Telecommunications – Radiotelephone system – Including private cordless extension system
Reexamination Certificate
2000-10-17
2002-12-31
Le, Thanh Cong (Department: 2684)
Telecommunications
Radiotelephone system
Including private cordless extension system
C455S414200
Reexamination Certificate
active
06501956
ABSTRACT:
BACKGROUND
The integration of computers and telephony services has grown tremendously over the last decade. Rapidly advancing technology in combination with decreasing equipment costs have spurred the computer-telephony integration (CTI) industry to new heights. Because of these advancements, telephone service providers are now generally able to offer more complex calling services to a wider population and at a lower cost than previously available.
In the evolution of the modem communication network, all telephone services, including so-called “enhanced” services, were previously provided by telephone switches. Every time a new calling service was developed, the switch had to be re-programmed by the switch vendor to implement that calling service. Because of the enormous complexity and expense of telephone switches, new calling services were generally delayed until the new switches were implemented. This process and the enormous costs of switches typically prohibited smaller telephone service providers from introducing and implementing their own calling services.
In response to this slow progression, the industry developed a design architecture called Advanced Intelligent Network (AIN). AIN architecture allowed much of the call processing and calling services to be removed from the switches and placed in peripheral computing systems. The AIN architecture uses peripheral computing systems as service control points (SCPs), service nodes (SNs), and intelligent peripherals (IPs) to provide call processing and calling services. Telephone service providers could now invest in relatively inexpensive computers with enough processing power to provide the enhanced calling services and call processing. This opened the market for calling services to the smaller telephone service providers.
The Internet has also experienced unmatched growth over the last decade. A vast array of information and services is now accessible to anyone with an Internet connection.
Most companies have web sites or web-enabled databases. Services which were previously limited to interactive calling implementation, such as information services, home banking, stock trading, and retail sales, have now become a mainstay of Internet commerce. Within the last five years, advancing technology has allowed Internet service providers (ISPs) to enter the long distance telephony market in competition with traditional telephone service providers. This evolutionary step established the potential for integration of the Internet with traditional CTI.
Recently, in the wireless phone industry, Internet content has become accessible, in a limited format, over a new design of wireless phone and wireless data terminals, and the development of wireless information formats. In addition to all of the communication services available to wireless phone users, they now enjoy limited access to the Internet content over an expanded visual display on their wireless phones. While this limited integration has increased the services and information resources available to the public, the amount and character of the information and services available is limited by the current technology.
The availability of Internet-based information and services based upon standard digital data networking and Internet standards such as hypertext transfer protocol (HTTP), transfer control protocol (TCP), Internet protocol (IP), extensible markup language (XML), hypertext markup language (HTML), scripting formats and others, which allow access to the Internet information relatively independent from a particular platform, creates a problem for mobile communication device users. With the memory, power, and input/output limitations inherent in the small mobile communication devices, it becomes increasingly difficult to take advantage of the current digital networking and Internet standards.
In response to this limitation, the industry has developed resource conservative alternatives to the current Internet and information protocols. Wireless Application Protocol (WAP) has risen to the top of these conservative alternatives as the defacto standard transport protocol for delivery of wireless information and telephony services to wireless devices.
Using WAP, information and resources are generally transported in a format which is more appropriate for wireless handheld device users. A WAP Gateway typically converts web protocols, such as HTTP and TCP/IP, into WAP transfer protocol and vice versa. To a limited extent, the WAP Gateway may also translate web content into the proper, reduced-sized format for display on a smaller handheld device, if it includes the appropriate logic and processing capabilities. Through appropriate use of proxy technology, much of the computational functionality is accomplished via the WAP Gateway, thus, further eliminating the need for excessive on-device memory and power.
The emerging wireless application protocols and formats (e.g. WML, HDML, see below) generally allow the use of soft keys (keys which have multiple functions dependent on the mode or function the handheld devices is operating in) for enabling users to make menu selections, scroll through multiple screens or “cards,” as they are referred to in WML. The availability of an alphanumeric keypad on most hand held devices allows for entry of standard text or numeric information either with dual tone multifrequency (DTMF) or other data signal criteria. Therefore, the presentation of the information is tailored to fit within the space confines and interactivity limits of a handheld device interface.
In addition to the WAP-styled technology, small-scaled web browsers are normally used to navigate through the information while presenting a familiar interface to the user. These small-scaled browsers, called mini-browsers, are typically designed to render mark-up languages designed specifically for the memory, input/output and bandwidth limitations of mobile handheld devices communicating over a wireless network. Two of the more prevalent languages, Handheld Device Markup Language (HDML) and Wireless Markup Language (WML) allow navigation similar to the standard HTML and use a tag-based language set defined as an XML document type. These wireless mark-up languages typically conserve memory resources by converting much of the overhead necessary for navigation into smaller machine-code or binary representations. WML or HDML applications can be written using existing HTML and XML development environments.
Although WAP and languages such as, HDML and WML, succeed in presenting a familiar interface compatible with a mobile handheld device, the inherent limitations of this interface complicates the user's interaction. Entering even a small amount of textual information using a 12-key alphanumeric keypad requires a great deal of concentration and detailed manipulation for the user. Furthermore, soft key functions must be arranged in standard locations in order for a user to navigate intuitively through “glance and touch” activation. In most instances, a user is engaged in multiple tasks when using a wireless device. Such a user will be less inclined to access a wireless information service if it requires too much special, physical attention.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
It would, therefore, be advantageous to have a fully-integrated communication system which may access and supply information services from the Internet, corporate databases, and other electronic information media and also provides enhanced interface between the user and the information service. It would also be advantageous to provide a simpler user interface which allows a user to control access to information and application functionality using basic inherent skills and minimized device manipulation. These and other features and technical advantages are achieved by a system that allows a blended communication and information system which can supply electronically accessed information to mobile devices and also provides a simple, intuitive interface between a user and an information service provider. Such mobile devices may inc
Watson Mike
Weeren Eric
Wilson Daren
Cong Le Thanh
Corsaro Nick
Fulbright & Jaworski L.L.P.
InterVoice Limited Partnership
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