WO2014198345A1

WO2014198345A1 - Method and apparatus to generate a contact entry corresponding to a calendared phone conference

Info

Publication number: WO2014198345A1
Application number: PCT/EP2013/062437
Authority: WO
Inventors: Alvis Matlija; Andrew Douglas Bocking
Original assignee: BlackBerry Ltd
Current assignee: BlackBerry Ltd
Priority date: 2013-06-14
Filing date: 2013-06-14
Publication date: 2014-12-18
Anticipated expiration: 2015-12-14

Abstract

An apparatus uses a calendar to detect when a scheduled phone conference is at least nearly extant and then generates a contact entry as corresponds to the phone conference. This contact entry can include the relevant call-in information as regards the phone conference as a primary contact number for the contact entry. By one approach, the device presents the contact entry on a display as a user-selectable call-in opportunity. This can include presenting the contact entry in a display of a contact list, in a list of recent call activity, and/or in a list of so-called favorites. By one approach the apparatus so presents the primary contact number as described above in a temporary manner. For example, the primary contact number may be automatically presented for no more than a corresponding access window of time as corresponds to the scheduled phone conference.

Description

METHOD AND APPARATUS TO GENERATE A CONTACT ENTRY CORRESPONDING TO A CALENDARED PHONE CONFERENCE

Field of Technology

[0001] The present disclosure relates to portable communication devices and more particularly to portable communication devices with access to a calendar or calendar service.

Background

[0002] Portable communication devices of various kinds are known in the art.

These portable communication devices include the nearly ubiquitous so-called

smartphone. Many such devices support not only basic two-way voice communications (via, for example, a wireless network such as cellular or wireless LAN) but other applications as well. For example, many such devices include a calendar or otherwise provide access to a calendar service.

[0003] A calendar (such as, by way of example, Outlook's™ calendar capability) permits a user to schedule future meetings and appointments and to arrange for automatic reminders to help prompt the user's attendance at or participation in such events. For many users at least some of these scheduled meetings are so-called distance meetings rather than face-to-face meetings. Multi-party conference calls are a common example of a distance meeting.

[0004] Joining a multi-party conference call often requires a multi-step procedure.

In many cases the intended participant first enters a particular phone number. When dialed and answered, the conference-call service then typically prompts the caller to enter a password/access code followed by the "#" character to indicate the conclusion of entering such information.

[0005] The aforementioned calendar can include such call-in information for corresponding scheduled conference calls. Though helpful to an extent, such an approach still often requires the user to locate and then enter that information (character by character) in order to join a given scheduled conference call. Present approaches in these regards can lead to frustrating delays, misdialed numbers, considerable user distraction, and displeased users.

Brief Description of the Drawings

[0006] FIG. 1 is a block diagram in accordance with the disclosure.

[0007] FIG. 2 is a flow diagram in accordance with the disclosure.

[0008] FIG. 3 is a screen shot in accordance with the disclosure.

[0009] FIG. 4 is a screen shot in accordance with the disclosure.

[0010] FIG. 5 is a screen shot detail in accordance with the disclosure.

[0011] FIG. 6 is a screen shot in accordance with the disclosure.

Detailed Description

[0012] The following describes an apparatus and method pertaining to use of a calendar to detect when a scheduled phone conference is at least nearly extant and then generating a contact entry as corresponds to the schedule phone conference. This contact entry can include, for example, the relevant call-in information as regards the scheduled phone conference as a primary contact number for the contact entry.

[0013] These teachings will accommodate providing that contact entry in any of a variety of ways. By one approach, for example, the device presents the contact entry on a display as a user-selectable call-in opportunity. This can include, if desired, presenting the contact entry in a display of a contacts list, in a list of recent call activity, and/or in a list of so-called favorites.

