), in some embodiments, other mechanisms perform the operations. For example, one or both of the companion electronic device 204 and the second source electronic device 206 may perform similar operations on their own to broadcast the activity advertisement message.

The process shown in FIG. 3 is performed in a first application where the source electronic device 202 is available on the first application of the source electronic device 202, ie, installed on / at the source electronic device 202. Begins upon receiving activity information describing the activity being performed (step 300). (Examples of activity information are described in more detail below with reference to FIG. 11.) In some embodiments, the first application provides or reports activity information to the source electronic device 202, for example, providing activity information. Provide or report to an operating system, daemon, or other process and / or service of source electronic device 202. In some embodiments, source electronic device 202 queries the first application for activity information. In general, activity information includes information describing an activity performed at least in part using an electronic device. Examples of activities include reading and / or editing documents (eg, word processing documents, spreadsheets, presentations, or other types of documents), writing email messages, drafting notes, accessing (browsing) websites, movies Viewing, playing an audio file, or otherwise using the application or app to perform the corresponding action.

Next, the source electronic device 202 determines whether or not to filter the received activity information (step 302), which discards the activity information without further processing and / or not to be broadcast in the activity advertisement message. The use of one or more criteria for. For example, the source electronic device 202 can measure the frequency at which the first application provides an update to the activity information and, if the frequency at which the activity information is updated exceeds a threshold, the activity information from the first application. May be discarded (which may be referred to as "throttling" activity information from the first application). As another example, the source electronic device 202 is a duplicate or repetitive activity information that does not include a significant change in previously reported activity information (eg, automatic reporting of "no change", simple / basic). Activity information, such as reporting actions / changes), reporting facts already known by the source electronic device 202, and so forth. As another example, in some embodiments, the source electronic device 202 filters the activity information based on the indication that the activity described by the activity information will not be advertised. For example, in some embodiments, the source electronic device 202 and / or the user of the source electronic device 202 may configure certain activities and / or certain types of activities as activities that will not be advertised. As another example, in some embodiments, source electronic device 202 ranks some or all of the activities for which activity information exists (ie, some or all of the activities that can be advertised) and based on the ranking Discard one or more of these activities. For example, the source electronic device 202 may assign a higher ranking to activities that the user has previously continued and lower ranking to activities that the user has not previously continued. In some of these embodiments, the source electronic device 202 may determine from the companion electronic device 204 to determine which advertised activities have previously continued and which advertised activities have not previously continued. Messages, e.g., messages such as those described below with reference to step 510 of FIG.

If the source electronic device 202 filters the activity information, for example discarding it (step 302, yes), the process ends. Otherwise, if the source electronic device 202 does not filter the activity information (step 302, no), the source electronic device 202 stores some or all of the activity information in the structure (step 304). ). For illustration, an embodiment of storing activity information in an entry in a table will be described, which will be referred to as an "advertised-activity" table. However, it is noted that the embodiments are not limited to using a table for storing activity information. Some embodiments use different storage mechanisms / structures for storing activity information such as associated arrays, content-addressable memories, and the like.

In some embodiments, while storing the activity information, the source electronic device 202 overwrites / overwrites or removes the activity information previously stored in the advertised-activity table. For example, source electronic device 202 may use a least-recently-used (LRU) algorithm to overwrite / overwrite or remove an entry in the advertised-activity table. Examples of advertised-activity tables are described in more detail below with reference to FIG. 12.

Next, the source electronic device 202 determines an activity identifier for the activity information (step 306). In general, the activity identifier includes information from the first application and activity information that identifies the activity performed in the first application. In some embodiments, the source electronic device 202 generates the activity identifier by reducing the activity information to a smaller coded representation that can be broadcast more efficiently than the overall activity information. In some of these embodiments, the coded representation is a hash of the activity information, that is, the output of a hash function (eg, MD4, MD5, SHA, MurmurHash, etc.) whose input includes the activity information. In some embodiments, the source electronic device 202 stores the activity identifier along with the activity information in the advertised-activity table (or any structure that the source electronic device 202 uses to store the activity information). Examples of activity identifiers are described in more detail below with reference to FIG. 12.

In some embodiments, the activity identifier includes a representation of a domain name. For example, in some embodiments, if the activity performed in the first application includes using a resource of a domain, the activity information includes at least a portion of a domain name, eg, a URL of the domain. In some embodiments, the source electronic device 202 determines the activity identifier by including some or all of the domain name in the activity identifier. For example, the activity identifier may be a hash of some or all of the URLs for the resource.

In some embodiments, the activity identifier identifies an entry in the structure where the source electronic device 202 has stored the activity information (eg, as described above with reference to step 304). For example, the activity identifier may identify an entry in the advertised-activity table where the source electronic device 202 has stored the activity information. The activity identifier may also include an identifier for the advertised-activity table itself. In some embodiments, in order to identify an entry in the structure where the source electronic device 202 has stored the activity information, the activity identifier is: (1) data in the advertised-activity table for identifying the advertised-activity table; A hash of, and (2) an index for an entry in the advertised-activity table that stores the activity information.

The source electronic device 202 then includes the activity identifier in the activity advertising message (step 308). In some embodiments, the activity advertising message includes other data in addition to the activity identifier. For example, in some embodiments, the activity advertisement message includes a flag used to indicate when the activity identifier includes a representation of a domain name for the online resource associated with the activity. In these embodiments, the source electronic device 202 asserts a flag indicating that the activity identifier includes a representation of a domain name (eg, sets the flag to a predetermined value (eg, 1)). . In some embodiments, for example, the source electronic device 202 includes instructions corresponding to it in the expanded activity data (extended activity data is described in more detail below), so that the source electronic device 202 may be configured as a source electronic device ( 202 asserts in the activity advertisement message a flag indicating that the advertised activity can continue in a manner that is individually provided to the companion electronic device 204.

In some embodiments, the activity advertisement message includes a timestamp for the activity / activity information. The timestamp may represent absolute time or relative time and may indicate the time at which the activity was last performed in the first application, such as the last time the document was edited, the website was accessed, the movie was watched, etc. . In some embodiments, the timestamp is independent of the activity / activity information, i.e., the timestamp is not associated with the source electronic device 202 and the user regardless of whether the user's final interaction includes the user performing the activity. It represents the time of last interaction.

The source electronic device 202 then broadcasts the activity advertisement message (step 310). For example, the source electronic device 202 can broadcast the activity advertisement message using the communication signal 208. In some embodiments, source electronic device 202 may broadcast / advertise an activity advertisement message in network environment 200 such that nearby devices in network environment 200 may receive the activity advertisement message. For example, in these embodiments, source electronic device 202 broadcasts an activity advertisement message using a Bluetooth ™ communication channel, such as Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE). Some embodiments may broadcast activity advertising messages on different communication channels, such as peer-to-peer networks, LANs, the Internet, and the like. Note that the activity broadcast may occur more than once, for example, the source electronic device 202 may broadcast the same activity advertisement message multiple times and / or periodically.

Available-building activity tables

In some embodiments, companion electronic device 204 stores activity information that is available, such as activity information that describes activities available in companion electronic device 204 (examples of activity information are described below with reference to FIG. 11). Is described in more detail in the following). For example, in some embodiments, companion electronic device 204 stores activity identifiers for available activity information. For purposes of illustration, the accompanying electronic device 204 is described as storing activity information available in a table, referred to as an "availability-activity" table (examples of the activity-activity table are described in this disclosure. Although described in more detail below.) Although embodiments are described that store available activity information in the Available-Activities table, it is noted that the embodiments are not limited to using a table for storing available activity information. do. Some embodiments may use other structures for storing available activity information, such as associated arrays, content-addressable memories, and the like.

4 shows a flow diagram illustrating a process for storing activity information into an available-activity table that describes activities available at companion electronic device 204, in accordance with some embodiments. It is noted that the operations shown in FIG. 4 are shown as a general example of the operations performed by some embodiments. The operations performed by some embodiments include different operations and / or operations performed in a different order. Additionally, although certain mechanisms (eg, companion electronic device 204, etc.) are used in the description of the operations, in some embodiments, other mechanisms perform the operations. For example, one or both of source electronic device 202 and second source electronic device 206 may perform similar operations on their own to store available activity information describing the available activities.

The process illustrated in FIG. 4 describes activity information that may be performed in companion electronic device 204, such as activity information describing activities available to companion electronic device 204 in a second application of companion electronic device 204. Is initiated upon receiving activity information (step 400). In general, activity information describes an activity that may be performed in a second application of the companion electronic device 204, that is, an action or function that the second application of the companion electronic device 204 may perform. In some embodiments, the second application reports / provides activity information as the second application is installed and / or used. In some embodiments, companion electronic device 204 queries or otherwise monitors the second application to collect activity information describing the activities available in the second application. In some embodiments, activity information is not performed on companion electronic device 204 but activity information for activities available to be performed (eg, a second application on companion electronic device 204 is installed / updated, initiated, Activity information reported by the second application, as used, and so forth.

Next, companion electronic device 204 determines a second activity identifier, that is, an activity identifier for activity information that describes the activity available in the second application (step 402). In general, the second activity identifier identifies the second application and the activities available to the second application. The second activity identifier may be a coded representation of activity information that describes the activity available to the second application. In some embodiments, companion electronic device 204 may perform some or all of the same operations that source electronic device 202 performs to generate an activity identifier for an activity performed within the first application. Determine the activity identifier (see FIG. 3, step 306). For example, in some embodiments, companion electronic device 204 may use a second hash function using the same hash function that source electronic device 202 uses to generate an activity identifier for an activity performed in a first application. Create an activity identifier.

