Telephonic communications – Audio message storage – retrieval – or synthesis – Call source identification
Reexamination Certificate
2001-07-31
2003-07-08
Weaver, Scott L. (Department: 2645)
Telephonic communications
Audio message storage, retrieval, or synthesis
Call source identification
C379S142060, C379S207150
Reexamination Certificate
active
06590965
ABSTRACT:
FIELD OF THE INVENTION
The present invention relates to voice mail communication, more particularly to the ability to provide the complete set of information, normally provided as ‘Caller ID’ information on the subscriber line, as an announcement accompanying a recorded voice mail message from the caller. For example, the voice mail system can obtain and announce the number and an associated name, with each voice mail message or for each call even if the caller did not leave a message.
BACKGROUND
Network-based voice mail service has become commonplace in business environments and is becoming an increasingly popular alternative to answering machines for residential telephone customers. A voice mail system is a specialized computer or set of interconnected computers. The voice is generally digitized, usually at a much lower rate than the 64 Kb/s encoding that the central offices of the telephone network use for voice traffic through the switched network. The digitized voice is stored in compressed form on a hard disk that maintains the voice mail operating system, system prompts, and greetings, and the messages themselves. A processor controls the compressing, storing, retrieving, forwarding and purging of files. A comprehensive review of exemplary voice mail systems and voice messaging systems is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 5,812,639 to Bartholomew et al.
Many voice mail systems today provide some information about the call with the stored audio signal. This voice mail identification is normally associated with the telephone number of the voice mail subscriber. As the ability to send return messages is a normal and expected attribute of voice mail communication, data message protocol provides for message headings to include both sending and receiving addresses. Thus, in conventional systems, the receiving voice mailbox typically gains access to the calling number information as part of its processing of each incoming call.
If received, the voice mail system stores the calling number and will announce that number to the subscriber during message retrieval and/or related mailbox access operations. The information may also be used to enable call-back to the party that left the message for the subscriber or for forwarding of a newly recorded message from the subscriber to a mailbox of the original calling party U.S. Pat. No. 6,061,432 to Wallace et al., for example, discloses a voice mail system with signaling connectivity to the interoffice signaling portion of the switched telephone network. This enables the voice mail system to query other network nodes, such as an end office switch or an intelligent signaling transfer point, to obtain routing information used to forward a reply message to an appropriate box of the original caller in a remote voice mail system.
However, the calling party information is not always available to the voice mail system. The information may be blocked, because of privacy concerns. More often, one of the carriers involved in delivering the call to the voice mail system does not have the capability, or for business reasons does not agree, to supply the calling party number to the serving end office switch. Hence, when the call comes in, the end office switch can not supply any such information to the voice mail system with the forwarded call. In many cases, a subscriber receives voice mail messages but receives no related network information about the calling party.
This situation can be a particularly bothersome where the voice mail message stored by the mail system is inadequate. The caller may have left an incomplete message, or the system may have received no audio message at all if the caller opted to hang-up quickly. A subscriber may find several ‘hang-ups’ recorded as messages in his or her voice mailbox with no attendant information about the calling party. As a result, the subscriber has no way to determine the nature of the calls or the identity of the callers for call-back or nuisance tracing purposes.
Caller identification or “caller ID” is another increasingly popular telephone service. Caller ID is a telephone on-hook capability that provides a called party with information about the caller before the called party answers the incoming call. Conventionally, such information includes the date and time of the call and the caller's telephone number. Essentially, the telephone network identifies the telephone number associated with the line or instrument used by the calling party and supplies the number and time to a display device at the called customer's premises. Subscribers having integrated service digital network (ISDN) type service receive the caller ID data, for display at the time of an incoming call, in the form of a data message, which the end office switch transmits over the D-channel.
For analog telephone customers, however, existing caller ID utilizes in-band transmission technology similar to that described in U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,582,956 and 4,551,581 to Doughty. In such a system, the end office switch connected to the called party's line transmits directory number data for the calling party's telephone line as frequency shift keyed (FSK) data inserted in the silent interval between ringing signal pulses applied to the called party's line. The receiving apparatus includes a line interface unit, a converter, a control circuit and a display unit. A frequency shift keyed (FSK) signal representing the special service information (e.g. date, time and number) is filtered from the ringing signals by the line interface unit. The converter detects the FSK signal and demodulates the special service information from the FSK signal. Following detection of the FSK signal, the control circuit receives and stores the information, for display and other purposes.
For several years, local telephone exchange carriers have offered an enhanced form of caller ID, sometimes referred to as “Caller ID Deluxe” service. This enhanced service utilizes intelligent network type call processing to access a Line Information Database (LIDB) to translate the calling party's directory number into corresponding name data. The end office switch forwards the name data and the normal caller ID telephone number, as an ISDN data message (D-channel) or as FSK encoded data inserted in the silent intervals between ringing signals.
The terminal devices for caller ID normally retain the information at least for some period of time. Hence, over time the terminal builds-up a list of several of the most recent numbers and possibly names for calling parties. If calls rolled-over into voice mail from a ring-no-answer at the subscriber station, the caller ID data is delivered to the terminal in the normal fashion, before the forwarding. Hence, the terminal stores the number and name data in its memory. The subscriber can review the list and use the data to call-back at a later time. The terminal does not receive the caller ID data if the line is busy, unless the subscriber also has call waiting deluxe service (name and number delivery during call waiting). In the normal busy situation or if the subscriber has selectively activated forwarding to voice mail, the central office switch redirects the call to the voice mail system without delivering any type of caller ID information to the subscriber's equipment.
Even if received on a call that terminated in voice mail, the information stored in the caller ID terminal may not be easy to correlate with messages retrieved from voice mail or ‘hang-up’ calls. The subscriber reviewing the voice mail messages would need to concurrently scan through the list of caller IDs in the terminal device, to see if there was any corresponding data relating to the messages in his/her voice mailbox. This is often impractical and inconvenient, even if all the data is present in the caller ID terminal memory. Also, the subscriber may want to retrieve voice mail messages while away from home or office, in which case the caller ID terminal with the relevant data is not available for concurrent review.
It would be preferable to
Bartholomew Dale L.
Cave David H.
Farris Robert D.
Poole R. Andrew
McDermott & Will & Emery
Verizon Communications Inc.
Weaver Scott L.
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