Classifications

• • G—PHYSICS
  • G06—COMPUTING OR CALCULATING; COUNTING
  • G06Q—INFORMATION AND COMMUNICATION TECHNOLOGY [ICT] SPECIALLY ADAPTED FOR ADMINISTRATIVE, COMMERCIAL, FINANCIAL, MANAGERIAL OR SUPERVISORY PURPOSES; SYSTEMS OR METHODS SPECIALLY ADAPTED FOR ADMINISTRATIVE, COMMERCIAL, FINANCIAL, MANAGERIAL OR SUPERVISORY PURPOSES, NOT OTHERWISE PROVIDED FOR
  • G06Q10/00—Administration; Management
  • G06Q10/10—Office automation; Time management
  • G06Q10/109—Time management, e.g. calendars, reminders, meetings or time accounting
• • G—PHYSICS
  • G06—COMPUTING OR CALCULATING; COUNTING
  • G06Q—INFORMATION AND COMMUNICATION TECHNOLOGY [ICT] SPECIALLY ADAPTED FOR ADMINISTRATIVE, COMMERCIAL, FINANCIAL, MANAGERIAL OR SUPERVISORY PURPOSES; SYSTEMS OR METHODS SPECIALLY ADAPTED FOR ADMINISTRATIVE, COMMERCIAL, FINANCIAL, MANAGERIAL OR SUPERVISORY PURPOSES, NOT OTHERWISE PROVIDED FOR
  • G06Q10/00—Administration; Management
  • G06Q10/06—Resources, workflows, human or project management; Enterprise or organisation planning; Enterprise or organisation modelling
  • G06Q10/063—Operations research, analysis or management
  • G06Q10/0631—Resource planning, allocation, distributing or scheduling for enterprises or organisations
  • G06Q10/06311—Scheduling, planning or task assignment for a person or group
• • G—PHYSICS
  • G06—COMPUTING OR CALCULATING; COUNTING
  • G06Q—INFORMATION AND COMMUNICATION TECHNOLOGY [ICT] SPECIALLY ADAPTED FOR ADMINISTRATIVE, COMMERCIAL, FINANCIAL, MANAGERIAL OR SUPERVISORY PURPOSES; SYSTEMS OR METHODS SPECIALLY ADAPTED FOR ADMINISTRATIVE, COMMERCIAL, FINANCIAL, MANAGERIAL OR SUPERVISORY PURPOSES, NOT OTHERWISE PROVIDED FOR
  • G06Q10/00—Administration; Management
  • G06Q10/10—Office automation; Time management
  • G06Q10/109—Time management, e.g. calendars, reminders, meetings or time accounting
  • G06Q10/1093—Calendar-based scheduling for persons or groups

Definitions

• the present invention relates to the field of calendaring system. More particularly, the invention relates to a method and system for calendar management services by synchronizing calendars in a confidential and anonymous manner.
• the present invention relates to a method for providing availability services by coordinating between calendars, comprising the steps of: a) dividing each calendar into time cubes such that each calendar is represented as a chronological sequence of uniform time scales (e.g., in a ribbon-like form); b) defining each cube on each specific calendar according to one of the following availability states: free, occupied or pending; c) allowing a user to send data representing an invitation to an event to one or more contacts for approval, and when an invitation of one or more contacts has been approved, opening a secure "private room” and importing to said "private room” the schedule of each approved contact in a confidential manner, such that each schedule of each contact includes data representing only their availability states, wherein all approved contacts including said user are defined as attendees of said event; d) at said secured "private room", searching all imported schedules simultaneously to find at least one option of common available matching time cubes among all attendee that defined as "free” state, or sequence or other combinations of "free” state time cubes between all
• the method further comprises allowing each user to set a level of importance to each event. Additionally, the method further comprises importing the level of importance given by the calendar's owner to time cubes that are stated as occupied. Moreover, the method further comprises allowing prioritizing events in the calendar according to their level of importance, whenever there is a time conflict between two or more events, by postponing the less important event and rescheduling it to other time.