In some embodiments, if the second application can perform an activity that includes accessing a resource of a domain, the activity information for that activity includes a domain name for the domain. In some of these embodiments, the second activity identifier is a coded representation of the domain name, which allows the second application to “claim” the domain name, that is, the companion electronic device 204 corresponds. Allows the second application to declare that the resource is available in the domain name so that it can deliver the activities to the second application. For example, as described below, in a scenario where a second application streams a movie from a particular site on the Internet, the second activity identifier may be a coded representation of at least some portion of the domain name for that site. The second application may be different from the first application—that is, the application whose activity is advertised in the activity advertising message—allowing an application different from the first application to continue the activity at the companion electronic device 204. Note that

Next, the companion electronic device 204 stores the second activity identifier into the available-activity table (step 404).

Extended activity data request and activity forwarding

In some embodiments, upon receiving the activity advertisement message, the electronic device may request the extended activity data for the advertised activity to cause the advertised activity to be subsequently delivered to the electronic device. 5 shows a flowchart illustrating a process for requesting extended activity data and delivering the activity, in accordance with some embodiments. More specifically, during the process shown in FIG. 5, companion electronic device 204 requests extended activity data for activities performed in a first application within source electronic device 202 from source electronic device 202. . Note that the operations shown in FIG. 5 are shown as a general example of the operations performed by some embodiments. The operations performed by some embodiments include different operations and / or operations performed in a different order. Additionally, although certain mechanisms (eg, source electronic device 202, companion electronic device 204) are used in the description of the operations, in some embodiments, other electronic devices and / or mechanisms perform the operations. do.

The process shown in FIG. 5 begins when the companion electronic device 204 receives an activity advertisement message, eg, an activity advertisement message broadcast from the source electronic device 202 (see FIG. 3, step 310) ( Step 500). Next, companion electronic device 204 determines whether companion electronic device 204 is in a receiving state (step 502). In general, companion electronic device 204 is in a receive state when it is available to perform activity delivery. For example, in some embodiments, companion electronic device 204 may display a lock screen when the device “wakes up,” eg, after a user presses a button to wake up the device. Switch to receive status In some embodiments, companion electronic device 204 may be used when companion electronic device 204 is in use, such as when a user is using an application of companion electronic device 204, and / or at a given time. When the application is used within the time period, it is not in a reception state.

If the companion electronic device 204 is not in a receiving state (step 502, no), the process ends (ie, the activity advertising message is ignored). Otherwise, if the companion electronic device 204 is in a receiving state (step 502, yes), the companion electronic device 204 may determine whether a second application associated with the first application is available at the companion electronic device 204. Determine (step 504). In general, this operation includes determining whether an application for continuing the activity described in the activity advertisement message from the source electronic device 202 is available on the companion electronic device 204. Determining whether the second application is available is described in further detail below with reference to FIGS. 7 and 8.

If the second application is not available (step 504, no), the process ends. Otherwise, if the second application is available (step 504, yes), the companion electronic device 204 retrieves activity information for the second application (step 506). For example, as further described in more detail with reference to FIGS. 7, 8, 11, and 12, after determining the second application, the companion electronic device 204 uses the activity identifier for the second application. Thus, activity information describing the activity available in the second application can be retrieved from the available-activity table (or from another structure used by companion electronic device 204 to store the available activity information). In some embodiments, companion electronic device 204 uses the retrieved activity information, eg, an application identifier in the retrieved activity information, to indicate that the activity is resumable, such as step 508 and / or FIG. 14. See below to customize as described below. Application identifiers will be described in more detail with reference to FIG. 11.

Next, companion electronic device 204 presents an indication that the activity is resumable (step 508). For example, companion electronic device 204 can present graphical icons and / or notifications within the display of companion electronic device 204. The indications are described in more detail below with reference to FIG. 14.

The companion electronic device 204 then determines whether activity transfer has been accepted (step 510). In some embodiments, the user of companion electronic device 204 accepts activity delivery by performing an action using the display, such as clicking on the display, dragging the display in one or more directions and / or to one or more specific locations, and the like. And / or decline. For example, to accept activity delivery, the user taps an icon / notification using a finger (on the touch screen display) and the icon / notification in a first direction (eg, left to right, upward, clockwise circle, etc.). You can drag. As another example, to reject an activity, a user can use a finger to tap an icon / notification and drag the icon / notification in a second direction (eg, right to left, downward, counterclockwise circle, etc.). In some embodiments, companion electronic device 204 delivers the activity based on a timeout period, i.e., determining that a period of time has passed without the user performing an action to accept the indication / activity delivery since the indication was presented. Determine that this was not accepted.

If activity delivery has not been accepted (step 510, no), the process ends. Note that in some embodiments, if activity delivery has not been accepted, companion electronic device 204 sends a message to source electronic device 202 to indicate that activity delivery has not been accepted. If activity delivery is accepted (step 510, yes), companion electronic device 204 sends a message to source electronic device 202 to request extended activity data for the activity performed in the first application. (Step 512). In general, the request for extended activity data includes information to facilitate the source electronic device 202 to determine the activity for which the extended data is being requested. For example, in some embodiments, companion electronic device 204 includes an activity identifier from an activity advertising message with a request for extended activity data.

Next, upon receiving the extended activity data from the source electronic device 202 in response to the request for the extended activity data, the companion electronic device 204 configures the second application using the expanded activity data ( Step 514). Configuring the second application may include starting / launching the second application, setting the state of the second application (or making a change to the state) based on the extended activity data, and otherwise correspondingly. And configuring the second application to perform the operation. For example, the companion electronic device 204 passes the document / resource identifier in the expanded activity data, information representing the document / resource, and / or a reference to the document / resource to the second application, whereby the second application Allow access to the document / resource (e.g., an identifier / information / representation thereof for a cloud-stored document for access by a second application from a cloud-based repository located on the Internet, a second from a database An identifier for the document to be accessed by the application / information representing it / reference to it, etc.). In some embodiments, where the activity includes creating a document stored in the source electronic device 202, the expanded activity data includes information representing the document or document, thereby providing companion electronic device 204 and / or agent information. 2 allows the application to use / regenerate the document for the second application at the companion electronic device 204. In some embodiments, the extended activity data includes the location and / or content of edits in the document, such as edits made within the document. In some embodiments, the extended activity data may include a final play / view / record location in the media file (ie, a location in the media file where playback or recording was interrupted or last performed), the location of a marker in the file, a game in the video game. Location / state of the gameplay (e.g., final play level, coordinates for where the player was last, points earned and / or achievements achieved, and / or state of game played on source electronic device 202) Location information) such as information that can be used to regenerate at the electronic device 204).

The companion electronic device 204 then begins to perform the activity in the second application (step 516), which is generally the second application in the companion electronic device 204 (if the second application is not already running). And launching a second application at the companion electronic device 204 based on the expanded activity data. For example, companion electronic device 204 may cause a second application to start execution in a viewing mode and / or an editing mode for a document related to the advertised activity, where the document is viewed / viewed at source electronic device 202. The second application can scroll to the final position in the document that was being edited. Next, companion electronic device 204 sends a notification to source electronic device 202 indicating that the activity has been delivered (step 518).

Note that some embodiments may use the information in the activity advertising message, such as an activity identifier, to begin configuring the second application while the extended activity data is being sent or even before the extended activity data is requested. Some of these embodiments use the information in the activity advertising message to set an initial background for the second application, and the mode for the second application (eg, edit mode, read-only mode, email writing mode, note taking mode, etc.). ). Thus, some embodiments may launch and / or configure a second application as soon as extended activity data is received, possibly as soon as activity delivery is accepted, thereby slowing down the data delivery time by application launch time. Improve performance on your network.

In some embodiments, companion electronic device 204 may be extended by using a different signal than communication signal 208 and / or by using a different communication channel / network interface than the communication channel / network interface from which the activity advertisement message was received. Send a request for activity data. For example, companion electronic device 204 may receive an activity advertisement message via a Bluetooth link (using the BLE protocol) and request extended activity data via a Wi-Fi link or the Internet. In such embodiments, source electronic device 202 and companion electronic device 204 may use communication signal 208 (eg, a Bluetooth link) to enable electronic devices to communicate over different communication channels / networks. Exchange information. For example, in some of these embodiments, companion electronic device 204 may generate information for creating a peer-to-peer network (eg, an ad-hawk Wi-Fi network) and accessing the peer-to-peer network. To the source electronic device 202. In some embodiments, source electronic device 202 provides extended activity data to a server, and companion electronic device 204 receives extended activity data from a server, such as via the Internet.

Transition to Received State Based on Ad Information

Although in FIG. 5 we have described embodiments of receiving an activity advertising message (FIG. 5, step 500) and determining whether the companion electronic device 204 is in a receiving state (FIG. 5, step 502). Some embodiments transition to the received state based on the information in the received activity advertisement message. In some of these embodiments, after receiving the activity advertisement message (eg, as shown in FIG. 5, step 500), the companion electronic device 204 determines whether the companion electronic device 204 is in a receiving state. Do not decide whether or not. That is, the process shown in FIG. 5 proceeds from step 500 to step 504 without performing the operation of step 502.

For example, in some embodiments, source electronic device 202 broadcasts an activity advertisement message along with a corresponding communication signal 208 using a low power protocol such as Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE), Zigbee, or the like. Companion electronic device 204 uses source electronic device 202 using a corresponding low power mechanism, such as a baseband processor in a corresponding network interface (eg, a baseband processor in networking subsystem 106). Activity advertisement message broadcast from In some of these embodiments, receiving the activity advertisement message is handled by the companion electronic device 204 using only the baseband processor for the companion electronic device 204, which is otherwise the companion electronic device 204. May be in an idle state (eg, a subsystem such as a processing subsystem is in a low power state). For example, in some embodiments, companion electronic device 204 may be a smartphone idle in a user's pocket, where the processing subsystem (and generally companion electronic device 204) is in a low power state. On the other hand, the baseband processor monitors the activity advertisement message.