[0014] By one approach the device presents the contact number as described above in a temporary manner. For example, these teachings may provide for automatically presenting the primary contact number for no more than a corresponding access window of time as corresponds to the scheduled phone conference. [0015] So configured, if, when, and as scheduled phone conferences arise on a user's calendar, a portable communication device can automatically provide the user with temporary convenient access to the corresponding call-in information. By presenting the call-in information as a contact entry, the user can select and utilize that call-in information using the same selection/dialing paradigm as ordinarily prevails for their particular device. This both simplifies the user experience and avoids the need for special training. Such an approach often also permits the user to initiate (and complete) the dial- in protocol for a given conference-call service with only a single selection event (such as, for example, a single selection tap on a touch-sensitive display).

[0016] These teachings are economically realized and are highly flexible in practice. In particular, these teachings can be deployed in conjunction with a variety of ways by which a given device presents conveniently-organized contact information. The teachings set forth herein are also readily scaled to accommodate any number of conference calls and conference-call dial-in protocols.

[0017] For simplicity and clarity of illustration, reference numerals may be repeated among the figures to indicate corresponding or analogous elements. Numerous details are set forth to provide an understanding of the embodiments described herein. The embodiments may be practiced without these details. In other instances, well-known methods, procedures, and components have not been described in detail to avoid obscuring the embodiments described. The description is not to be considered as limited to the scope of the embodiments described herein.

[0018] FIG. 1 presents a portable communication device that will readily support the teachings set forth herein. Accordingly, for the sake of an illustrative example, it will be presumed in the following description that such a portable communication device carries out the described actions. It will be understood, however, that no particular limitations are intended in these regards nor with respect to any of the specific details of the described portable communication device.

[0019] This illustrative portable communication device includes a control circuit

102 that controls the overall operation of the portable communication device. Such a control circuit 102 can comprise a fixed-purpose hard- wired platform or can comprise a partially or wholly programmable platform. These architectural options are well known and understood in the art and require no further description here. This control circuit 102 is configured (for example, by using corresponding programming as will be well understood by those skilled in the art) to carry out one or more of the steps, actions, and/or functions described herein.

[0020] Corresponding communication functions, including data and voice communications, are performed through a communication subsystem 104 that includes, for example, at least one wireless transceiver. The communication subsystem receives messages from and sends messages to a wireless network 150. The wireless network 150 may be any type of wireless network, including, but not limited to, a wireless data networks, a wireless voice network, or a network that supports both voice and data communications.

[0021] The control circuit 102 may also operably couple to a short-range communication subsystem 132 (such as an 802.11 or 802.16-compatible transceiver and/or a Bluetooth™-compatible transceiver). To identify a subscriber for network access, the portable communication device may utilize a Subscriber Identity Module or a Removable User Identity Module (SIM/RUIM) card 138 for communication with a network, such as the wireless network 150. Alternatively, user identification information may be programmed into a memory 110.

[0022] A power source 142, such as one or more rechargeable batteries or a port to an external power supply, powers the electronic device. The control circuit 102 may interact with an accelerometer 136 that may be utilized to detect direction of gravitational forces or gravity- induced reaction forces. The control circuit 102 also interacts with a variety of other components, such as a Random Access Memory (RAM) 108, an auxiliary input/output (I/O) subsystem 124, a data port 126, a speaker 128, a microphone 130, and other device subsystems 134 of choice.

[0023] A display 112 can be disposed in conjunction with a touch-sensitive overlay 114 that operably couples to an electronic controller 116. Together these components can comprise a touch-sensitive display 118 that serves as a graphical-user interface. Information, such as text, characters, symbols, images, icons, and other items may be displayed on the touch-sensitive display 118 via the control circuit 102.

[0024] The touch-sensitive display 118 may employ any of a variety of

corresponding technologies including but not limited to capacitive, resistive, infrared, surface acoustic wave (SAW), strain gauge, optical imaging, dispersive signal

technology, and/or acoustic pulse recognition-based touch-sensing approaches as are known in the art. If the touch-sensitive display 118 should utilize a capacitive approach, for example, the touch-sensitive overlay 114 can comprise a capacitive touch-sensitive overlay 114. In such a case the overlay 114 may be an assembly of multiple stacked layers including, for example, a substrate, a ground shield layer, a barrier layer, one or more capacitive touch sensor layers separated by a substrate or other barrier, and a cover. The capacitive touch sensor layers may comprise any suitable material, such as indium tin oxide (ITO).