• the matching considering time zone differences and the required travelling time for each attendee either from the previous event's location or according to location provided from location services or by the user.
• the method further comprises providing means to clear the entire day from meetings/events and optionally have them all reschedule.
• the method further comprises providing an option for the user to add remark that occurs at a certain time, but does not affect the user's schedule.
• the method further comprises providing an option to send task(s) to one or more contacts of the user, wherein the task can be added (either automatically or upon approval) to the calendar of said contact(s). For example, creating such a send task can be posted as a time based remark to the user's calendar.
• the method further comprises providing the user with more than one option to handle his tasks, e.g., such as through his scheduled time for the task on his calendar, or via a task list on his inbox.
• the method further comprises applying with one or more optional meeting time for the event, wherein the optional time sequences will be displayed on the calendar of each user such that the optional time cubes will be marked on the calendar and will allow the user to choose one of the offered matching options.
• the method may further provide an "earliest choice” button for allowing the user to easily select the earliest time sequence that matches all the information, terms and limitations of the event and its attendees.
• the optional event's time may appear as marked on the user's calendar without sharing any information of the other attendee's schedule. The user will be able to choose one of the offered optional meeting time or press the "earliest choice" button to set the earliest option as the event's time.
• the method further comprises further comprises allowing to display on the calendar of each user a location based notification related to a third party entity.
• the third party entity can be an advertiser or a commercial content provider.
• the invention in another aspect relates to a system for coordinating between users' calendars, comprising: a) a meeting coordinating server adapted for synchronizing between users' calendars in a confidential and anonymous manner via a secure "private room" without using any calendaring content except the availability status of each user, whether it free, occupied or pending; and b) a dedicated application adapted for running/executing on a user's terminal unit in order to communicate and synchronize with said meeting coordinating server.
• the system further comprises an advertising server for allowing one or more third party entities to provide location based content with respect to the user's calendar and current/future scheduled location(s), wherein whenever such location based content exist a notification will be displayed on the user's calendar as an icon or other relevant symbol which only represents or indicates the sector or type of the content.
• FIG. 1 schematically illustrates meetings coordinator system, according to an embodiment of the invention
• Fig. 2 schematically illustrates an exemplary representation in a ribbon-like form of a calendar divided into time cubes, according to an embodiment of the present invention
• - Fig. 3 schematically illustrates the matching between available time cubes of several attendees considering time differences and proximate traveling time to the location;
• Fig. 4 schematically illustrates the registration of the meeting's / event's time and the traveling time as occupied on each of the attendee's calendar
• FIG. 5-9 schematically illustrate exemplary screen layouts of the meeting coordinator system, according to some embodiments of the present invention.
• Embodiments of the present invention are directed to methods, systems and computer products for retrieving real time availability data (free/ occupied/pending data) in a confidential and anonymous manner via an availability service for use by a requesting calendaring application's and/or a dedicated website for scheduling meetings and/or asset use with one or more meeting attendees and/or assets.
• the term "contacts" is used to indicate entities that are able to interact with the availability service of the present invention.
• the entities can be private users, third parties, reservation service providers, businesses, professional users, etc.
• a private user may interact with other contacts whether they appear in his/her own contacts list or not.
• Fig. 1 and the following discussion are intended to provide a brief, general description of a suitable computing environment in which the invention may be implemented. While the invention will be described in the general context of program modules that execute in conjunction with a dedicated application program that runs on a mobile device (e.g., a smart phone) and can be integrated by a dedicated website, those skilled in the art will recognize that the invention may also be implemented in combination with other program modules. Similarly, while certain examples may refer to a smart phone, other mobile devices or computer based electronic systems can be used as well, such as, without limitation, a tablet, a network- enabled personal digital assistant (PDA), a Personal Computer (PC) system and so on.
• PDA personal digital assistant
• PC Personal Computer
• program modules include routines, programs, components, data structures, and other types of structures that perform particular tasks or implement particular abstract data types.