In some embodiments, upon recognizing the activity advertisement message as such, the baseband processor wakes up the processing subsystem to perform subsequent operations (also generally bringing the companion electronic device 204 higher power from an idle operating state). Can be switched to an active operating state rather than /). For example, in some embodiments, companion electronic device 204 may monitor the activity advertisement message and respond to the activity advertisement message, which is filed on the same date as the present application, which is incorporated by reference as described above. United States pending title, "Operating Mode Transitions based on Advertising Information", by Agent Craig P. Dooley, Akshay Mangalam Srivatsa, Anjali S. Sandesara, and Michael Giles, Agent Case No. APL-P22643USP1 As described in patent application xx / xxx, xxx. In some embodiments, the companion electronic device 204 / smartphone does not need to be taken out of the user's pocket and activated to place the companion electronic device 204 in a received state.

Respond to Requests for Extended Activity Data

6 shows a flowchart illustrating a process for responding to a request for extended activity data, in accordance with some embodiments. More specifically, during the process shown in FIG. 6, an electronic device, such as source electronic device 202, responds to a request for extended activity data from an electronic device, such as companion electronic device 204. Note that the operations shown in FIG. 6 are shown as a general example of the operations performed by some embodiments. The operations performed by some embodiments include different operations and / or operations performed in a different order. Additionally, although certain mechanisms (eg, source electronic device 202, companion electronic device 204) are used in the description of the operations, in some embodiments, other electronic devices and / or mechanisms perform the operations. do.

The process shown in FIG. 6 may be used to request a request for extended activity data, such as a request for extended activity data transmitted by the companion electronic device 204, as described with reference to step 512 of FIG. 5. Begins when the source electronic device 202 receives (step 600).

Next, the source electronic device 202 uses the information in the request for extended activity data to determine that the request is for extended activity data for the first application (step 602). For example, as described above, the request for extended activity data may include the activity identifier from the activity advertisement message (see step 308 of FIG. 3). In some embodiments, the source electronic device 202 may be configured in an advertised-activity table (or other structure in which activity information is stored; examples of the advertised-activity table are described in more detail below with reference to FIG. 12). Performs a lookup on the activity identifier. If the source electronic device 202 finds an entry in the advertised-activity table that includes the activity identifier from the activity advertisement message, the source electronic device 202 retrieves the activity information for the entry, eg, for the entry. By determining that the application identifier is an application identifier for the first application, it may be determined that the activity identifier corresponds to the first application (examples of activity information and application identifiers will be described in more detail with reference to FIGS. 11 and 12).

Next, the source electronic device 202 optionally sends a notification / request to the first application to perform an update related to the activity (step 604). In some embodiments, the notification causes the first application to update the extended activity data before providing the expanded activity data to the companion electronic device 204. For example, the first application may use the notification to update the final scrolled / viewed position for the document related to the activity and / or to perform actions related to the activity, such as saving the document related to the activity, related to the activity before the activity is delivered. A recent draft of a document can be used to perform finishing actions related to the activity, such as updating extended activity data.

The source electronic device 202 then retrieves the extended activity data for the first application (step 606). In some embodiments, the source electronic device 202 requests the first application to provide extended activity data. In some embodiments, the first application provides initial activity information (see FIG. 3, step 300) with some or all of the extended activity and / or periodically reports the extended activity information (eg, N Report every second-N is a number such as 1, 3, etc.-extended activity each time an event occurs for the first application, such as a document being saved in the first application and a movie being watched in the first application being paused Report information).

Next, the source electronic device 202 transmits the expanded activity data to the companion electronic device 204 (step 608). Generally, extended activity data is information that can be used to configure a second application to continue the activity, such as a document identifier (and / or for a document) that identifies the document used for the activity performed in the first application. Information representing a document, such as a reference), URL of a webpage accessed / browsed from a first application (and / or information representing a webpage / URL such as a reference to a webpage / URL), location information (e.g., An indication of the last viewed / scrolled position in the document or web page, the last played position of the video game, etc., on the source electronic device 202 and / or on the internet (eg, “cloud storage”) or on a corporate network. Copies of draft documents (and / or references to draft documents) stored on accessible storage devices And the like to the current information).

The source electronic device 202 then receives a notification that the activity has been delivered (step 610), eg, sent by the companion electronic device 204, as described with reference to FIG. 5, step 518. Receive a notification. In some embodiments, in response to receiving the notification, source electronic device 202 notifies the first application that the activity has been delivered (step 612). In some embodiments, the source electronic device 202 and / or the first application may be configured to receive one or more actions related to the activity based on receiving the notification, such as deleting a locally stored document / document draft, closing an open document, Perform housekeeping tasks such as shutting down the application.

In some embodiments, the source electronic device 202 uses a different signal from the communication signal 208 and / or is different from the communication channel / network interface to which the request for activity advertisement message and / or extended activity data was communicated. By using a communication channel / network interface, it provides extended activity data. For example, the source electronic device 202 may receive a request for extended activity data over a Bluetooth link and provide extended activity data over a Wi-Fi link or the Internet.

Secure communication using cloud pairing

As previously discussed, in some embodiments, electronic devices performing an activity transfer operation are named "Predefined Wireless Pairing", which is incorporated by reference as a preliminary pairing operation, eg, as described above, Pending U.S. Patent Application No. xx / xxx, xxx, Agent Case No. APL-P22642USP1, filed on the same date as this application, by inventors Jason C. Conn, Akshay Mangalam Srivatsa, Craig P. Dooley, and Michael Giles. Participate in a "cloud pairing" operation such as the predefined pairing described in the call. In some embodiments, electronic devices encrypt and decrypt messages exchanged with each other to perform an activity delivery operation using security information obtained during a cloud pairing operation, eg, using an encryption key obtained during a cloud pairing operation. do.

For example, in some embodiments, the source electronic device 202 may use an activity advertisement message (FIG. 1) using an encryption key obtained during a cloud pairing operation that the source electronic device 202 performs with the companion electronic device 204. 3, see step 310) and / or the expanded activity data (see FIG. 6, step 608). In some embodiments, companion electronic device 204 may have the same security information, different security information obtained during a cloud pairing operation that companion electronic device 204 performs with source electronic device 202, and / or cloud pairing operation. Encrypts the request for extended activity data (see FIG. 5, step 512) and / or the notification that the activity has been delivered (see FIG. 5, step 518) using information derived from the security information obtained during the do.

Determining a Second Application Using Activity Identifiers

As previously described, in some embodiments, the electronic device determines whether a second application associated with the first application is available at the electronic device (to facilitate possible activity delivery to the electronic device). 7 shows a flow diagram illustrating a process for determining whether a second application is available to a companion electronic device 204, in accordance with some embodiments. The operations shown in FIG. 7 may be performed during the process shown in FIG. 5, eg, step 504. Note that the operations shown in FIG. 7 are shown as a general example of the operations performed by some embodiments. The operations performed by some embodiments include different operations and / or operations performed in a different order. Additionally, although certain mechanisms (eg, companion electronic device 204, etc.) are used in the description of the operations, in some embodiments, other mechanisms perform the operations. For example, one or both of source electronic device 202 and second source electronic device 206 may perform similar operations to determine for themselves whether a second application is available.

The process shown in FIG. 7 begins when the companion electronic device 204 determines whether a flag in the activity advertisement message is asserted (step 700). As previously described, in some embodiments, source electronic device 202 asserts a flag within an activity advertising message to indicate that the activity identifier is a representation of and / or includes a domain name for the advertised activity. In some of these embodiments, companion electronic device 204 determines that the activity advertisement message includes a representation of a domain name by determining that the flag is asserted. The flags are described in detail later herein, for example, with reference to FIGS. 11 and 13.

If the flag in the activity advertisement message is asserted (step 700, yes), the companion electronic device 204 processes the flag (step 702). The processing of the flag that occurs in step 702 is described later with reference to FIG. Some embodiments repeat step 702 (ie, the processing described with reference to FIG. 8) for each asserted flag in the activity advertisement message, eg, the activity advertisement message includes two or more asserted flags. If so, processing for each asserted flag is repeated.

If the activity advertisement message does not include an asserted flag (step 700, no), the companion electronic device 204 may retrieve the activity identifier from the activity advertisement message for the activities available at the companion electronic device 204. Compare to activity identifiers (step 704). For example, the companion electronic device 204 stores the available-activity table of the companion electronic device 204 (or activity information available to the companion electronic device 204, as previously described with reference to FIG. 4). The activity identifier from the activity advertisement message in the activity identifiers).

If a lookup for an activity identifier finds a match in an entry in the activity table (step 706, yes), the companion electronic device 204 causes the second application to store its activity identifier in that entry. Determine that it is an application (step 708).

If the lookup for the activity identifier did not find a match in the available activity information (step 706, no), the companion electronic device 204 may not allow the application associated with the first application to be available at the companion electronic device 204. Not determined (step 710).

Determining a Second Application Using Flags

As previously described, some embodiments assert a flag within an activity advertising message. 8 shows a flowchart illustrating a process for determining a second application using a flag, in accordance with some embodiments. More specifically, FIG. 8 shows a flow diagram illustrating a process performed by companion electronic device 204 in step 702 of FIG. 7. Note that the operations shown in FIG. 8 are shown as a general example of the operations performed by some embodiments. The operations performed by some embodiments include different operations and / or operations performed in a different order. Additionally, although certain mechanisms (eg, companion electronic device 204, etc.) are used in the description of the operations, in some embodiments, other mechanisms perform the operations. For example, one or both of the source electronic device 202 and the second source electronic device 206 may perform similar operations on their own.

