Microsoft Technology Licensing, LLC

Yahoo! Inc.

Excalibur Ip, LLC

Sharad Goel

Duncan James Watts

Daniel Gray Goldstein

Rajiv Poonamalli

James George Cavalaris

Adam Joseph Lenart

Jordan Rian Cohen

Ullattil Shaji

John C Langford

Jake M Hofman

Robert Warren Gruen

Michael Howard Hill

Mark Henriksen Phaedrus

Paul Y Sim

Luis Carrasco

Ulattil Shaji

Faisal Ansari

Alexander L Strehl

Sham Kakade

Methil Harysh Menon

Darya Valchonak Kishylau

Jordan Cohen

Disclosed in some examples, are methods, systems, GUIs, and machine-readable mediums for providing an improved command bar interface that assists a user in entering commands by implementing a scope operator to specify a command scope and also visual controls for entering parameters of commands. The command bar may have a default global scope that may be modified by users by entering a scope operator and a scope identifier. The command bar may render a set of parameter segments to assist users in entering parameters for the commands.

Command bar user interface

A tracking system is provided comprising a non-transitory computer readable storage medium having stored therein data representing instructions executable by a programmed processor for monitoring a database. The storage medium comprises instructions for receiving a current shortened content address from a requesting user, the current shortened content address including a shortened content address base and an appended link identifier, and instructions for determining a content address associated with the current shortened content address. The storage medium further comprises instructions for storing the shortened content address base and the appended link identifier in a database and instructions for determining if the tracking system has previously received a request for a shortened content address associated with the content address from the requesting user. The storage medium also comprises instructions for generating a new link identifier when the system has not previously received a request for a shortened content address associated with the content address from the requesting user and instructions for recording a chain of relationships of appended link identifiers with any new link identifiers in the database.

System for tracking diffusion

Various techniques of content virality determination and visualization are disclosed herein. For example, a method of determining network content virality metric includes constructing a diffusion cascade for a computer network content based on a plurality of time points at which individual users adopt the network content and connection information of the users. The method also includes calculating, with a processor, a virality metric of the network content based on a structural characteristic of the constructed diffusion cascade. Based on the calculated virality metric, one may determine if the network content is viral.

Content virality determination and visualization

Techniques for computing device update configuration are described. In implementations, an update service is employed to manage update groups for various types and/or classifications of computing devices. An update group can specify particular update statuses for functionalities of a computing device, such as device driver updates, software updates, firmware updates, and so forth. In at least some implementations, a computing device can be assigned to an update group based on attributes of the computing device, such as an identifier of a manufacturer for the computing device, a make identifier for the computing device, a model identifier, and so forth. Update information associated with the update group can be synchronized with the computing device.

Computing device update control

A tracking system comprising a non-transitory computer readable storage medium having stored therein data representing instructions executable by a programmed processor for monitoring a database is provided. The storage medium includes instructions for storing a plurality of link identifiers in a database, each link identifier associated with a content address identifier and instructions for receiving a current shortened content address with an appended link identifier from a requesting user. The storage medium further includes instructions for determining a requested content address identifier associated with the current shortened content address and instructions for determining if the tracking system has previously received any previous shortened content address associated with the requested content address identifier from the requesting user. The storage medium also includes instructions for creating a new link identifier for the requesting user only when the tracking system has not previously received any previous shortened content address associated with the requested content address identifier from the requesting user.

A tracking system comprising a non-transitory computer readable storage medium having stored therein data representing instructions executable by a programmed processor is provided. The storage medium of the tracking system includes instructions for receiving a request for content from a device using a first shortened content address, the first shortened content address including a shortened content address base and a first link identifier. The storage medium further includes instructions for determining a content address identifier associated with the first shortened content address and instructions for searching the device for a cookie associated with the content address identifier, the cookie including a cookie link identifier. The storage medium also includes instructions for providing the content to the device using the first shortened content address when the cookie is found on the device and the cookie link identifier is the first link identifier and instructions for providing the content to the device using a second shortened content address when the cookie is found on the device and the cookie link identifier is not the first link identifier, the second shortened content address including the shortened content address base and the cookie link identifier. The storage medium further includes instructions for generating a new link identifier when the cookie is not found on the device and instructions for providing the content to the device using a third shortened content address when the cookie is not found on the device, the third shortened content address including the shortened content address base and the new link identifier.

A computer-implemented method tracks diffusion. The method includes receiving a tracking request from an initiating user to track diffusion of content located at a content address. A computer tracking system generates a first shortened content address for the content address, from which the content is provided to the initiating user. The method includes receiving content requests from one or more requesting users, and generating, for each requesting user, a unique subsequent shortened content address for the content address. Content is provided to each requesting user using the subsequent shortened content address generated for each requesting user respectively. Each content request from the requesting users is made using either the first shortened content address or one of the subsequent shortened content addresses.

A computer-implemented method for managing device drivers includes requesting a device driver update set for a plurality of devices connectable to a computing device. The method also includes receiving the device driver update set, installing each driver of the device driver update set on the computing device. At least one updated driver in the update set is an updated driver for a device that is disconnected from the computing device at the time of the request. The method further includes configuring the at least one updated driver for the non-connected to activate when the device is detected by the computing device.

Driver installation for targeted and non-present devices

A system and method for personalized search ranking may use a user's feedback to immediately reorder search results for this particular user so as to improve click-through rate. Upon receiving a query including one or more words, a search engine may identify a list of search results and display the search results on a search result page. A machine-learning module may collect information about a user's browsing activities on the result page, update estimates of relevance of the search results, and reorder the search result list to personalize it for the user.

Growing community of inventors

New York, NY, United States of America

Sharad Goel