• program modules may be located in both local and remote memory storage devices.
• user inputs or gestures are described as being provided via phone key presses, data entry via a keyboard, or by clicking a computer mouse, optionally, user inputs can be provided using other techniques, such as by voice or otherwise.
• the example screen layouts, appearance, and terminology as depicted and described herein, are intended to be illustrative and exemplary, and in no way limit the scope of the invention as claimed.
• one exemplary system for implementing the invention includes a meeting coordinator server 1 and plurality of terminal units capable of communicating with meeting coordinator server 1.
• the terminal units can be any computer based device such as smart phones 2, a Personal Computer (PC) and the like.
• the communicating with server 1 can be done via a dedicated application or via a dedicated website (or web interface).
• the server 1 includes at least one processing unit and system memory (not shown).
• the system memory includes one or more dedicated software applications and may include also program data for providing calendar management services by synchronizing between users' calendars in a confidential and anonymous manner.
• the system may further incorporate with terminal unit(s) of third party services 5 to be discussed in greater details below.
• the server 1 and the terminal units communicate via a communication network 3, such as the Internet.
• each user of the system has its own private calendar that can be managed locally by the dedicated application either on a mobile device such as the smart-phone 2 or simultaneously and in synchronized manner via another computer system 4, such as a PC or a tablet.
• the server 1 and the dedicated application e.g., via the user's terminal unit 2) can update each other periodically (e.g., every 15 minutes).
• the dedicated application allows each user to set one or more terms in order to automatically manage the user's schedule, such as working hours, location (e.g. in order to take into account traveling time due to different city location and even different time zones between the attendees that are invited to the same event), reminders (e.g., to take a medicine, live sporting event, formal dress code, etc.), and the like.
• the event is scheduled, all the attendees will be defined as a meeting group of that specific event, which provides them with the ability to handle communication between all attendees with the reference of that specific event (e.g., massages, sharing file / image, voice massage, conference call, send tasks, etc.).
• the dedicated application allows the user to set the level of importance for each scheduled event (i.e., occupied time period in the user's calendar). For example, there can be at least two level of importance, such as “not important” and “very important”. Therefore, in case there are two or more event that are scheduled at the same time period, the system will alert the user, and either by the user approval or automatically the system will reschedule the less important event.
• the meetings coordinating process within the server 1 involve the following steps:
• each calendar into a plurality of time cubes (e.g., each time cube may represent a time period of 15 minutes) thereby providing calendars in form of a chronological sequence of uniform time scales (e.g., similar to a running ribbon as indicated by numeral 10 in Fig. 2);
• each time cube according to one of the following statuses: free (i.e., available, as indicated by numeral 11 in Fig. 2, e.g., can be represented by a green color), occupied (i.e., busy, as indicated by numeral 12 in Fig. 2, e.g., can be represented by a red color) or pending (as indicated by numeral 13 in Fig. 2, e.g., can be represented by a yellow color).
• free i.e., available, as indicated by numeral 11 in Fig. 2, e.g., can be represented by a green color
• occupied i.e., busy, as indicated by numeral 12 in Fig. 2, e.g., can be represented by a red color
• pending as indicated by numeral 13 in Fig. 2, e.g., can be represented by a yellow color
• all time cubes can be set as "free", unless otherwise defined;
• the first available sequence of "free" time cubes for all attendees is indicated by the time cubes within the dotted line 14 in Fig. 3 with respect to the exemplary ribbon like form of the relevant calendar portion of three attendees (as indicated by the attendees: User 1, User 2 and User 3).
• the travelling time of User 3 to the scheduled event with User 1 and User 2 may take several hours (e.g., due to the distance between the previous event's location of user 3 and the location of the new schedule event.
• the system synchronizes the available sequence of common "free" time cubes between all attendees, it takes into consideration the proximate traveling time needed for each attendee to arrive at the location of the new schedule event.
