Microsoft Technology Licensing, LLC

Ankur Khator

Benjamin J Smith

David J Lee

Richard D Prologo

Joshua Debner

Chunkit Jacky Chan

Puneet Agrawal

Vijay Krishnan

Sree Hari Nagaralu

Jenny Linnéa Maria Ahlbäck

Jasmina S Mathieu

Embodiments relate to leveraging automated image understanding to foster user engagement with an image. An image viewer application is provided with image analysis algorithms that determine features of an image by identifying objects in the image, recognizing faces in the image, etc. Hotspots may be added to the display of the image at locations of the features. Contextual metadata such as data about a user, user activity, other images, etc. can be used to determine which features will be provided with hotspots and what information will be associated with the hotspots. In one embodiment, the information associated with a hotspot is another image, and interactive selection of the hotspot causes the image to be both displayed and processed for hotspot augmentation. Tools may be provided to modify or edit the image based on the features found via the image analysis.

Using image understanding to assist user engagement

Systems and methods for selecting representative photos for a photo album are described. An example computing device may include a display, a logic device, and a storage device storing instructions executable by the logic device to, for each known individual recognized in one or more photos of the album, determine an affinity score for that known individual indicating a connection of that known individual to a) a user of the computing device and b) a context corresponding to the album. The instructions may be further executable to select one or more known individuals based on the affinity score to be included in a subset of the known individuals recognized in one or more photos of the album, and select a representative photo of each of the subset of the known individuals to be included in one or more of a highlight photoset and a cover photo for the album.

Visual representations of photo albums

Methods, computer systems, and computer-readable storage media for utilizing breadcrumb information associated with a Web page to improve a user's search experience on a search engine page and to improve ranking of search results are provided. Breadcrumb information is identified for a plurality of Web pages and is used to create an entity data structure. The entity data structure is used to determine related search items, deep links, and query suggestions on a search engine page. Further, contextual relationships between different breadcrumb elements that are part of a breadcrumb trail associated with a Web page are identified and used to adjust a ranking order of the Web page on a search engine results page.

Application of breadcrumbs in ranking and search experiences

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Sammamish, WA, United States of America

Ankur Khator