The process shown in FIG. 8 begins when the companion electronic device 204 determines an application corresponding to the flag (step 800). In some embodiments, companion electronic device 204 uses the location of the asserted flag and / or the value of the flag to determine an application corresponding to the flag. For example, if an activity advertising message includes two or more flags that may be asserted, each of the flags may be used to identify different applications that may be used to continue the activity. In some embodiments, the flag is a multi-bit field and different values of the multi-bit field identify different applications. In some embodiments, companion electronic device 204 stores a mapping in which the location / value of flags identifies the application to which it corresponds.

Next, companion electronic device 204 determines whether an application corresponding to the flag is available at companion electronic device 204 (step 802). For example, the companion electronic device 204 can confirm whether an application corresponding to the flag has been installed in the companion electronic device 204. In some embodiments, step 802 is not performed / omitted such that the process shown in FIG. 8 continues from step 800 to step 804. For example, in embodiments where flags are used to identify only pre-installed applications that are known to be available at companion electronic device 204 and cannot be uninstalled by a user, step 802 is Not performed.

If an application corresponding to the flag is available (step 802, yes), the companion electronic device 204 determines that the second application is an application corresponding to the flag (step 804). The process then ends, which may include continuing at step 506 of FIG. 5.

If the application corresponding to the flag is not available at the companion electronic device 204 (step 802, no), the process ends. At this point, the companion electronic device 204 may determine that the second application is not available (eg, step 504, no for FIG. 5), or continue to step 704 of FIG. 7. The activity identifier from the message can be used to determine whether a second application is available.

In some embodiments, the process shown in FIG. 8 allows an application different from the first application to continue the activity at the companion electronic device 204. For example, consider the case where the first application is a web browser and the activity performed in the first application includes browsing of a social media website. In this example, the second application may be a social media app that accesses a resource (eg, social media user page, etc.) accessed from the first application / web browser (ie, the second application is an app, not a web browser). . By using the flag, these embodiments can configure the social media app to continue the activity that was being performed on the social media website at the same point where the web browser was interrupted. As another example, in some embodiments, the first application is a standalone media streaming app (eg, a media player app) that streams a movie from a website, and the second application is a web browser capable of streaming a movie. By using the flag, these embodiments configure the web browser to continue playing the movie, which uses the extended activity data for the activity to cause the web browser to continue playing the movie where the media streaming app was interrupted. It may include.

In some embodiments, the source electronic device 202 will indicate that the source electronic device 202 will subsequently provide instructions / information on how to continue the activity at the companion electronic device 204. Set a second flag (or different value for the flag) in the advertising message. In some embodiments, the application corresponding to the flag includes instructions / information on how to continue the activity at companion electronic device 204. In some embodiments, the extended activity data provides instructions / information for continuing the activity at the companion electronic device 204.

Determining a second application using a structure to store the advertised activity

As previously described with reference to FIG. 3, in some embodiments, the activity identifier in the activity advertisement message is in a structure (eg, a table) in which the electronic device that advertised the activity stores activity information for the advertised activity. Identifies the entry. 9 shows a flowchart illustrating a process for determining whether a second application is available when an activity identifier identifies an entry in such a structure, in accordance with some embodiments. More specifically, during the process shown in FIG. 9, companion electronic device 204 may identify an activity identifier that identifies an entry in the advertised-activity table from which source electronic device 202 stored activity information for the advertised activity. Use to determine whether a second application associated with the first application is available at the companion electronic device 204 (examples of advertised-activity tables are described in more detail below with reference to FIG. 12). Note that the operations shown in FIG. 9 are shown as a general example of the operations performed by some embodiments. The operations performed by some embodiments include different operations and / or operations performed in a different order. Additionally, although certain mechanisms (eg, source electronic device 202, companion electronic device 204) are used in the description of the operations, in some embodiments, other electronic devices and / or mechanisms perform the operations. do.

The process shown in FIG. 9 begins when the companion electronic device 204 receives an activity identifier that identifies an entry in the advertised-activity table from which the source electronic device 202 stored activity information for the advertised activity. (Step 900). In some embodiments, the activity identifier includes a table identifier and an entry index, the table identifier identifies the advertised-activity table in which the source electronic device 202 stored the activity information for the advertised activity, and the entry index is Identifies an entry in the advertised-activity table identified by the table identifier in which activity information for the advertised activity is stored. In some embodiments, the table identifier is a hash of advertised-activity table data.

The companion electronic device 204 then determines whether an advertised-activity table for the activity identifier is available at the companion electronic device 204 (step 902). In some embodiments, companion electronic device 204 uses the table identifier from the activity identifier to determine whether companion electronic device 204 has stored a local copy of the advertised-activity table.

If the advertised-activity table for the activity identifier is not available at the companion electronic device 204 (step 902, no), the companion electronic device 204 is advertised from the source electronic device 202. (Step 904). In some embodiments, companion electronic device 204 is configured to transmit an advertised-activity table identified by an activity identifier from an activity advertisement message, eg, an advertised-activity table identifier by a table identifier. 202). The companion electronic device 204 can transmit this request, and the source electronic device 202 can respond to this request using the communication signal 208 and / or a different communication signal / different channel.

In some embodiments, companion electronic device 204 periodically synchronizes local copies / copies of its advertised-activity table with source electronic device 202. For example, the companion electronic device 204 receives a copy of the advertised-activity table from the source electronic device 202 using a "push" mechanism, that is, without sending a request for a copy of the advertised-activity table. can do.

If the advertised-activity table for the activity identifier is available at the companion electronic device 204 (step 902, yes), or after receiving the advertised-activity table from the source electronic device 202, the companion electronic device. 204 retrieves the activity information from the advertised-activity table using the activity identifier (step 906). For example, the companion electronic device 204 can retrieve activity information from an entry in the advertised-activity table identified by the entry index.

In some embodiments, the operations shown in FIG. 9 enable information describing two or more activities to be advertised within a single activity advertising message. For example, consider the case where the size of the activity advertisement message is limited due to the limitation of the network protocol used to broadcast the activity advertisement message. In such a case, the entry identifier, i.e., the activity identifier that identifies the entry in which the activity information is stored, may be smaller than the coded representation, i. These embodiments may enable the conveying of multiple entry identifiers within an activity advertising message.

As previously described with reference to FIG. 3, the described embodiments are not limited to using a table to store available activity information. Some embodiments use different structures for storing available activity information, such as associative arrays, content-addressable memories, and the like. In such embodiments, the activity identifier may identify an entry in the structure in which the source electronic device 202 is storing activity information for the advertised activities. For example, in such embodiments, the table identifier can identify the structure and the entry index can identify the index within the structure in which the source electronic device 202 has stored the activity information for the advertised activity.

Also, although embodiments are described using one advertised-activity table, some embodiments use two or more advertised-activity tables, eg, advertised activities in different advertised-activity tables. Stores activity information for.

Determine the most recent activity

As previously described, network environment 200 may include a second source electronic device, which may broadcast activity advertising messages for activities performed at the second source electronic device. As also described previously, some embodiments include a time stamp in the activity advertisement message to indicate the time at which the activity advertised in the activity advertisement message was last performed. 10 shows a flowchart illustrating a process for determining the most recent activity from two or more activity advertising messages, in accordance with some embodiments. More specifically, during the process shown in FIG. 10, the companion electronic device 204 is included with the advertisement from the source electronic device 202 (“activity advertisement”), and the second source electronic device 206. And the included timestamp (“second activity advertisement”) to determine the most recent of the activities advertised within the activity ad and the second activity ad. Note that the operations shown in FIG. 10 are shown as a general example of the operations performed by some embodiments. The operations performed by some embodiments include different operations and / or operations performed in a different order. Additionally, although certain mechanisms (eg, source electronic device 202, companion electronic device 204, second source electronic device 206) are used in the description of the operations, in some embodiments, other electronic devices. And / or mechanisms perform the operations.

For the process shown in FIG. 10, assume, for example, as shown in FIG. 5, the companion electronic device 204 has already received an activity advertisement from the source electronic device 202. Accordingly, companion electronic device 204 has an activity advertisement including a first timestamp included with the activity advertisement.

The process shown in FIG. 10 begins when the companion electronic device 204 receives a second activity advertisement (step 1000). Next, companion electronic device 204 compares the first timestamp included with the activity advertisement with the second timestamp included with the second activity advertisement (step 1002). For example, the companion electronic device 204 can compare the time stamps to find out which is newer (ie, indicating a more recent time).

If the comparison indicates that the first timestamp is newer (step 1004), the companion electronic device determines that the activity performed in the first application, that is, the activity advertised within the activity advertisement, is the most recent activity. (Step 1006). Otherwise, if the comparison indicates that the second timestamp is newer (step 1004, no), the companion electronic device 204 may be advertised within the activity performed in the second application, that is, within the second activity advertisement. Determine that the activity is the most recent activity (step 1008).

In some embodiments, companion electronic device 204 only displays an indication that the activity is resumable for the most recent of the advertised activities, thereby providing a number of indications presented to the user within the display of companion electronic device 204. Decrease (e.g., as shown in FIG. 14). In some embodiments, companion electronic device 204 uses the timestamp to present an indication that the activities are resumable, in order, for example, first presenting the most recent activity and then in descending order based on relative recentness. Present other advertised activities. In such embodiments, two or more indications may be presented side by side, one over the other, etc., depending on the relative recency of the corresponding activities.

In some embodiments, companion electronic device 204 presents indications for the resumeable activities in order using a history of activities that have previously been continued. In some embodiments, companion electronic device 204 orders the activities that have been previously performed in higher order, i. Present before an indication of resumability. In some embodiments, two or more indications are presented in order, based on the number of times each of the corresponding activities has previously continued.

