Patent Application
20050091284
Aspects of the present invention relate to systems and graphical user interfaces used to manage and display contact information. More specifically, aspects of the present invention provide a single graphical user interface that displays contact information that is synchronized with several different devices and applications.
Computer devices are increasingly being used to store contact data. It is not uncommon for a user to store contact data in devices and locations such as mobile phones, personal digital assistants (PDAs), laptop computers and servers connected to the Internet. Synchronization applications have been developed to help users synchronize contact data stored in different locations. For example, after updating a phone number stored in a mobile telephone, a particular synchronization application may be used to synchronize the updated phone number with contact data stored in an application such as Microsoft® Outlook®. The data stored in the same mobile phone may also be synchronized with a contact data stored in a proprietary contact application.
One of the common drawbacks associated with storing data, such as contact data, in several different devices and locations is that it is common to have inconsistent data. For example, a user may update a friend's phone number stored on a mobile phone and update the same friend's address stored in a laptop computer. Several weeks later the user may not remember if the phone number stored in the mobile phone or the laptop computer is the most current number. Another common drawback associated with current systems and methods is that users may have redundant data. For example, a user may store a phone number and home address in a contact application under the name Tom Smith and store a work email address and home address under the name Thomas Smith. This results in partial contact information being included in two different records.
Therefore, there is a need in the art for systems and methods that increase the consistency of contact data stored in multiple devices and in multiple locations. There is also a need in the art systems and methods that reduce the amount redundant contact data.
Aspects of the present invention address one or more of the issues mentioned above, thereby providing systems and methods that increase the consistency of contact data stored in multiple devices and reduce the amount of redundant contact data. A contact database stores a plurality of contact records. Related contact records are linked together so that updating one record results in the updating of the related records. A graphical user interface allows users to merge linked records. The unmerge command may result in the creation of a new composite record and the re-linking of related contact records.
Aspects of the present invention are described with respect to the accompanying figures, in which like reference numerals identify like elements, and in which:
Exemplary Operating Environment
A basic input/output system 160 (BIOS), containing the basic routines that help to transfer information between elements within the computer 100, such as during start-up, is stored in the ROM 140. The computer 100 also includes a hard disk drive 170 for reading from and writing to a hard disk (not shown), a magnetic disk drive 180 for reading from or writing to a removable magnetic disk 190, and an optical disk drive 191 for reading from or writing to a removable optical disk 192 such as a CD ROM or other optical media. The hard disk drive 170, magnetic disk drive 180, and optical disk drive 191 are connected to the system bus 130 by a hard disk drive interface 192, a magnetic disk drive interface 193, and an optical disk drive interface 194, respectively. The drives and their associated computer-readable media provide nonvolatile storage of computer readable instructions, data structures, program modules and other data for the personal computer 100. It will be appreciated by those skilled in the art that other types of computer readable media that can store data that is accessible by a computer, such as magnetic cassettes, flash memory cards, digital video disks, Bernoulli cartridges, random access memories (RAMs), read only memories (ROMs), and the like, may also be used in the example operating environment.
A number of program modules can be stored on the hard disk drive 170, magnetic disk 190, optical disk 192, ROM 140 or RAM 150, including an operating system 195, one or more application programs 196, other program modules 197, and program data 198. A user can enter commands and information into the computer 100 through input devices such as a keyboard 101 and pointing device 102. Other input devices (not shown) may include a microphone, joystick, game pad, satellite dish, scanner or the like. These and other input devices are often connected to the processing unit 110 through a serial port interface 106 that is coupled to the system bus, but may be connected by other interfaces, such as a parallel port, game port or a universal serial bus (USB). Further still, these devices may be coupled directly to the system bus 130 via an appropriate interface (not shown). A monitor 107 or other type of display device is also connected to the system bus 130 via an interface, such as a video adapter 108. In addition to the monitor, personal computers typically include other peripheral output devices (not shown), such as speakers and printers.
The computer 100 can operate in a networked environment using logical connections to one or more remote computers, such as a remote computer 109. The remote computer 109 can be a server, a router, a network PC, a peer device or other common network node, and typically includes many or all of the elements described above relative to the computer 100, although only a memory storage device 111 has been illustrated in
When used in a LAN networking environment, the computer 100 is connected to the local network 112 through a network interface or adapter 114. When used in a WAN networking environment, the personal computer 100 typically includes a modem 115 or other means for establishing communications over the wide area network 113, such as the Internet. The modem 115, which may be internal or external, is connected to the system bus 130 via the serial port interface 106. In a networked environment, program modules depicted relative to the personal computer 100, or portions thereof, may be stored in the remote memory storage device.
It will be appreciated that the network connections shown are illustrative and other techniques for establishing a communications link between the computers can be used. The existence of any of various well-known protocols such as TCP/IP, Ethernet, FTP, HTTP, Bluetooth, IEEE 802.11x and the like is presumed, and the system can be operated in a client-server configuration to permit a user to retrieve web pages from a web-based server. Any of various conventional web browsers can be used to display and manipulate data on web pages.
Description of Illustrative Embodiments
Computer device 212 includes a contact database 218 for storing contact information. Contact information may include names, addresses, phone numbers, email addresses, instant messenger identifications, etc. In alternative embodiments of the invention, contact database 218 may also store other data, such as digital certificates, passwords, playlists, data files or any other data that a user wishes to synchronize with a store. Moreover, the function of the single database 218 may be performed with two or more databases. For example, a first database may store contact data and a second database may store playlists.
A plurality of synchronization adapters 220a-220e are used to synchronize data stored in contact database 218 and stores 202, 204, 206, 210 and 216. One skilled in the art will appreciate that structure of any particular synchronization adapter may be a function of the type of store and an application programming interface (API) that is used to access data stored in contact database 218. One or more stores may be configured to not allow a user to manage data stored in that store. Active Directory 208, for example, allows users to read data, but not to write data. Active Directory 208 may be connected to computer device 212 via an import adapter 222. Import adapter 222 is used to transfer data from Active Directory 208 to contact database 218.
A synchronization mapping record 224 may include rules, constraints or other information that governs the synchronization of data. For example, if mobile phone 206 only allows a user to store two phone numbers per name, a constraint in synchronization mapping record 224 may prevent more than two phone numbers per name from attempting to be synchronized with the data stored in mobile phone 206.
PDA publisher record 306, mobile phone publisher record 310 and contact application publisher record 314 each synchronize with a composite record 318. Publisher records 306, 310 and 314 and composite record 318 may be included within contact database 218 (shown in
In the embodiment shown in
In step 704 possible duplicate contact records are identified. Possible duplicate contact records may correspond to contact records having the same identity claims. In step 706 a dialog box is displayed that identifies the possible duplicate contact records and includes an option for merging the possible duplicate contact records.
In step 708 a command to merge the possible duplicate records is received. The user may select merging now button 804 to cause contact records to be merged. In steps 710, the contact data from the at least two composite records is merged into a single composite record. For example, if one composite record corresponds to a contact identified as John Smith and a second composite record corresponds to a contact identified as Jonathan Smith, the contact data from both records would be merged into a single composite record that identify the contact with a single name. Finally, in step 712, the publisher records that were linked to the original composite records are linked to the single composite record. Re-linking the publisher records to the composite record ensures that contact data will be synchronized appropriately.
The present invention has been described in terms of preferred and exemplary embodiments thereof. Numerous other embodiments, modifications and variations within the scope and spirit of the appended claims will occur to persons of ordinary skill in the art from a review of this disclosure.
