Lucent Technologies Inc.

Avaya Technology LLC

At+t Corp.

Avaya Inc.

Robert M Klein

Gordon Richards Brunson

Joann J Ordille

David Ray Burritt

Ravi Sethi

Elliott Evans

Hector Urroz

Michel J Worford

A switching system adjunct () monitors a call between a calling and a called party and reestablishes the call when one of the parties has been or is being dropped. The reestablishment may be effected to a same or a different phone number of the dropped party, and may be effected via the same or a different medium (e.g., wired or wireless). The call record of the original call is merged into the call record of the reestablished call, thus preserving the context of entities involved in the call that exists at the time that the party is dropped.

Dropped call continuation

A method and apparatus for interfacing a communications server for use with a circuit based telephony system with an Internet protocol telephony system are provided. The present invention enables service providers to service both tip-ring telephony type communications and Internet protocol telephony type communications using a single communications server. In addition, the present invention enables existing tip-ring telephony type communications servers to be modified to support Internet telephony communications.

Internet protocol standards-based multi-media messaging

An automated method and apparatus are provided for placing an intelligent telephone call using an Internet browser. The Internet web browser caller is presented with a web page particular to the called party, and the called party has provided to a personal receptionist server system a set of possible reach me numbers where the called party may be found at a particular time. One or more telephonic calls are then placed to attempt to reach the called party. If the system is successful in finding the called party, the text entered name of the caller via the web page is read and the server will ask the called party if a telephonic call is desired with the caller. If a conference with the caller is desired, the web page will be updated to display &ldquo;please answer your phone, I have your party on the line&rdquo; and the call back number will be rung to set-up the conference between the caller and called party. Alternatively, a telephonic call to the caller will be placed using Internet Protocol audio streaming technology. If the called party is not found or if the call is rejected, the web page will display something like &ldquo;your party was not reachable . . . &rdquo; and other alternate call answer options will be displayed (e.g., message drop, call redirection, information presentation).

Method and apparatus for placing an intelligent telephone call using an internet browser

A voice messaging system allowing the monitoring of telephone calls is provided. The system permits subscribers to monitor incoming calls handled by voice messaging systems, and to selectively listen to the message as it is recorded, ignore the message, or establish two-way audio communications with the caller. The system further provides these monitoring capabilities to the subscriber at any location having access to a computer network that is interconnected to the message server, for example the Internet. The present invention is particularly well-suited for use with telephones that are part of private branch exchanges, telephones subscribing to central voice messaging systems, and telephones whose lines are used for the transmission of computer data in addition to voice communications.

Message monitor application concept and implementation

An Internet/intranet-based arrangement for interaction between a messaging system and a message originator and delivery of the message originator's message to a mailbox of the messaging system uses TCP/IP communications applications such as HTTP, Telnet, FTP, or Chat as information-transfer and message delivery mechanisms, creating an Internet/intranet-based text, binary, video, and/or multimedia file message-delivery analogue to the call-answer message-creation capability of telephony-based messaging systems.

Internet/intranet user interface to a multimedia messaging system

A messaging system (100) is interfaced with a translation facility (101) so as to provide automated message translation for hearing-impaired and vision-impaired individuals. When a message is deposited (300) in a mailbox (112-113), a daemon process (117) checks (302-304) what translation service the mailbox owner is subscribed to, and then checks (306-312) whether any messages in the mailbox have a translatable component. The daemon process removes (316-318) any such message from the mailbox and sends (320-326) the translatable component to the translation facility with a request to perform the subscribed-to translation--such as voice-to-text or text/fax-to-voice. When the translated component is returned (440), the daemon process checks (442) whether the mailbox owner is subscribed to receive only the translated component or also the original untranslated component, and accordingly either appends (446) the translated component to the message or replaces (444-446) the untranslated component with the translated component in the message. The daemon process then marks (448) the message as translated and deposits (450) the marked message back in the recipient's mailbox for retrieval by the recipient.

Automated message-translation arrangement

Video and telephony messaging are integrated by a telephony multi-media messaging system (101) connected to a plurality of video workstations (103-104) by a LAN or WAN (100). The workstations are connected to ISDN telephone lines (153-154). The workstations answer video calls on the video lines and/or on the LAN or WAN that go unanswered by users, record video messages from the video calls, and send the video messages via the LAN or WAN to the messaging system for storage. They also retrieve stored video messages via the LAN or WAN from the messaging system and play them to users. The messaging system stores both video and non-video messages and has a telephony user interface (114-115 and 118) for storing and retrieving non-video messages and for accessing non-video portions of all messages. The video terminals perform functions, such as answering of video calls and recording of video messages, on behalf of the telephony messaging system which cannot itself perform those functions, while the messaging system performs functions, such as providing a rich set of messaging features and providing telephony access from a variety of different telephony terminals to at least portions of the video messages, on behalf of the video terminals which cannot themselves perform those functions.

Video messaging arrangement

A program-implemented arrangement (26) executing on a computer (22) facilitates use of a voice messaging system (VMS 12) by other application programs (25) by interacting with the application program interface (API) of the VMS on behalf of the application programs. In response to an application program writing a message identifier and a destination identifier to a pipe (37), a daemon process (34) of the arrangement retrieves the identified message from its database (33) and causes the VMS to deliver it to the identified destination. Messages to populate the database are generated via the conventional VMS message-creation facility and are brought into the database by a message-retrieval process (32) of the arrangement.

Arrangement for automated delivery of voice-mail messages for software

Voice, facsimile, and electronic mail messaging is integrated in a system (FIG. 1 ) that converts e-mail messages into voice-and-fax messages. An e-mail message (400) is parsed into voiceable, prose, segments (403) and non-voiceable, non-prose, segments (404). Prose segments are converted into voice message segments (503) via text-to-speech facilities. Each non-prose segment is converted into a fax segment (504). Voice pointers (505) to fax segments are inserted into the voice message, in places corresponding to the non-prose segments in the e-mail message. The voice file (500) and fax file (510) are then stored for subsequent delivery of the message as an integrated voice-and-fax message. Conversion of integrated voice-and-fax messages into e-mail messages is likewise envisioned.

Multi-media integrated message arrangement

An arrangement (FIG. 4 ) that automatically generates and manages a subscriber's personal greeting for a voice message system (1000), based upon information contained in the subscriber's electronic schedule database (1007), such as a calendar manager program's database, stored in a computer (1002). The arrangement, implemented as a process on the computer, periodically converts information for the present time that is stored in the schedule database into a voicable greeting, using text-to-speech conversion facilities, and sends the greeting to the voice message system for conventional use.

Growing community of inventors

Denver, CO, United States of America

Robert M Klein