Activity Information

As previously described, some embodiments use activity information that describes the activity performed at the electronic device. 11 illustrates a block diagram illustrating activity information 1100, activity information 1110, and activity information 1120 in accordance with some embodiments. Note that activity information 1100, activity information 1110, and activity information 1120 shown in FIG. 11 are presented as a general example of the format of activity information used by some embodiments. Some embodiments use different formats and / or include different information in activity information.

Activity information 1100 includes an application identifier 1102 that identifies an application used to perform the activity described within activity information 1100. For example, the application identifier 1102 containing the string com.apple.Keynote identifies the application Keynote, which is an application that can be used to edit and view the presentation. Activity descriptor 1104 includes a string EditPresentation , which identifies the activity to be performed using the application Keynote as a presentation editing. The timestamp 1106 comprising the string / number 103 identifies the time at which the activity was last performed, for example, the last time the user edited the presentation in the application Keynote. The timestamp may represent the real time when the activity was last performed, e.g., wall clock time (or its representation, such as system time), or has elapsed since the time since the activity was last performed, or since a synchronization event. It can be a representation of time. In some embodiments, the timestamp is in real time, such as absolute / wall clock time (or system time) when the source electronic device 202 was last used (eg, finally active by the user). Or a timestamp may be a representation of the time that has elapsed since the time since the source electronic device 202 was last used, or since a synchronization event. In activity information 1100, flag 1108 is not asserted.

Activity information 1110 includes an application identifier 1112 that identifies an application used to perform the activity described within activity information 1110. For example, application identifier 1112, which includes the string com.apple.Mail , identifies application Mail, which is an application that can be used to compose and send email messages. Activity descriptor 1114 includes the string ComposeDraft to identify that the activity performed using the application Mail includes drafting a message. Timestamp 1116, which includes a string / number 315, identifies the time at which the activity was last performed, for example, the last time the user drafted using Mail. Flag 1118 for activity information 1110 is not asserted.

Activity information 1120 includes an application identifier 1122 that identifies an application used to perform the activity described within activity information 1120. For example, application identifier 1122, which includes the string com.apple.Safari , identifies application Safari, which is a web browser. Activity descriptor 1124 includes a string www.evideostreamer.com that identifies a domain name that is accessed using a web browser. In this example, activity descriptor 1124 holds a domain name, so flag 1128 in activity information 1120 is asserted flag 1128 to indicate that activity descriptor 1124 includes a domain name. to be. Timestamp 1126, which includes the string / number 820, identifies the time when the web browser was last used to access the movie streaming website.

Activity information 1130 includes an application identifier 1132 that identifies an application used to perform the activity described within activity information 1130. For example, application identifier 1132 comprising the string com.CompanyA.MediaPlayer identifies application MediaPlayer, which in this example was developed by developer CompanyA , which is an application that can be used to play and record multimedia content. do. The activity descriptor 1134 includes a string PlayVideo to identify that the activity performed using the application MediaPlayer is to play video, that is, include video playback. Timestamp 1136, which includes the string / number 902, identifies the time at which the activity was last performed, for example, the last time the user played the video using MediaPlayer. Flag 1138 for activity information 1130 is not asserted.

For illustration purposes, the timestamp shown in FIG. 11 is calculated as delta (difference) from a synchronization event, such as on time. Thus, in the examples shown in FIG. 11, the activity described using activity information 1100 becomes the most recent activity, since the timestamp 1106 is on time since the activity described using activity information 1100 was performed. This is because it indicates that the minimum amount of time has elapsed from.

Although the examples of FIG. 11 use application identifiers and activity descriptors, it is noted that some embodiments may use different information to identify an application and / or activity. For example, some embodiments use numerical identifiers for application identifiers and / or activity descriptors. In some embodiments, the application identifier is an identifier for a corresponding application in an online "app store". In some embodiments, the application identifier includes some or all of the bundle identifier, such as for example the bundle ID. Also, while the application identifier shown is separate from the activity descriptor, some embodiments combine the application identifier and the activity descriptor into a single identifier.

In some embodiments, application / app developers provide information about activity descriptors, such as activity descriptor 1104, activity descriptor 1114, activity descriptor 1124, and activity descriptor 1134. In such examples, the developer of the application / app can determine a number of activities for the application / app, and can provide relevant values for the activity descriptors.

Advertised-activity table

12 shows a block diagram illustrating an advertised-activity table 1200 in accordance with some embodiments. As described above, the advertised-activity table 1200 includes information about activities that were advertised (ie, activities for which an activity advertisement message was sent by an electronic device, such as source electronic device 202). . Note that the advertisement-activity table shown in FIG. 12 is shown as a general example of the advertisement-activity tables used by some embodiments. Some embodiments present activity information differently in the advertisement-activity table and / or include more or less information.

Entry 1202, identified by entry index 1206, stores activity information 1100 and activity identifier 1204. In this example, activity identifier 1204 is generated using application identifier 1102 and activity identifier 1104, such as a hash of string " com.apple.Keynote :: EditPresentation ".

Entry 1212, identified by entry index 1216, stores activity information 1110 and activity identifier 1214. In this example, activity identifier 1214 is generated using application identifier 1112 and activity descriptor 1114, such as a hash of string " com.apple.Mail :: ComposeDraft ".

Entry 1222, identified by entry index 1226, stores activity information 1120 and activity identifier 1224. In this example, activity identifier 1224 is generated using activity descriptor 1124, such as a hash of the string www.evideostreamer.com .

Entry 1232, identified by entry index 1236, stores activity information 1130 and activity identifier 1234. In this example, activity identifier 1234 is generated using application identifier 1132 and activity descriptor 1134, such as a hash of string " com.CompanyA.MediaPlayer :: PlayVideo ".

For illustrative purposes, entries 1202-1232 store all of activity information 1100-1130, respectively. However, note that in some embodiments, entries 1202-1232 store only a portion of activity information 1100-1130, respectively. For example, some embodiments do not store timestamps 1106-1136 in entries 1202-1232.

Available-activity table

In some embodiments, the available-activity table described above is formatted similar to the advertised-activity table 1200 shown in FIG. 12. However, entries in the available-activity table include application information regarding applications available within the corresponding electronic device, eg, companion electronic device 204.

Activity advertising message

13 illustrates a block diagram illustrating an activity advertisement 1300, eg, an activity advertisement message, in accordance with some embodiments. Note that the activity advertising message shown in FIG. 13 is shown as a general example of activity advertising messages used by some embodiments. Some embodiments order the fields in the activity advertisement messages differently and / or include different information in the activity advertisement message.

The activity advertisement message 1300 optionally includes a device ID field 1302, and a version ID field 1304. The device ID field 1302 includes an identifier that identifies the device that sent the activity advertisement message 1300, such as the source electronic device 202. The version ID field 1304 includes a version identifier, such as a version identifier, that the companion electronic device 204 can use to determine how the fields in the activity information 1300 are formatted and / or how the information is stored in the fields. do.

Activity identifier field 1306 includes an activity identifier, such as one or more of activity identifiers 1204-1224. The flag field 1308 includes one or more flags, eg, flags 1108-1128, corresponding to the advertised activity.

Timestamp field 1310 includes a timestamp, eg, one or more of timestamps 1106-1126, for the advertised activity in activity identifier field 1306.

Resumable-activity display

As previously described, some embodiments present an indication that the activity is resumable prior to requesting extended activity data. 14 shows a block diagram illustrating a resumable-activity indication, that is, an indication that an activity is resumable, in accordance with some embodiments. More specifically, FIG. 14 shows a resumeable-activity indication displayed on display 1400 for companion electronic device 204. It is noted that the resumable-activity indication shown in FIG. 14 is shown as a general example of the resumable-activity indication used by some embodiments. Some embodiments use different resumeable-activity indications and / or present resumeable-activity indications differently.

In the illustrated embodiment, the companion electronic device 204 is a smartphone that includes a touch screen display 1400. The embodiment shown in FIG. 14 is in a receive state because the display 1400 shows a lock screen with an unlock indicator 1402, which shows the phrase “slide to unlock”. In general, a user of the companion electronic device 204 uses a finger to lock a graphic to unlock the companion electronic device 204, such as pushing a graphic for the unlock indicator 1402 across the display 1400. The release indicator 1402 is used to perform the operation.

Resumable-activity indication 1404 includes a graphic, such as an icon that a user can manipulate to accept (or decline) activity delivery. In FIG. 14, resumeable-activity indication 1404 indicates that the resumeable activity includes using a mail application, including an icon resembling an envelope. In some embodiments, a user may accept activity delivery by clicking / touching on resumable-activity indication 1404 and / or moving resumable-activity indication 1404 along a path on display 1400. have. For example, in some embodiments, a user may accept activity delivery by touching and dragging resumeable-activity indication 1404 along or near path 1406 (shown in dashed lines).

For illustrative purposes, the resumeable-activity indication 1404 is shown in a lock screen for the companion electronic device 204. In some embodiments, resumeable-activity indication 1404 can be viewed using a different screen / location, such as an unlock screen, menu bar, notification window / popup, and the like. In addition, the position, size, graphics, color, and / or other visual characteristics of the resumeable-activity indication 1404 may be changed for different embodiments and may depend on the type of activity that can be resumed. For example, in some embodiments, companion electronic device 204 determines a graphic that appears within resumeable-activity indication 1404 based on the application identifier for the advertised activity. As another example, in some embodiments, a resumeable-activity indication 1404 appears in the lower left corner of the display 1400. Some embodiments present multiple resumable activity indications at the same time.

Note that accepting (or rejecting) activity delivery may include moving the resumable-activity indication 1404 along the path different from the path 1406, such as along a curved path or the like, to the top of the screen. In some embodiments, a user clicks on resumable-activity indication 1404, taps on resumable-activity indication 1404, swipes on resumeable-activity indication 1404, and resumes-activity indication Activity delivery may be accepted by performing a gesture using 1404.