• the location information can be obtained as one of the scheduling terms either from previous event of each attendee calendar (if such event was scheduled) or based on location information provided by the user or by location services provided by the user's mobile device, e.g., GPS, cellular, and the like (e.g., as indicated by the three "free” time cubes within the dotted line 15 in Fig. 3).
• the three "free" time cubes within dotted line 15 represent the proximate traveling time of the attendee (e.g., User 3) to the meeting's location from his previous event's location, and
• the system further comprises software means for providing one or more optional meeting time for an event, wherein the optional time sequences will be displayed on the calendar of each user such that the optional time cubes will be marked on the calendar and will allow the user to choose one of the offered matching options.
• the system may further comprise software means for providing an "earliest choice” button for allowing the user to easily select the earliest time sequence that match all the information, terms and limitations of the event and it's attendees.
• the suggested system can be used as a smart secretary that provides secretarial and personal management services to the user.
• the system is able to automatically manage the user's schedule based on the user's working hours and habits.
• the system further comprises additional features and services.
• the system may offer meeting location according to users' requests and even can provide additional information and on-line reservations from a third party entity such as flights, hotel, car rental, restaurant reservation service or any other booking and prepayment services if needed, e.g., as shown by the third party services 5 in Fig. 1.
• a third party entity such as flights, hotel, car rental, restaurant reservation service or any other booking and prepayment services if needed, e.g., as shown by the third party services 5 in Fig. 1.
• this can be obtained by using and cooperating with local / global matching search engines and PayPal / credit cards payment service via a secure payment channel.
• the system allows a user to define selected contacts as special roll contacts, and optionally also to mark them in a unique visual manner with respect to the other contacts in the list (as indicated by numerals 52 and 53 in Fig. 8).
• the special roll contact may represent people that have specific task with respect to someone's private or professional life, such as a babysitter, a driver, a language translator, a dog walker, etc. This enables the user to set a specific roll for the contact to be used when setting an event. For example, a user can define a specific contact with a special roll such as a babysitter.
• the user can use the dedicated application to sync with the babysitter's schedule (or alternatively with babysitting services) to order babysitting services in accordance with the desired event (e.g., the concert).
• a specific event e.g., a concert
• the user can use the dedicated application to sync with the babysitter's schedule (or alternatively with babysitting services) to order babysitting services in accordance with the desired event (e.g., the concert).
• the user can use the dedicated application to send the relevant meeting/event's attendees special information/request/question regarding the event (e.g., dressing code, "bring a cake” or "would you be needed a vegetarian dish?", and the like).
• special information/request/question regarding the event e.g., dressing code, "bring a cake” or "would you be needed a vegetarian dish?", and the like.
• all the attendees will be defined as a meeting group of that specific event. This provides them with the ability to handle communication between all attendees with the reference of that specific event (e.g., massages, sharing file / image, voice massage, conference call send tasks etc.).
• the system allows the user to set limitations to a contact, such as meet intervals (e.g., meeting every two weeks), enable/disable different properties, etc.
• a contact such as meet intervals (e.g., meeting every two weeks), enable/disable different properties, etc.
• meet intervals e.g., meeting every two weeks
• enable/disable different properties etc.
• enable/disable properties may include:
• Allow send task - will allow the specific contact to send a task to the user's calendar
• the user can use the dedicated application to clear the entire day from meetings/events and have them all reschedule by the system automatically (e.g., in case of emergency).
• Clear my day will function as an emergency button, to provide immediate assistance by clearing the entire day from meetings and tasks and will inform all the scheduled meeting's attendees (and tasks senders) about the need to cancel or reschedule the events of that day.
• the system will apply the user to choose between a default of a general message or a freehanded personal message he can apply.
• Clear my day option is clearing the day and deleting all the meetings.
• all the users that are participants in meetings during that day will get a message of canceled meetings.
• CMD may load an alert with 3 options:
• the dedicated application may send reminders for the user's events/ meetings with all remarks mentioned to the reference.