[0025] One or more touches, also known as touch contacts or touch events, may be detected by the touch-sensitive display 118. The control circuit 102 may determine attributes of the touch, including a location of a touch. Touch location data may include data for an area of contact or data for a single point of contact, such as a point at or near a center of the area of contact. Generally speaking, a swipe is a touch that begins at one location on the touch-sensitive display 118 and ends at another location (as when the user places their fingertip on the touch-sensitive display 118 and then drags their fingertip along the surface of the touch-sensitive display 118 before finally lifting their fingertip from that surface).

[0026] The portable communication device includes an operating system 146 and software programs, applications, or components 148 that are executed by the control circuit 102 and are typically stored in a persistent, updatable store such as the memory 110. Additional applications or programs may be loaded onto the portable communication device through the wireless network 150, the auxiliary I/O subsystem 124, the data port 126, the short-range communications subsystem 132, or any other suitable subsystem 134. In this illustrative example the aforementioned applications includes a calendar program configured to manage a device-resident calendar database, or a calendar client configured to communicate with a server that hosts a calendar service. Such calendar programs and clients are well known in the art and require no further elaboration here.

[0027] The memory 110 may be a storage medium (i.e. a tangible or non- transitory medium excluding signals and carrier waves) that stores executable instructions which, when executed, causes one or more of the functions, steps, or actions described herein. In particular, this memory 110 can serve, for example, to non- transitorily store the computer instructions that, when executed by the control circuit 102, cause the control circuit 102 to behave as described herein. (As used herein, this reference to "non- transitorily" will be understood to refer to a non-ephemeral state for the stored contents (and hence excludes when the stored contents merely constitute signals or waves) rather than volatility of the storage media itself and hence includes both non-volatile memory (such as read-only memory (ROM) as well as volatile memory (such as an erasable programmable read-only memory (EPROM).)

[0028] As a communication device, a received signal such as a text message, an e- mail message, or web page download is processed by the communication subsystem and input to the control circuit 102. The control circuit 102 processes the received signal for output to the display 112 and/or to the auxiliary I/O subsystem 124. A user may employ the communication device to generate data items (such as, for example, e-mail messages) that may be transmitted over the wireless network 150 through the communication subsystem. For voice communications, the overall operation of the portable

communication device is similar. The speaker 128 outputs audible information converted from electrical signals, and the microphone 130 converts audible information into electrical signals for processing.

[0029] FIG. 2 presents a process 200 that the above-described portable

communication device can carry out. It will be understood that other appropriately- configured and provisioned devices can similarly carry out some or all of the steps, actions, and/or functionality described herein. For the sake of an illustrative example it will be presumed in particular that an appropriately-configured control circuit (such as the above-described control circuit 102) carries out the illustrated process 200 for example by executing computer-readable instructions of the storage medium. [0030] At block 201 the control circuit uses a user's calendar to detect when a scheduled phone conference is at least nearly extant. By one approach the user's calendar is locally stored on the same device that harbors the control circuit. In lieu of the foregoing or in combination therewith, these teachings will also support an approach with the control circuit accessing a remotely-located calendar for the user. These teachings will also accommodate accessing more than one user calendar in order to have access to a more comprehensive view of the user's schedule when the user employs more than one calendar to schedule their activities.

[0031] As used herein, the expression "is at least nearly extant" will be understood to mean that the current time is just prior to or substantially coincident with at least one of the scheduled start time of the scheduled phone conference and a time that occurs during the scheduled duration of that scheduled phone conference. These teachings will also accommodate including some predetermined period of time immediately preceding (and/or following) the scheduled start time/duration of the scheduled phone conference. For example, this activity could include using the user's calendar to detect when the present time is within, say, ten minutes of the scheduled start time of the scheduled phone conference and the scheduled conclusion of the phone conference.

[0032] By one approach, whether to include a preliminary and/or succeeding time window in addition to the duration of the scheduled phone conference itself can comprise a default setting and/or can be made subject to alteration by the user if so desired.