Auto and manual activity ads

In some embodiments, the source electronic device 202 automatically broadcasts the activity advertisement based on the detected location of the source electronic device 202, etc., for example, at a predetermined time interval, as soon as the activity information is received. . In such embodiments, source electronic device 202 may provide settings such as system preferences that a user may use to turn on and off the broadcast of an activity advertisement.

In some embodiments, the source electronic device 202 manually starts to broadcast the activity advertisement, ie, waits for input from the user to start the activity advertisement broadcast. In some of these embodiments, the source electronic device 202 initiates an activity advertisement broadcast when detecting a user input, and for a predetermined period of time and / or the user notifies the source electronic device 202 of the suspension of the activity advertisement. The activity ad broadcast continues until you provide input that points to it. In some embodiments, user input for starting and / or stopping an activity advertisement may include movement of the source electronic device 202 (eg, shaking the source electronic device 202, moving the source electronic device 202 in the arc direction, source Rocking the electronic device 202, etc.), performing one or more gestures on the touch screen for the source electronic device 202, pressing a key and / or button combination, and the like.

In some embodiments, the activity advertisement message, and / or the message that the source electronic device 202 sends with the activity advertisement message to (eg, in addition to) the companion electronic device 204 causes the companion electronic device 204 to timer. Let's start. In some embodiments, companion electronic device 204 remains in a receive state as described above until such a timer expires. The source electronic device 202 can provide the companion electronic device 204 with an end time for the timer, or the companion electronic device 204 can determine the end time.

In some embodiments, the companion electronic device 204 presents an indication that the activity is resumable until the timer expires, and if the user accepts the indication, the user unlocks the companion electronic device 204. The activity continues at the companion electronic device 204 without having to perform one or more operations (eg, fingerprint scan, password entry, etc.). More specifically, companion electronic device 204 may detect that the user has accepted the indication and bypass the lock screen / unlock operation so that the companion electronic device 204 does not need to unlock the companion electronic device 204. ) Can be allowed to start using. In some embodiments, the user is allowed to bypass the lock screen / unlock operation only before the timer expires.

Activity continues framework

In some embodiments, the third party application may be configured to access an activity delivery operation, eg, some or all of the operations previously described with reference to FIGS. 3-10, at electronic devices capable of participating in the activity delivery operation. Receive through the available "Continue Activity" framework. The activity continuation framework may provide third party applications with access to operating system functions, daemons, processes, services, etc. that perform at least some of the activity delivery operations. For example, in some embodiments, a provider of an electronic device and / or an operating system for the electronic device provides an application programming interface (API), through which third party applications invoke functions that facilitate activity transfer operations. can do. In some embodiments, the activity continuity framework is one that allows third party applications (and third party application developers) to implement (or even know about) low-level details of activity continuation. Enables the transfer of activity from an electronic device to another electronic device.

For example, in some embodiments, to enable a third party application to participate in an activity delivery operation, the third party application developer may need to create activity descriptors for activities that the third party application can perform, and Provides a way to configure third-party applications to perform activities. In some of these embodiments, in an electronic device such as source electronic device 202, the third party application provides an activity descriptor (and possibly extended activity data) for the activity performed in the third party application. The activity continues to call the functions provided by the framework. In an electronic device, such as companion electronic device 204, to configure a third party application to perform the activity, the activity continue framework may pass extended activity data to a third party application (eg, a command line switch or Via parameters, by using an object, etc.). Thus, the activity continuity framework can facilitate activity continuity for third party applications with minimal effort and cost for third party application developers.

Messages exchanged between electronic devices

15 shows a compartmental diagram illustrating messages exchanged between electronic devices, in accordance with some embodiments. As can be seen in FIG. 15, messages are exchanged over a period of time between the source electronic device 202 and the companion electronic device 204, with the activity advertisement 1500 occurring in time first and the lower messages being timed. Subsequently occurs. Although messages are exchanged in a particular order in FIG. 15, in some embodiments, other messages are exchanged and / or the messages are exchanged in a different order. In general, the electronic devices of the described embodiment exchange sufficient messages to enable the operations described herein.

The messages in FIG. 15 are associated with two operations performed by the source electronic device 202 and / or the companion electronic device 204. The first operation including the advertisement 1500 is an activity advertisement operation as shown in FIG. 3. During an activity advertisement operation, the source electronic device 202 broadcasts at least one activity advertisement 1500.

The second operation, which includes a request 1502 for extended activity data, extended activity data 1504, and notification of activity delivery 1506, is an activity delivery operation such as that shown in FIGS. During the activity delivery operation, the companion electronic device 204 responds to the activity advertisement 1500 using a request 1502 for extended activity data. When receiving a request 1502 for extended activity data, the source electronic device 202 responds by sending extended activity data 1504. In some embodiments, after the companion electronic device 204 uses the extended activity data to begin performing the activity in the second application, the companion electronic device 204 sends the activity delivery notification 1506 to send the source electronics. The device 202 knows that the activity has been delivered.

Forward information about activities

As described above, in some embodiments, the source electronic device (eg, source electronic device 202) forwards the activity related information to the companion electronic device (eg, companion electronic device 204). In general, activity related information includes any information that may be used when performing an activity (eg, an activity delivered to a companion electronic device, or other activity performed on the companion electronic device, as described herein). For example, activity related information may include information from a copy and paste clipboard within the source electronic device 202 (eg, text, images, video, sound, settings, files, etc.), previous versions of the file, undo ( undo) content of the buffer (which maintains a record of changes to the system made by the user, which can be used to reverse the changes), and / or other types of information. Upon receiving the activity related information, the companion electronic device may use the activity related information for one or more activities. For example, if the activity related information includes the contents of the undo buffer, the companion electronic device uses the contents of the undo buffer received from the source electronic device to use the local undo buffer (ie, undo within the companion electronic device). Buffer) can be updated. For example, an undo buffer could contain a listing of the last N actions performed when editing a document, and the listing would reverse those actions when subsequently editing the document using menus, hotkey combinations, and the like. Or “cancel”. In this way, the companion electronic device can configure itself to enable reversal or undo of operations previously performed on the source electronic device.

17 illustrates a flow diagram illustrating a process for forwarding activity related information from a source electronic device to a companion electronic device, in accordance with some embodiments. More specifically, FIG. 17 illustrates an embodiment in which the source electronic device 202 forwards activity related information to the companion electronic device 204 using an advertising message. It is noted that the operations shown in FIG. 17 are shown as a general example of the operations performed by some embodiments. The operations performed by some embodiments include different operations and / or operations performed in a different order. Additionally, although certain mechanisms (eg, companion electronic device 204, etc.) are used in the description of the operations, in some embodiments, other mechanisms perform the operations.

For the process shown in FIG. 17, the contents of the clipboard in the source electronic device 202 are used as activity related information. However, in some embodiments, and as described above, other types of activity related information may be forwarded from the source electronic device 202. In addition, as used herein, "clipboard" refers to a copy and paste clipboard in a corresponding device. In some embodiments, the clipboard is a software service (eg, operating system software service, standalone application, etc.) that provides temporary storage for information in the electronic device. The clipboard allows the user to interact with the information by performing operations such as copying, pasting, and cutting. Such clipboards are generally known in the art and thus are not described in more detail herein.

The process shown in FIG. 17 begins when the source electronic device 202 determines that activity related information is available for forwarding to the companion electronic device 204 (step 1700). For example, based on receiving the activity information described above (eg, see step 300 of FIG. 3), the source electronic device 202 may perform one or more checks and determine that activity related information is available. . As another example, when the user receives an indication indicating that a user has performed a copy operation of copying information (eg, copied text, file, image, etc.) to the clipboard, the source electronic device 202 may use the activity related information. You can decide that it is possible. As another example, the source electronic device 202 can monitor various operations being performed on the source electronic device 202 as part of performing the activity and directly or indirectly determine that activity related information has become available. Can be. As described above, in the case of the example of FIG. 17, the contents of the clipboard are activity related information. Thus, the source electronic device 202 determines, at step 1700, that the one or more copied items that were placed while performing the current activity are on the clipboard.

The source electronic device 202 then generates an activity related informational advertisement (step 1702). In general, activity-related informational advertisements may allow accompanying electronic device 204 (and possibly other devices receiving the activity-related informational advertisement) to determine that the activity-related information is of interest and process the activity-related information. Include enough information to do this. Continuing the clipboard example, the source electronic device 202 generates an activity related information advertisement, which causes the accompanying electronic device 204 to associate the activity related information described in the activity related information advertisement, that is, the source electronic device 202. Not only determine that the contents of the clipboard from are of interest to the companion electronic device 204, but also update the clipboard within the companion electronic device 204 with or based on the contents of the clipboard from the source electronic device 202. It can be done.

18 illustrates a block diagram illustrating an activity related information advertisement 1800 generated by the source electronic device 202 in accordance with some embodiments. The activity related information advertisement 1800 optionally includes a device ID field 1802, a version ID field 1804, an activity identifier field 1806, and a timestamp field 1808. The device ID field 1802 includes an identifier that identifies the device that sent the activity related information advertisement 1800, eg, the source electronic device 202. The version ID field 1804 is a version identifier such as a version identifier that the companion electronic device 204 can use to determine how the fields in the activity related information advertisement 1800 are formatted and / or how the information is stored in the fields. It includes. The activity identifier field 1806 includes one or more of activity identifiers, eg, activity identifiers 1204-1224, that identify the activity with which the corresponding activity related information is associated. The time stamp field 1808 includes a time stamp for the activity advertised within the activity identifier field 1806. As discussed above, timestamps may be used to resolve the order in which two or more activity related information advertisements 1800 should be processed, which activity related information advertisements 1800 should be ignored, and the like.