• An additional advantage provided by the invention is that the dedicated application in accordance with meeting coordinator server help the user to organize multi participants events, schedule with all attendees, giving the user number of precipitance how approved and scheduled your event in their calendar. For example, the user can use the dedicated application to receive main dish preference etc.
• a user could choose to send designed invitations (e.g., interactive, multimedia, 3D designed invitations, etc.) to selected events and even to add music (e.g. ringtone/ songs/ video clip/ remix music/ play list, etc.) as background music to the invitation.
• Figs. 7A and 7B schematically illustrate exemplary screen layouts of such an invitation.
• the invitation includes a textured/designed background (e.g., an image file type such as JPG, GIF or any other suitable image file type), text, schedule and operation button(s) for the invited user such as "accept” / "deny” and the option to view the event's time sequence on the user's schedule before accepting or denying the invitation.
• Fig. 7A shows an example of the invitation creation screen where the user may select the preferred background, fonts, etc.
• Fig. 7B shows the invitation as received by an invited contact of that user.
• a user could choose to hide a meeting's data from the calendar, and the time of the event will appear as busy, but only by applying a password the meeting's data will be exposed.
• the system allows the user to choose a specific background color to each contact person or a group of contacts (e.g., different color for each private group). This color can be used as the background color of all the events related to that contact person / group on the user's calendar.
• the dedicated application will help the user to follow open invitation he had sent preapproved, incoming invitations he had received, update or cancel meetings/ events. Moreover, through the dedicated application the user will be able to organize or join a group (e.g., for walking the dog shifts, purchases, school shuttle, book reading, etc.), but with the user's contacts or with other system's users having relevant attributes, e.g., such as users who live in the same city or have other common attributes.
• main groups there are at least two types of main groups: i) private groups that the user creates like family, friends, colleagues; and ii) meeting groups that are created automatically when a meeting or event is set.
• Fig. 5 schematically illustrates an exemplary screen layout of private groups, according to an embodiment of the present invention.
• the center screen layout there is a dialer 50 that enables the user to navigate between all groups.
• turning the dialer 50 left or right enables to navigate between the different groups. For example, tapping on the center of the dial will provide information regarding the currently selected group screen such as the created date of the group, the number of contacts in this group, the last post sent in this group, etc.
• Fig. 6 schematically illustrates an exemplary screen layout of meeting groups, according to an embodiment of the present invention.
• the meeting groups are created automatically when a meeting is set.
• the navigation between these groups is done in a dialer 50 like form, but with a schedule range selection 51 where the user can select the desired date range, such as day, week, month, etc.
• TBR Time Based Remark
• TBR is an option for the user to write down something that occurs at a certain time, but does not affect his scheduled. For example: Mom went to a vacation.
• the TBRs will appear in the calendar but will show that time as available and will be taken under consideration as available when using the auto meeting set up mechanism.
• the system comprises an option to send assignment(s) to one or more contacts of the user.
• the task can be added (either automatically or upon approval) to the calendar of that contact. Creating such a send task can be posted as a TBR to the user's own calendar.
• the method further comprises providing the user with two or more options to handle his tasks, e.g., through his scheduled time for the task on his calendar or via the task list on his inbox. Both options will simultaneously update each other.
• the system comprises a virtual billboard.
• the virtual billboard may include several categories/topics, such as places, attractions and business nearby, career opportunities, lost and found, community news, yard sale, group gathering and the like as schematically illustrated in Fig. 9.
• the billboard content can be either location based information (e.g., by GPS or according to scheduled meeting's locations) or non-location based information.
• each category may showcase top/selected messages (e.g., 3-5 messages on each category on each screen).
• the messages can be scrolled sideways to provide unlimited ads.
• the system comprises a location based content module (e.g., an advertising server), or alternatively, means to communicate with a third party commercial content server, for allowing one or more third party entities to provide location based content with respect to the user's calendar and its current/future scheduled location(s).
• a location based content module e.g., an advertising server
• a third party commercial content server for allowing one or more third party entities to provide location based content with respect to the user's calendar and its current/future scheduled location(s).
