System for Managing an Audio Conference

1. Field of the Invention

This invention generally relates to audio telephone conferences, and more particularly to managing an audio conference in which some participants have both an audio connection and a computer interface that displays information about the conference call.

2. Description of the Related Art

Audio conferences are often used as an effective and easy way of communicating in a business meeting. However, there are many things that may be communicated by visual cues during a face-to-face meeting that must be communicated with an audio indicator during an audio conference. The lack of visual communication and the need for extra audio indicators seriously impacts the productivity of an audio conference.

Typically, at the beginning of an audio conference, all of the participants are connected at the same time. If another person then later joins the meeting there must be some audio indication that someone else has joined to allow the others to know who is in the meeting. The person that has joined the meeting may ask "who else is here" in order to determine to whom they are speaking. One existing audio conference system, sounds a tone when someone enters or leaves a conference, prompting the other participants to ask "Who left?" or "Who entered?" In addition, if a participant decides to leave the conference or reenter the conference, there must be an audio indication of this.

During the conference there may be a discussion concerning documents or graphical materials that all of the participants do not possess. It may be desirable to share these documents with all participants. Often this material is either pre-sent to the participants or sent after the meeting, but is not typically received during the meeting.

A further problem in audio conferences is the need to balance the voice levels of the participants. For example, some participants may have phones that produce a higher volume, while others may use speaker phones that produces a great deal of background noise, and it would be desirable to be able to change signal volumes of individual participants.

Systems and methods consistent with the present invention include steps and structure for setting up an audio conference by sending a message via an audio system and via a computer system to potential conference participants regarding an audio conference. The potential conference participants then return an indication of whether they desire to be audio conference participants and computer conference participants. If so, the audio conference system will send each computer participant display data with information about the audio conference including who is participating in the conference.

Additional display data may be passed by participants to each of the other participants in the audio conference on their computer system. The audio conference system can also maintain a status of the audio conference by adding display data to reflect that another participant has entered the audio conference or by indicating that a participant has a disconnected telephone.

The accompanying drawings, which are incorporated in and constitute a part of this specification, illustrate embodiments of the invention and, together with the description, serve to explain the advantages and principals of the invention. In the drawings:

FIG. 1 is an overall system diagram of an embodiment of the present invention;

FIG. 2 is a flow chart, showing the steps for setting up and carrying out a conference call according to the present invention;

FIG. 3 is a flow chart showing the steps an individual participant takes to set up and maintain an audio conference according to the present invention;

FIG. 4 is an exemplary screen for listing potential participants and selecting participants;

FIG. 5 is an exemplary screen utilized by a participant to create a new audio conference or to view information about an audio conference;

FIG. 6 is an example of a screen displayed during an audio conference according to the present invention;

FIG. 7 is an example of a conference control panel according to the present invention; and

FIG. 8 is a flow chart showing additional processing steps performed by a voice processing and web server.

Reference will now be made in detail to the construction and operation of preferred implementations consistent with the present invention that are illustrated in the accompanying drawings. The following description of the present invention is only exemplary. The present invention is not limited to these implementations, but may be realized by other implementations.

FIG. 1 illustrates one implementation consistent with the present invention. FIG. 1 shows a plurality of individual user sites 110.sub.1 -110.sub.n and a group site 120 with a plurality of additional user sites, 122.sub.1 -122.sub.3. As shown in block 115, each participant site 110.sub.1 -110.sub.n includes a connection interface 116 through which its telephone 119 and its computer system 117 communicate with a public switched telephone network (PSTN) 130 in a conventional manner. The connection interface 116 is preferably a read always connection such as an ISDN allowing outside communication to be received at any time. PSTN 130 in turn communicates with a local communication site 140. The conference controller 140 includes a voice processing server 144, web server 146, and an interface 148. The interface 148, such as an Ethernet interface, allows communication between the web server 146 and a local area network/distributed network (LAN/Intranet) system 150 which communicates with outside computer terminals such as terminals 122.sub.1 -122.sub.3.

Private branch exchange (PBX) 142 is a conventional device used to oversee telephone communications at a specific site. PBX 142 acts as an interface between the PSTN 130 and the group of users 124.sub.1 -124.sub.3 to receive telephone communications from PSTN 130. The voice processing server 144 processes received telephone communications and in turn communicates with the PSTN 130 via known standards, such as an Services Digital Network Primary Rate Interface (ISDN PRI).

FIG. 2 is a flow chart of the steps for organizing a conference call. Voice processing server 144 and web server 146 include processors for performing the procedure shown in FIG. 2. The voice processing server 144 directs PSTN 130 to call potential participants to the audio conference at a set conference time (step 200). After PSTN 130 calls the individuals, it returns an indication to the voice processing server 144 indicating whether the calls were answered and accepted (step 210). For example, a message may state "press 1 to participate in telephone conference, press 2 or hang up to decline."