The activity related information field 1810 includes activity related information, and / or information based on, derived from, or otherwise identifying it. Continuing the example above, in some embodiments, the source electronic device 202 includes, in the activity related information field 1810, some or all of the actual content from the clipboard in the source electronic device 202. For example, if a section of text has recently been copied to the clipboard, then the section of text, i.e., the text itself, is accompanied by an activity related information field 1810, possibly with metadata including format, timestamp, version information, etc. ) May be included. As another example, if a section of text, image, and file was individually copied to the clipboard during one or more copy operations, some or all of the text, image, and section of the file, possibly with corresponding metadata, may be It may be included in the activity related information field 1810.

As another example, in embodiments where the source electronic device 202 includes information based on, derived from, or associated with activity related information in the activity related information field 1810, the source electronic device 202 may include activity related information. Within field 1810 may include compressed information, presentation information, information that may be used to derive activity related information, and / or other information based on or associated with the activity related information. For example, source electronic device 202 may include an indication that information is available (eg, a pointer, tag, identifier, reference, and / or other indicator), which presumably indicates a basic identification of the type of information. But does not include the actual activity related information itself in the activity related information advertisement 1800. In such embodiments, companion electronic device 204 may perform one or more operations to retrieve activity related information presented within activity related information advertisement 1800. For example, assuming that the source electronic device 202 includes a pointer to the activity related information in the activity related information field 1810, the companion electronic device 204 can communicate with the source electronic device via one or more corresponding separate communications. From 202, activity related information indicated by the pointer can be retrieved.

In some embodiments, information based on, or derived from, the activity related information may be included in the activity related information field 1810 in addition to some or all of the actual activity related information. Continuing the clipboard example, assuming that a small section of text (100 bytes) and a large image (4 MB) have been copied to the clipboard within the source electronic device 202, the source electronic device 202 may display an activity related information field ( 1810 may contain small sections of text (and possibly corresponding metadata), but may include only references to images. The companion electronic device 204 may then request an image using that reference, as described above. In some embodiments, the size of the activity related information is used to determine whether activity related information or information based thereon is to be included in the activity related information advertisement 1800. For example, based on one or more thresholds (eg, maximum size for activity related information advertisement 1800, etc.), activity related information may be included directly or indirectly within activity related information field 1810 (eg, a pointer, Represented by an indicator or the like).

The source electronic device 202 then transmits (eg, broadcasts, unicasts, multicasts, etc.) the activity related information advertisement 1800 (step 1704). For example, using the corresponding protocol, the source electronic device 202 can unicast the activity related information advertisement 1800 to the companion electronic device 204. In general, during this operation, the source electronic device 202 provides the activity related information advertisement 1800 to the companion electronic device 204 via a wired or wireless communication link. As described in greater detail below, when receiving an activity related information advertisement 1800, the companion electronic device 204 optionally selects activity related information for use when performing one or more activities in the companion electronic device 204. To provide.

In the case of the example of FIG. 17, embodiments in which the source electronic device 202 advertises activity related information separately from the above described activity advertisement (eg, activity advertisement 1300) are described. In other words, in some embodiments, activity advertisement 1300 is transmitted in addition to activity related information advertisement 1800. However, in some embodiments, some or all of the activity related information described above (ie, actual information, pointers, etc.) is included in activity advertisement 1300. In such embodiments, a separate activity related information advertisement 1800 may not be used. In such embodiments, the activity advertisement 1300 includes various fields, values, and the like, used to maintain activity related information or information based thereon. In such embodiments, the companion electronic device 204 may perform operations similar to those shown in FIG. 19 to process activity related information in the activity advertisement 1300.

Although activity related information advertisement 1800 is shown as an example of activity related information advertisement, in some embodiments, activity related information advertisement 1800 is formatted differently (eg, including a different arrangement of fields, etc.). . For example, in some embodiments one or more of the fields described as optional are not optional. In general, the activity related information advertisement 1800 includes sufficient information to enable the source electronic device 202 to communicate activity related information to the companion electronic device 204, such that the companion electronic device 204 is accompanied by a companion electronic device. At 204, it is possible to provide activity related information for use in performing one or more activities.

19 shows a flowchart illustrating a process for receiving, at a companion electronic device, activity related information from a source electronic device, in accordance with some embodiments. More specifically, FIG. 19 illustrates an embodiment in which the companion electronic device 204 receives activity related information from the source electronic device 202. It is noted that the operations shown in FIG. 19 are shown as a general example of the operations performed by some embodiments. The operations performed by some embodiments include different operations and / or operations performed in a different order. Additionally, although certain mechanisms (eg, companion electronic device 204, etc.) are used in the description of the operations, in some embodiments, other mechanisms perform the operations.

For the process shown in FIG. 19, the contents of the clipboard in the source electronic device 202 are used as activity related information. However, in some embodiments, and as described above, other types of activity related information may be received from the source electronic device 202.

The process shown in FIG. 19 begins when the companion electronic device 204 receives an activity related information advertisement 1800 from a source electronic device 202 (step 1900). As noted above, this operation enables the companion electronic device 204 to process the activity related information and optionally provide activity related information for use when performing one or more activities in the companion electronic device 204. It may include receiving a unicast, broadcast, multicast, etc. of the activity-related information advertisement 1800 that includes the information.

The companion electronic device 204 then determines 1902 whether the activity related information described in the activity related information advertisement 1800 is of interest. In general, during this operation, companion electronic device 204 determines whether activity related information is to be used in companion electronic device 204. In this description, it is noted that the act of determining that activity related information is of interest and thus providing (or otherwise) providing activity related information is described as "optionally" providing activity related information. In other words, companion electronic device 204 selects whether to provide activity related information to activities within companion electronic device 204 as described herein.

In some embodiments, when determining whether activity related information is of interest, companion electronic device 204 displays an activity related information availability indicator on a display (eg, display 1400) of companion electronic device 204. present. 20 illustrates a block diagram illustrating an activity related information availability indicator 2000 in accordance with some embodiments. As can be seen in FIG. 20, activity related information availability indicator 2000 is an icon that is presented on display 1400 of companion electronic device 204. In some embodiments, activity related information availability indicator 2000 is generally a simple icon indicating that activity related information is available. However, in some embodiments, activity related information availability indicator 2000 may be a representation of the type (s) of activity related information (eg, text indicator as shown, image indicator, undo) within an icon. Buffer indicator, clipboard indicator, combination indicator, etc.). Similar to the resumable activity indication 1404 described above, in some embodiments, the user may indicate an activity related information availability indicator (or not) to signal the companion electronic device 204 to accept (or not) the activity related information. 2000). For example, a user finger taps the activity related information availability indicator 2000 on a touch-sensitive screen, performs a mouse point hover and clicks on the activity related information availability indicator 2000, and Click-select the relevant information availability indicator 2000, drag it along a specified path, and so forth. In some embodiments, acceptance of the activity related information causes the companion electronic device 204 to determine that the activity related information is of interest.

In some embodiments, when determining whether the activity related information is of interest (in addition to or instead of using the activity related information availability indicator 2000 described above), the companion electronic device 204 may correspond to the corresponding information. Determines whether the activity will be delivered from the source electronic device 202 to the companion electronic device 204, whether the activity related information is in a format supported by the companion electronic device 204, and the like. In general, companion electronic device 204 determines that activity related information is of interest when activity related information should be available to and within activities within companion electronic device 204.

If the activity-related information described in the activity-related information advertisement 1800 is not of interest (step 1904), the companion electronic device 204 may stop processing associated with the activity-related information advertisement 1800 and the process may It ends. During this operation, in some embodiments, companion electronic device 204 may remove activity related information availability indicator 2000 from the display screen, configure itself to ignore future duplicate advertisements, Deliver a negative acknowledgment or denial to the source electronic device 202, and the like.

If the activity related information described in the activity related information advertisement 1800 is of interest (step 1904), the companion electronic device 204 obtains the activity related information (1906). In general, during this operation, companion electronic device 204 retrieves at least some of the activity related information from one or both of activity related information advertisement 1800 and source electronic device 202. During this operation, when the activity-related information advertisement 1800 includes some or all of the actual activity-related information, the companion electronic device 204 may obtain some or all of the activity-related information from the activity-related information advertisement 1800. Can be. For example, assuming that the source electronic device 202 includes at least a portion of the contents of the clipboard within the activity related information advertisement 1800, the companion electronic device 204 may be configured to retrieve the clipboard from the activity related information advertisement 1800. You can get the content.

In addition to or instead of obtaining activity related information from the activity related information advertisement 1800, the companion electronic device 204 may obtain some or all of the activity related information from the source electronic device 202. For example, the source electronic device 202 may be in an activity related information advertisement 1800, a pointer (or other indicator thereof) to activity related information on the source electronic device 202 (eg, in the source electronic device 202). Companion electronic device 204 may request activity related information from the source electronic device 202.

In some embodiments, activity related information may be obtained along with the extended-activity data, ie, included in the extended activity data by the source electronic device 202. In some of these embodiments, companion electronic device 204 requests the transmission of activity related information along with the expanded activity data. For example, activity related information advertisement 1800 may include an indication that activity related information is available, such as a pointer or other indicator, and the companion electronic device conveys the corresponding activity, as described herein. Along with doing so (ie requesting extended activity data), a request may be received to obtain activity related data.