• a notification will be displayed on the user's calendar as an icon or other relevant symbol which indicates or represents only the sector or type of the content, such as gastronomy sector (e.g., an icon in form of a cup of coffee that may indicate of a food related benefit such as a happy hour at a local pub or a discount at a specific restaurant), truism sector (e.g., an icon in form of the letter "i" that may represent a discount at a specific nearby hotel), culture and entertainment (e.g., an icon in form of a smiling face that may represent a discount for a sport event, a theater nearby, or movie), purchase culture (e.g., an icon in form of a shopping cart that may represent malls and shopping center nearby), transportation (e.g., an icon in form of a private car that may represent flight deals, available parking lot, car rent), etc.
• Fig. 10 schematically illustrates an icon 55 in form of a cup of coffee that represents the gastronomy sector as presented in
• the advertising are implemented in a manner and placements not just to avoid interference to the users working environment but even to bring the advertising to the users benefit as well to the advertiser.
• This is done through the concept that the system's application is an innovative way of connecting between users by considering them not only as private, social or professional individuals but all at once.
• the system provides with calendar management services. Through this ability, the system will offer a unique match between the advertiser to the users in the aspect of their device location detection and future event locations of the user, in a unique approach:
• the system offers a new kind of advertisement which will, without any doubt, make the users curious and thus, increase their click probability on the ads.
• No more need to relate to usual terms from the advertising world such as impressions, clicks, conversions, CTR (click through rate: the relation between impressions and clicks). Showing the users geo-located thematic icons all along their way or future scheduled locations, without them to know what advertiser is hiding behind, will make stronger their will to discover what the icon is. And will create a curiosity by the user in the aspect of a "lottery ticket".
• a small and user friendly pop-up will open up and give the user the possibility to win and save a free gift/benefit, a coupon and the like at a nearby located business.
• the user gains a benefit with that relates to his current/future scheduled locations.
• the advertiser gains: a) a target audience per to the location near his business; b) creating curiosity through the ads that will increase the clicking frequencies and by that attract more users to view their ads; c) advertising at the suggested venue screen will be the closest advertising to "close deal". For example, if a user will choose to click on the business's ad as his meeting venue, that business will appear on the user's invitation and will be shown at all event's attendees' schedule.
• the system of the present invention allows users to received / send an invitation with all meeting/ event's data, and to easily and efficiently schedule and synchronized with the user's meetings attendees in a secured manner knowing that anyone can't see the other's schedule. Moreover, a user can determine weather to accept the invitation, accept it but through day / dates / hour limitations (without letting other attendees knowing of such) or decline in a gentle way.

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• 2013
  • 2013-02-21 CA CA 2883487 patent/CA2883487A1/en not_active Abandoned
  • 2013-02-21 AU AU2013311266A patent/AU2013311266A1/en not_active Abandoned
  • 2013-02-21 BR BR112015005030A patent/BR112015005030A2/pt not_active Application Discontinuation
  • 2013-02-21 CN CN201380052287.6A patent/CN104704518A/zh active Pending
  • 2013-02-21 WO PCT/IL2013/050155 patent/WO2014037932A1/en not_active Ceased
  • 2013-02-21 IN IN1804DEN2015 patent/IN2015DN01804A/en unknown
  • 2013-02-21 RU RU2015108140A patent/RU2618376C2/ru active
  • 2013-02-21 KR KR1020157007916A patent/KR20150056561A/ko not_active Withdrawn
  • 2013-02-21 MX MX2015002428A patent/MX2015002428A/es unknown
  • 2013-02-21 JP JP2015530547A patent/JP2015531505A/ja active Pending
  • 2013-08-27 US US14/010,897 patent/US20140074536A1/en not_active Abandoned
  • 2013-09-02 EP EP20130182656 patent/EP2706491A1/en not_active Ceased
• 2014
  • 2014-08-25 IL IL234295A patent/IL234295A/en active IP Right Grant

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