Similarly, the duration of such a preliminary and/or succeeding time window can comprise a default setting and/or a user- modifiable setting as desired.

[0033] At block 202 the control circuit then automatically generates a contact entry as corresponds to the detected scheduled phone conference. The specific nature of the contact entry can vary with the specifics of the application setting. In some cases, when a supported list of contacts in a given device provides for only a name and a corresponding telephone number, the generated contact entry could comprise a new (temporary) contact entry having the name of the scheduled phone conference (as appears in the user's calendar) as the contact name and the call-in information used as the corresponding telephone number. [0034] Many modern portable communication devices permit pauses to be programmed into the automatic dialing of a telephone number in order to accommodate private exchange delays, answering delays, and so forth. For example, the asterisk character serves in some systems to denote a two-second delay. Accordingly, when the call-in information for a given conference call specifies the telephone number 1 800 555 1234 followed, when answered, by the follow-on access code 1234567 which is then to be followed by the "#" character, the present teachings will provide for using "1 800 555 1234 *** 1234567#" as the "telephone number" for the new contact entry to represent the scheduled phone conference.

[0035] In many application settings (though not necessarily all application settings) it can then be useful to visually provide that new, temporary contact entry to the user. Accordingly, and as shown at block 203, this process 200 will accommodate optionally presenting the aforementioned contact entry on a display as a user-selectable call-in opportunity. By one approach this user-selectable call-in opportunity can serve to dial the appropriate conference call dial-in information in response to a single tap (e.g. a speed-dial) or other selection gesture by the user.

[0036] FIGS. 3-6 provide some specific illustrative examples in these regards. It will again be understood that the specifics of these examples are intended to serve an illustrative purpose and are not intended to convey any specific corresponding limitations.

[0037] FIG. 3 illustrates a given device's touch-sensitive display 1 18 prior to the generation of a temporary contact entry as described above. In this example the screen shot depicts a "Calls" display that presents a list 301 of the most recently-engaged contact numbers (i.e., both incoming and outgoing telephone calls). The user can select any one of the displayed contact numbers by tapping or pressing on that desired number. The device will then initiate a call using the telephone number associated with the selected contact number. In this illustrative example the user can also scroll the list 301 in order to view other contact numbers in the list 301 that are not presently visible. Such conventions are known in the art and require no further elaboration here.

[0038] In this example the touch-sensitive display 118 also includes a list 302 of so-called favorite contacts. These favorites might be so-designated by the user and/or may reflect those contacts that are mostly frequently contacted by the user via this device. As with the list 301 of recently-engaged contact numbers described above, the user can similarly tap or press on one of these favorites to cause the device to use the

corresponding telephone contact number to initiate a call to the corresponding contact.

[0039] In this example the touch-sensitive display 118 also depicts a call button

303 the user can select to display the recently-engaged contact numbers as per the presently-depicted display, a contacts button 304 the user can select to display a list of contacts, and a dial pad button 305 that the user can select to display a keypad by which the user can enter a specific telephone number, character by character.

[0040] Referring to FIG. 4, the device now presents in the aforementioned list 301 of recently-engaged contact numbers an additional entry 401. The displayed telephone number, in fact, is the number to dial to join a conference call as per the details of a calendar event/entry contained in the user's calendar. More particularly, as per the process 200 described above the device has detected an extant scheduled phone conference in the user's calendar and has generated this temporary contact entry that is now presented in the list 301 of recently-engaged contact numbers (notwithstanding, of course, that this number is not necessarily a "recently- engaged" contact number).

[0041] Using this approach, the user can readily and easily have access to the necessary call-in information at a time of need as simply tapping this temporary contact entry in this list 301 will cause the device to dial in to the scheduled phone conference using the appropriate information and protocol. If desired, of course, the displayed information could also include a name for the conference. These teachings would also accommodate displaying only the name for the conference rather than the conference call call-in number (and/or access code).