Companion electronic device 204 then provides activity related information for use in performing one or more activities in companion electronic device 204 (step 1908). During this operation, companion electronic device 204 stores the activity related information using one or more corresponding structures (memory, clipboard, cache, buffer, etc.), whereby the activity related information is generated by the activities (eg, source electronic device ( To activities delivered from companion 202 to companion electronic device 204, activities initiated on companion electronic device 204, and the like. In some embodiments, “providing activity related information for use in performing one or more activities” refers to the activity related in such a way that during the operation of the activity, the activity related information can be used in a corresponding and expected manner. It includes providing information. Continuing with the clipboard example, this shows the contents of the clipboard from the source electronic device 202 as if the information on the clipboard is generally available at the companion electronic device 204-ie within the companion electronic device 204. As it is from the clipboard-which can include making it available for pasting and other operations. For example, hotkeys and menu selections can thus be used to access the contents of the clipboard copied from the source electronic device 202 on the companion electronic device 204. As another example, assuming that the activity related information includes the contents of the undo buffer, the undo buffer in the companion electronic device 204 may retrieve the activity related information (ie, the history of the operations performed at the source electronic device 202). And updated to allow corresponding operations that were not initially performed at the companion electronic device 204 to be undone at the companion electronic device 204.

Continuing with the clipboard example, in some embodiments, providing activity related information for use in performing one or more activities in the companion electronic device 204 may include: the clipboard described in the activity related information advertisement 1800. Copying the contents of the data to a clipboard in the companion electronic device 204. In such embodiments, the contents of the clipboard may be partially or completely overwritten by the contents of the clipboard described in the activity related information advertisement 1800. In some embodiments, the companion electronic device 204 (eg, its operating system) is a separate delivered information buffer to avoid overwriting and thus the loss of useful information on the clipboard within the companion electronic device 204. (transferred information buffer). In such embodiments, the delivered information buffer can be accessed using corresponding menu selections, hotkeys, and the like. In some embodiments, the user may be presented with a choice (eg, a pop-up prompt) to overwrite the clipboard or to write information to the delivered activity buffer. In some embodiments, the delivered information buffer is a software service (eg, operating system software service, standalone application, etc.) that provides temporary storage for information in electronic devices, but the hardware-based delivered information buffer alone or in software. It can be used in combination with the passed information buffer. The delivered information buffer allows the user to perform operations such as copying, pasting, cutting, etc., to interact with the information stored in the delivered information buffer.

In some embodiments, the user may display an interface (eg, display) that allows the user to determine what content of the clipboard from the source electronic device 202 is to be copied to the clipboard within the companion electronic device and where to copy it. (At 1400). For example, after selecting the activity related information availability indicator 2000, a pop-up window may be presented on the display 1400 that shows or otherwise lists the contents of the clipboard from the source electronic device 202. The pop-up window includes mechanisms for selecting what content will be copied to the clipboard within the companion electronic device 204, where on the clipboard the content will be copied, and the like.

Although the activity related information availability indicator 2000 is presented at a specific location on the lock screen, in some embodiments, the activity related information availability indicator 2000 may be any screen during operation of the companion electronic device 204. Note that it may be presented in different positions in the phase, and the like. In addition, activity related information availability indicator 2000 may be presented with and / or associated with resumable activity indication 1404. In such embodiments, the user can resume activity related information availability indicator 2000 and resume either or both of delivering the activity (as described herein) or accepting activity related information. One or both of activity indication 1404 can be selected. In some embodiments, companion electronic device 204 presents only resumable activity indication 1404, and the user selecting resumeable activity indication 1404 is such that companion electronic device 204 delivers the activity. (As described herein) and accepting activity related information.

The above description of the embodiments has been presented for the purposes of illustration and description only. It is not intended to be exhaustive or to limit the embodiments to the forms disclosed. Accordingly, many modifications and variations will be apparent to those of ordinary skill in the art. In addition, the above disclosure is not intended to limit the embodiments. The scope of the embodiments is defined by the appended claims.

Claims (20)

As a method,
By a companion electronic device,
Receiving, from a source electronic device, a message comprising an indication that activity related information is available from the source electronic device, the indication comprising a pointer to the activity related information on the source electronic device, wherein the message Does not contain activity-related information-;
In response to receiving the indication in the message, obtaining the activity related information from the source electronic device based on the pointer to the activity related information on the source electronic device in a transmission separate from the message; And
Selectively providing the activity related information for use by one or more processes on the companion electronic device when performing one or more activities on the companion electronic device.
How to include. The method of claim 1,
Selectively providing the activity related information includes replacing part or all of the contents of the clipboard in the companion electronic device with source clipboard information, wherein the source clipboard information is a clipboard in the source electronic device. A method comprising a copy of some or all of the contents of a. The method of claim 2,
The source clipboard information includes the contents of an undo buffer in the source electronic device that maintains a record of changes made to one or more applications of the source electronic device, wherein the record is that the changes are reversed at the companion electronic device. How to make it possible. 3. The method of claim 2, further comprising receiving an indication regarding replacing the content of the clipboard, wherein some or all of the content of the clipboard in the companion electronic device is responsive to receiving the indication. Replaced by the source clipboard information. The method of claim 2,
Storing the source clipboard information in a transferred information buffer in the companion electronic device, wherein the transferred information buffer is different from the clipboard in the companion electronic device; And
Providing the source clipboard information from the passed information buffer for use in activities in the companion electronic device.
How to include more. The method of claim 1,
Receiving the activity related information along with extended activity data, wherein the extended activity data includes information indicating configuration of an application in the companion electronic device for continuing the activity from the source electronic device. How to. The method of claim 1,
Optionally providing the activity related information,
Presenting an activity related information availability indicator on a display of the companion electronic device;
When receiving an acceptance of the activity related information availability indicator, providing the activity related information for use in performing one or more activities at the companion electronic device; And
Not receiving the activity related information for use when performing one or more activities in the companion electronic device upon receiving a rejection of the activity related information availability indicator;
Including, the method. As a companion electronic device,
Processing subsystem; And
Networking subsystem
Including;
The processing subsystem and the networking subsystem are configured to perform a method, the method comprising:
Receiving a message from a source electronic device, the message comprising an indication that activity related information is available from the source electronic device, the indication including a pointer to the activity related information on the source electronic device, the message Does not contain activity-related information-;
In response to receiving the indication in the message, obtaining the activity related information from the source electronic device based on the pointer to the activity related information on the source electronic device in a transmission separate from the message; And
Selectively providing the activity related information for use by one or more processes on the companion electronic device when performing one or more activities on the companion electronic device.
Including a companion electronic device. The method of claim 8,
Selectively providing the activity related information includes replacing part or all of the contents of the clipboard in the companion electronic device with source clipboard information, wherein the source clipboard information is a clipboard in the source electronic device. Companion electronic device, including a copy of some or all of the contents of the. The method of claim 9,
The source clipboard information includes the contents of an undo buffer in the source electronic device that maintains a record of changes made to one or more applications of the source electronic device, wherein the record is that the changes are reversed at the companion electronic device. A companion electronic device that makes it possible. 10. The method of claim 9, further comprising receiving an indication regarding replacing the content of the clipboard, wherein some or all of the content of the clipboard in the companion electronic device is responsive to receiving the indication. Accompanying the source clipboard information. The method of claim 9,
The method,
Storing the source clipboard information in a delivered information buffer in the companion electronic device, wherein the delivered information buffer is different from the clipboard in the companion electronic device; And
Providing the source clipboard information from the passed information buffer for use in activities in the companion electronic device.
The companion electronic device further comprises. The method of claim 8,
The method further includes receiving the activity related information along with extended activity data, wherein the extended activity data indicates configuration of an application in the companion electronic device to continue the activity from the source electronic device. Companion electronic device comprising information. The method of claim 8,
Optionally providing the activity related information,
Presenting an activity related information availability indicator on a display of the companion electronic device;
When receiving an acceptance of the activity related information availability indicator, providing the activity related information for use in performing one or more activities at the companion electronic device; And
Not receiving the activity related information for use when performing one or more activities in the companion electronic device upon receiving a rejection of the activity related information availability indicator;
Including a companion electronic device. A non-transitory computer readable medium storing instructions that, when executed by a processing subsystem in a companion electronic device, cause the companion electronic device to perform a method, the method comprising:
Receiving a message from a source electronic device, the message comprising an indication that activity related information is available from the source electronic device, the indication including a pointer to the activity related information on the source electronic device, the message Does not contain activity-related information-;
In response to receiving the indication in the message, obtaining the activity related information from the source electronic device based on the pointer to the activity related information on the source electronic device in a transmission separate from the message; And
Selectively providing the activity related information for use by one or more processes on the companion electronic device when performing one or more activities on the companion electronic device.
A non-transitory computer readable medium comprising a. The method of claim 15,
Selectively providing the activity related information includes replacing part or all of the contents of the clipboard in the companion electronic device with source clipboard information, wherein the source clipboard information is a clipboard in the source electronic device. A non-transitory computer readable medium comprising a copy of some or all of the contents of the document. The method of claim 16,
The source clipboard information includes the contents of an undo buffer in the source electronic device that maintains a record of changes made to one or more applications of the source electronic device, wherein the record is that the changes are reversed at the companion electronic device. A non-transitory computer readable medium that makes it possible. The method of claim 16,
The method,
Storing the source clipboard information in a delivered information buffer in the companion electronic device, wherein the delivered information buffer is different from the clipboard in the companion electronic device; And
Providing the source clipboard information from the passed information buffer for use in activities in the companion electronic device.
The non-transitory computer readable medium further comprising. The method of claim 15,
The method further includes receiving the activity related information along with extended activity data, wherein the extended activity data indicates configuration of an application in the companion electronic device to continue the activity from the source electronic device. A non-transitory computer readable medium containing information. The method of claim 15,
Optionally providing the activity related information,
Presenting an activity related information availability indicator on a display of the companion electronic device;
When receiving an acceptance of the activity related information availability indicator, providing the activity related information for use in performing one or more activities at the companion electronic device; And
Not receiving the activity related information for use when performing one or more activities in the companion electronic device upon receiving a rejection of the activity related information availability indicator;
A non-transitory computer readable medium comprising a.

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