Abstract: Disclosed herein are systems, methods, and non-transitory computer-readable storage media for preserving context across multiple customer service venues. A system configured to practice the method identifies a user profile of a user requesting customer service, generates a context based on the user profile, the request, and other relevant data. The system communicates with the user at a first customer service venue based on the context, and receives an indication of movement of the user from the first customer service venue to a second customer service venue. The system transfers the context to the second customer service venue, and communicates with the user at the second customer service venue based on the context. A customer service venue can be a knowledge base, a troubleshooting guide, a social network, an online virtual world, a text-based chat, a voice conversation, a video chat, a spoken dialog system, and an onsite visit.

Abstract: Disclosed herein are systems, methods, and non-transitory computer-readable storage media for sorting and outputting, base on relevancy, feedbacks to a user. For example, user characteristics of a user associated with viewing an item can be received directly from the user or from a social network profile associated with the user. The received user characteristics can be compared to user characteristics associated with feedbacks to yield respective degrees of similarity. Finally, the feedbacks can be output to the user based on the respective degrees of similarity.

Abstract: Disclosed herein are systems, methods, and non-transitory computer-readable storage media for providing customized customer service interactions between users and an enterprise. A method includes the steps of receiving a customer service request from a user terminal and generating a customer intimacy profile for the user associated with the user terminal based at least on user data associated with the user and available from at least one social media channel. The method also includes assembling customer service object for the user terminal based at least on the customer intimacy profile, where the customer service object identifying at least one customer service channel available for the user. The method further includes delivering a user interface to the user terminal, where a content of the user interface is based on the customer service object.

Abstract: Disclosed are systems, methods, and non-transitory computer-readable storage media for benchmarking the performance of a contact center of an enterprise with respect to online communications channels. A system configured to practice the method first identifies messages posted by users on an online communications channel during a first time interval. Each of these messages includes an identification of user problems encountered by the users. The system then identifies messages posted by agents of the enterprise on the online communications channel. Specifically, the messages identified are those consisting of an agents responding to the user problems identified in messages posted by the users. The system can then generate response performance measures for the enterprise. The response performance measures can be based on a temporal relationship between corresponding messages posted by a users and agents.

Abstract: A mechanism is disclosed that enables the invocation of methods of object instances that have persistent data and a mutable key. A mutable key capability is advantageous in a variety of applications, such as monitoring a set of users and their login status on a plurality of media servers (e.g., an email server, an instant messaging server, a voice mail server, a video server, an audio-conferencing server, etc.). The methods that can be invoked include get methods, set methods, unset methods, finder methods, destructors, and business methods. Implementations based on the Enterprise JavaBean specification are disclosed for three illustrative embodiments of the present invention. The illustrative embodiments of the present invention can also be implemented in accordance with object persistence mechanisms other than Enterprise JavaBeans.

Abstract: A system and method for permitting an initiator of a communication session request and a recipient of the communication session request to quickly negotiate the beginning of a communication session, such as a phone call, wherein the negotiation is performed based on the expressed current need and the current availability of the recipient.

Abstract: An object persistence mechanism is disclosed that enables the generation of software objects that have persistent data and a mutable key. A mutable key capability is advantageous in a variety of applications, such as monitoring a set of users and their login status on a plurality of media servers (e.g., an email server, an instant messaging server, a voice mail server, a video server, an audio-conferencing server, etc.). Implementations based on the Enterprise JavaBean specification are disclosed for three illustrative embodiments of the present invention. The illustrative embodiments of the present invention can also be implemented in accordance with object persistence mechanisms other than Enterprise JavaBeans.

Abstract: A mechanism is disclosed that enables garbage collection of object instances that have persistent data and a mutable key. A mutable key capability is advantageous in a variety of applications, such as monitoring a set of users and their login status on a plurality of media servers (e.g., an email server, an instant messaging server, a voice mail server, a video server, an audio-conferencing server, etc.). Implementations based on the Enterprise JavaBean specification are disclosed for three illustrative embodiments of the present invention. The illustrative embodiments of the present invention can also be implemented in accordance with object persistence mechanisms other than Enterprise JavaBeans.

Abstract: An apparatus and methods are disclosed that enable a caller to specify a condition of availability for a return call when the caller is unable to reach the called user. A condition might indicate a time interval in which the caller is willing to accept a return call, a location, or some other constraints. In the illustrative embodiments, when a caller places a call and is unable to reach the called user, the caller is prompted via an interactive voice response (IVR) system for one or more conditions of availability for a return call. As soon as the called user's terminal becomes available, a software application checks whether the condition of availability is satisfied, and if so, establishes a call between the caller's terminal and the called user's terminal.

Abstract: Methods and apparatus are provided for controlling an availability of a user in an enterprise environment. If an enterprise user requests to change an availability status on one or more media, a determination is made as to whether to grant the request based on one or more predefined criteria associated with the enterprise. For example, the predefined criteria may comprise resource needs or one or more policies of the enterprise. The predefined criteria may be expressed as one or more rules in a rule base.

Abstract: Methods and apparatus are provided for collecting proxy presence information about an object associated with a user from one or more proxy presence sources associated with the user. A proxy presence agent is associated with each of the proxy presence sources; and the proxy presence agents provide proxy presence information to one or more presence servers. The object may be, for example, one or more of a business document, an application document, or one or more runtime objects associated with the user. The proxy presence agent reports one or more of macropresence events and micropresence events related to the object. A continuous presence function is generated for each of the proxy presence sources that characterizes the likelihood that the object is active at the corresponding presence source at a given time. The proxy presence sources may include, for example, one or more business applications, application execution environments, devices or locations.