Voice processing server 144 directs the web server 146 to invite potential conference participants to participate in the computer portion of the conference. Web server 146 sends invitations to the web portion of the conference at the same time that the voice processing server 144 sends audio invitations to the participants telephones. The time for sending the invitations is the designated conference time previously sent by the person organizing the conference. Web server 146 communicates through interface 148 and LAN/Intranet 150 to individual computer sites 122.sub.1 -122.sub.3 and through PSTN 130 to individual computer sites 117, and sends an invitation to potential participants at the designated conference time inviting the users to participate in the computer portion of the audio conference (step 220). The participants respond with a computer message indicating whether they wish to participate in the computer portion of the conference (step 230).

Voice processing server 144 sends a display indicator to participants indicating that a specific participant has answered the telephone and is participating in the telephone conference and/or in the computer portion of the conference (step 240). This display indicator would be passed through the telephone system to reach the computer system participants 110, and through the LAN/Intranet 150 to reach the computer system participants within group site 120.

FIG. 3 is a flowchart showing the steps performed by a participant in setting up and entering into an audio conference. To set up a conference, a participant sends information to the web server 146 through a computer to either LAN/Intranet 150 or PSTN 130. The participant may alternatively set up the conference through an operator who in turn sends the necessary information to the communication site 140. To set up a conference, basic conference information such as participants' names, numbers, and computer addresses must be entered or selected from a database (step 300). For convenience, a participant can maintain a database that includes a listing of potential conference participants, their phone numbers and computer addresses.

FIG. 4 illustrates an exemplary screen utilized by a participant to select potential audio conference participants from a master participant list 410. FIG. 5 illustrates a conference request display that includes fields such as title 510, time 520, invited participants 530, agenda 540, and attached conference materials 550. After providing information about the conference, the request is sent over the LAN/Intranet 150 to web server 146 and voice processing server 144 (step 310).

After the conference is set up, and at the scheduled time of the audio conference, each invited participant will receive an audio telephone message inviting them to participate in the audio conference (step 320). An invitation to participate is also received at each participant's computer at the predetermined conference time (step 330).

FIG. 6 shows an exemplary computer screen displaying conference invitation including the title of the conference 610, time of the conference 620, and names of the invited participants 630. The invited participants may select to join the conference or decline to join the conference. The responses to this message are returned to the web server 146 via either the PSTN 130, or the LAN/Intranet 150. Users respond to both invitations, e.g., by sending a computer response or by answering the telephone (step 340).

FIG. 7 illustrates an exemplary conference control panel display that each participant can view. The conference control panel display allows the users to input commands that are relayed to the web server 146. This includes information such as the title of the conference 710, the conference time 720, and the participants' names and whether they are participating in the audio and/or computer portion of the conference 730. A control panel includes controls allowing a participant to change the volume of any one of the other participants or mute one of the other participants. Preferably, only a single conference participant may mute another participant from being heard by anyone. A conference agenda is shown in field 740. A list of document-type material that has been sent over the LAN/Intranet 150 to the participants is shown in field 750.

Participants may exchange additional documents over the computer network during a conference. FIG. 8 shows additional processing steps performed by the voice processing server 144 and web server 146. Web server 146 receives new document or display data (step 800) and propagates the received data to each of the participants in the computer portion of the conference (step 810).

During a conference, a participant may desire to exit or invite another participant to enter the conference. FIG. 7 shows buttons allowing participants to indicate they are leaving 760 the conference or requesting the system to add another participant 770. When web processing server 146 receives a request to exit (step 820), the web processing server 146 and instructs the voice processing server 144 to disconnect the exiting participant and send an indication to each of the participants that the participant has exited the web portion of the conference (step 825). When the web processing server 146 receives a request from a participant to add another participant (step 830), server 146 and voice processing server 144 both invite the new participant in the same manner that the original participants were invited (step 825). Display data is sent to the participants indicating whether the newly invited participant answered the telephone invitation and whether the participant accepted the computer conference invitation (step 840).

When a participant hangs up, PSTN 130 sends an industry standard "on hook" indication to the voice processing server 144 (step 850). The voice processing server 144 then instructs web processing server 146 to send a display indicator to each participant updating the status of participants (step 840). The conference continues until time is up for the conference or all participants disconnect (step 860).

Systems and methods consistent with the present invention allow an audio telephone conference to be set up automatically and to include a computer connection between parties wishing to share information and view information about the audio conference. The systems and methods also allow participants to view who is participating in the conference and whether they are still connected to the conference. They also allow participants to share documents, charts, and agenda information.

Persons of ordinary skill in the art will recognize that various modifications and variations can be made in the systems and methods consistent with the present invention without departing from the scope or spirit of the invention. Other embodiments will be apparent to those skilled in the art from consideration of the specification and practice of the invention. The specification and examples are only exemplary. The true scope and spirit of the invention is indicated by the following claims.