[0042] In addition to the forgoing, or in lieu thereof, these teachings will also accommodate temporarily modifying the above-mentioned favorites list 302 to include an icon/button 501 for the temporary contact entry as shown in FIG. 5. This approach, too, provides a simple and intuitive way by which a user can easily effect the dial-in protocol by which they can join a scheduled conference call. [0043] As noted above, by pressing the contacts button 304 as shown on the touch- sensitive display 118 in this illustrative example the user can switch to a listing or array of the contacts (e.g. organized alphabetically by first or last name) contained in their contacts list. As shown in FIG. 6, such a listing 601 can be modified per these teachings to temporarily include the aforementioned temporary contact entry 602. In this example, the temporary entry 602 is presented at the very top of the list 601 notwithstanding that such a placement does not otherwise likely accord with the sequentially-based

presentation sorting. Such placement, however, again makes it very easy and simple for the user to quickly locate and utilize (again via, for example, a single tap on the displayed temporary contact entry 602) the contact entry to gain access to a scheduled conference call.

[0044] So configured, these teachings serve to automatically leverage the contents of a user's calendar in order to identify scheduled conference calls and the scheduled information regarding dial-in information for such calls. That information is then presented to the user via a temporary contact listing in any one or more of a variety of user- interface locations and paradigms to facilitate the ease by which the user can locate, identify, and utilize the temporary contact listing to join the scheduled conference call with a minimum of cognitive and/or physical effort and coordination.

[0045] The present disclosure may be embodied in other specific forms without departing from its essential characteristics. The described embodiments are to be considered in all respects only as illustrative and not restrictive. The scope of the disclosure is, therefore, indicated by the appended claims rather than by the foregoing description. All changes that come within the meaning and range of equivalency of the claims are to be embraced within their scope.

Claims

What is claimed is:

1. An apparatus comprising:

a wireless transceiver;

a memory having stored therein a user's calendar and at least one of a contact list and a list of recent call activity;

a display;

a control circuit operably coupled to the wireless transceiver, the memory, and the display and configured to:

use the user's calendar to detect when a scheduled phone conference is at least nearly extant;

generate a contact entry as corresponds to the scheduled phone conference.

2. The apparatus of claim 1 wherein the control circuit is configured to generate the contact entry, at least in part, by using information regarding the scheduled phone conference from the user's calendar as name information for the contact entry.

3. The apparatus of claim 2 wherein the control circuit is further configured to generate the contact entry, at least in part, by using call-in information as regards the scheduled phone conference as a primary contact number for the contact entry.

4. The apparatus of claim 1 wherein the control circuit is further configured to:

present the contact entry on the display as a user-selectable call-in opportunity.

5. The apparatus of claim 4 wherein the control circuit is configured to present the contact entry on the display as a user-selectable call-in opportunity for no more than a corresponding access window as corresponds to the scheduled phone conference.

6. The apparatus of claim 4 wherein the control circuit is configured to present the contact entry in at least one of the contact list and the list of recent call activity.

7. The apparatus of claim 6 wherein the control circuit is configured to present the contact entry in both the contact list and the list of recent call activity.

8. The apparatus of claim 1 wherein the apparatus comprises a portable wireless communication device.

9. A method comprising:

by a control circuit:

using a user's calendar to detect when a scheduled phone conference is at least nearly extant; and

generating, relative to the using, a contact entry as corresponds to the scheduled phone conference.

10. The method of claim 9 wherein generating the contact entry comprises, at least in part, using information regarding the scheduled phone conference from the user's calendar as name information for the contact entry.

11. The method of claim 10 wherein generating the contact entry further comprises, at least in part, using call-in information as regards the scheduled phone conference as a primary contact number for the contact entry.

12. The method of claim further comprising:

presenting the contact entry on a display as a user-selectable call-in opportunity.

13. The method of claim 12 wherein presenting the contact entry on the display comprises presenting the contact entry on the display as a user-selectable call-in opportunity for no more than a corresponding access window as corresponds to the scheduled phone conference.

14. The method of claim 12 wherein presenting the contact entry comprises presenting the contact entry in at least one of the contact list and the list of recent call activity.

15. The method of claim 14 wherein presenting the contact entry in at least one of the contact list and the list of recent call activity comprises presenting the contact entry in both the contact list and the list of recent call activity.