Abstract: Methods and apparatus are disclosed for collecting presence information about a user from one or more presence sources associated with the user, such as applications, devices and locations. A presence agent is associated with each presence source; and the presence agents provide presence information to one or more presence servers. Typically, the presence agents execute on a processor associated with the corresponding presence source. The presence agent reports one or more of macropresence events and micropresence events. The presence agent optionally prompts the user to update the presence information based on one or more criteria, such as exceeding a time threshold since the last presence event. Continuous presence functions are generated for each presence source that characterize the likelihood of the user to be present on the corresponding presence source at a given time.

Abstract: Methods and apparatus are provide for developing a virtual assistant for at least one party of a communication. A developer provides one or more virtual assistant software modules that control an execution of the virtual assistant; and also provides a set of proxy methods that are called by the virtual assistant software modules to provide one or more desired functions. The developer may optionally be presented with a library containing one or more virtual assistant software modules or proxy methods. The developer can optionally revise the one or more virtual assistant software modules or proxy methods selected from the library, for example, based on a selection of one or more supported external applications.

Abstract: Methods and apparatus are provided for analyzing user activity and for recording such user activity in an entity relationship model. A network is searched for materials associated with a user and content analysis techniques are performed on the associated materials to extract one or more characteristics from the associated materials based on predefined criteria. The extracted information is stored in an entity relationship model that relates the user to the extracted characteristics. The characteristics may include activity information, expertise information and location information. The entity relationship model can thereafter be searched to identify and optionally contact one or more users having desired characteristics.

Abstract: Methods and apparatus are provided for developing and processing workflows that include communication tasks. A workflow is generated according to the present invention by inserting at least one communication node in the workflow. The communication node associated is with a communication task having at least one property that is resolved at run time. For example, the media type, recipient list, or timing of a communication may be resolved at run-time. A workflow generation tool is provided that generates a workflow based on (i) a user selection of at least one communication node to insert in a workflow, and (ii) a user specification of one or more properties of the communication task, wherein at least one property of the communication task is resolved at run time. At run-time, a workflow engine parses at least communication node in a workflow associated with a communication task and having at least one property that is resolved at run time.

Abstract: Methods and apparatus are provided for establishing a conference based on the presence or preferences (or both) of one or more invitees. The presence of each invitee is evaluated on one or more devices. A media type is selected based on the presence information. User preference information may be evaluated for those invitees who are not currently present on a device. The selected media type for the conference may optionally be required to support the requirements of the conference, such as document sharing or video links. In this manner, the same communication application can trigger conferences of different media types (where the selected media type is most likely to lead to the successful establishment of the conference). In addition, the present invention allows a media type to be selected that will be more likely to lead to the successful establishment of a conference.

Abstract: Methods and apparatus are disclosed for providing a virtual assistant to at least one party of a communication. The virtual assistant is injected into the communication, for example, by a VXML engine. The operation of the virtual assistant is controlled by one or more software modules that are obtained from a proxy node. The software modules allow commands received from or destined for the party to be interpreted. The virtual assistant may optionally be customized based on a selection of the one or more supported external applications. The proxy node provides at least one method for the party that allows the party to access functionality provided by at least one external application. The proxy node interprets signals from the virtual assistant; converts the signals from the virtual assistant into commands for the external application; and converts one or more of commands, messages and data from the external application into signals understood by the virtual assistant.

Abstract: A method and apparatus are disclosed for prefetching Internet resources based on the estimated round trip time of the resources. Whenever a user clicks on an embedded hyperlink, the prefetching strategy aims to ensure that the corresponding document has been prefetched or can be fetched very quickly from its origin server. Web access time as perceived by the user is reduced, while also minimizing the network, server and local resource overhead due to prefetching. The estimated round trip time is obtained or approximated for all referenced documents. The “round trip” time or access time of a resource is the time interval between the sending of the first byte of an HTTP request for the resource until the last byte of the server response has arrived at the requesting Web client. Documents with the longest access times are prefetched first and prefetching generally continues until the estimated round trip time falls below a predefined threshold.

Abstract: A method and apparatus for enabling a user of a telecommunications terminal to specify desired characteristics for the recipient of a call in lieu of a contact identifier are disclosed. The illustrative embodiment enables a user to specify one or more of the following criteria for a recipient: (i) a role requirement that specifies a role (e.g., a nurse, a doctor, etc.); (ii) a capability requirement that specifies one or more capabilities (e.g., able to speak Spanish, etc.); (iii) a location requirement (e.g., on the third floor of Building A, etc.); and (iv) a cardinality descriptor for the number of recipients (e.g., one recipient, at least three recipients, etc.). The illustrative embodiment also employs availability data (e.g., a schedule, etc.) and rules to determine whether a particular person is available to receive a call.

Abstract: The invention provides a software instrumentation tool operative to control the execution of a target program, and to execute user-specified instrumentation actions upon occurrence of corresponding user-specified events during target program execution. Advantageously, the instrumentation tool permits the instrumentation actions to be implemented without modification of the target program code, and can be used to provide any desired type of instrumentation on any target program. In an illustrative embodiment, the instrumentation tool includes a frontend portion which provides a creation graphical user interface (GUI) to the tool, and a backend portion which controls execution of the target program and executes the user-specified actions. The frontend portion also includes, for a given target program, a created GUI which is created by a user for providing selected instrumentation functions for the given target program.