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System and method for pushing calendar event messages from a

1. 15 20 25 30 35 40 45 50 55 60 65 10 message for redirection the software 12 then sends the message to a secondary memory store located in the mobile device 24 using whatever means are necessary In the preferred embodiment this method is to send the mes sage back over the LAN 14 WAN 18 and through the wireless gateway 20 to the mobile data communication device 24 In doing so the redirector preferably repackages message A as an E mail with an outer envelope B that contains the addressing information of the mobile device 24 although alternative repackaging techniques and protocols could be used such as a TCP IP repackaging and delivery method most commonly used in the alternative server configuration shown in FIG 2 The wireless gateway 20 requires this outer envelope information B in order to know where to send the redirected message A Once the message A in B is received by the mobile device 24 the outer envelope B is removed and the original message A is placed in the secondary memory store within the mobile device 24 By repackaging and removing the outer envelope in this manner the present invention causes the mobile computer 24 to appear to be at the same physical location as the host system 10 thus creating a transparent system In the case where message C is representative of an external message from a computer on the Internet 18 to the host system 10 and the host 10 has been configu
2. E RUE A 15 1600 n S Newsletter Battery Friendly Bulletin vol 1 Issue 3 pp 6 014 429 A 1 2000 LaPorta et al 1 7 and unnumbered page 1999 6 016 478 A 1 2000 Zhang et al 705 9 Article Comerford Handhelds Duke It Out for the Inter 6 023 700 A 2 2000 Owens et al net Wireless Internet pp 35 38 and 41 Aug 2000 dpud d ranman Press Detail Extended Systems and Motorola Bring Shor 6 058 431 A 5 2000 Srisuresh et al t Range Wireless to the Paging E volution Jan 13 2000 6 078921 A 6 2000 Kelley 70710 Q pgs 6 085 232 A 7 2000 Kikinis Press Detail 3Com Corporation Licenses Bluetooth Tech 6 091 951 A 7 2000 Sturniolo et al nology from Extended Systems Feb 22 2000 2 pgs 20000 ewe gt Se Web site Article Hawaleshka The Web in Your Pocket 6 101 531 A 8 2000 Eggleston et al Maclean s May 15 2000 3 pgs 6 115 394 A 9 2000 Balachandran et al Claxton Messaging API s for Voice Networks Telecom 6 115 736 A 9 2000 Devarakonda et al munications pp 116 120 1998 6 125 281 A 9 2000 Wells et al 455 466 Egevang K et al The IP Network Address Translator 6 130 892 A 10 2000 Short et al Net k Workine G 1 10 Mav 1994 6 134 432 A 10 2000 Holmes et al 455 412 2 May 6 138 089 A 3 10 2000 Guberman 704 207 Manual Server and BBS Software for the Packet Radio by 6 141 690 A 10 2000 W
3. Calendar Components 144 and NULL terminator 146 The specific formats of each part of the CICAL structure will be further described below Version Number 142 The version number is preferably a single byte The version number for all CICAL messages conforming to this US 6 463 463 B1 17 specification is the hex value Ox10 Note however that another version number could be utilized Length Structure 144 The Calendar Components 144 segment in the CICAL data structure includes a length structure The length struc ture contains the length of the data that follows The structure contains a variable number of bytes The most significant bit of each byte is used as a structural indicator if the most significant bit is set then the following byte is also part of the length structure If the most significant bit is clear then the current byte is the last byte of the length structure In particular a k byte length structure appears as a sequence of k 1 bytes each with the most significant bit MSB set followed by a single byte with the MSB cleared The value of the length structure is obtained from the least significant 7 bits of each byte concatenated in big endian format for example 0x85 0x99 0x23 is equivalent to the binary value 000 0101 001 1001 010 0011 or in decimal notation 85155 Notice that it is explicitly intended that a length structure may contain a number of 0x80 bytes as leading bytes While such bytes do not co
4. The method of claim 11 wherein the wireless mobile device is a two way pager a wireless personal digital assistant or a cellular telephone with data messaging capa bilities 13 The method of claim 11 further comprising the step of storing the meeting request message at an electronic mailbox coupled to the host system 14 The method of claim 11 further comprising the steps of prior to generating the file attachment compressing the meeting request message 15 The method of claim 14 wherein the compressing step further comprises the step of transforming the meeting request message from a first format in which information regarding the meeting request is formatted using a plurality of verbose text strings into a second format in which the plurality of verbose text strings are replaced with a plurality of numerical values 10 15 20 24 16 The method of claim 11 further comprising the steps of generating a meeting reply message at the wireless mobile device in response to a received meeting request mes sage providing a file attachment including the meeting reply message generating an e mail message at the wireless mobile device wherein the file attachment is attached to the e mail message and transmitting the e mail message with the file attachment from the wireless mobile device to the host system 17 The method of claim 16 further comprising the steps of the host system determining that the file a
5. 192 194 STANDARD EMAIL HANDL ING IS ATTACHMENT CONTENT TYPE CALENDAR DATA 196 OPEN ATTACHMENT AND PROCESS CALENDAR DATA 198 CREATE MEETING ITEM IN USER S HOST CALENDAR e00 SEND MEETING REQUEST TO ATTENDEES THROUGH HOST SYSTEM Fig 9 U S Patent Oct 8 2002 Sheet 9 of 10 US 6 463 463 B1 May 17 Messages mM v Wed Moy 17 2000 11 38 zzAlbert test 3 2 e 11 30 zzALbert Accepted Tes 11 28 reqAddr Test 7 11 20 Dan McCar Re Hello 11 20 Melinda He Re How are y 11 08 Melinda He Re How are y 10 28 Dan McCar Re Hello 10 07 Tim Tyhur Re not going 08 51 Wen Gao Donuts in 08 49 Don Hello Fi 10 08 48 Akos Horv Timbits g 03 17 Wordsmith A Word A Day 00 10 alerte OPEC Venezue Tue May 16 2000 21 41 Selma Enns re comouter 17 47 Phil Ren Recurring Mult 16 38 Tommy Reception area From zzAlbert Hecht Enns lt Email A Subject test 9 1 Attachment s When Wednesday May 17 2000 4 30 PM 5 09 PM lt GMT 05 00 gt Eastern Time lt US amp Canada gt 3le jw calendar 247 Fig I der tet tet lent tet leur deg tee d U S Patent Oct 8 2002 Sheet 10 of 10 US 6 463 463 B1 Meeting Request Wed May 17 2000 e S 7 00 39 Reminder 1S minutes Organizer zzAlbert Hecht Enns Invited Albert Hecht Enns Notes When Wednesday May 17 2000 4 30 P
6. 463 463 B1 120 HOST INBOX 120A MEETING 7 REQUEST EMAIL WITH CICAL ATTACHMENT 1208 COMMAND BYTE CICAL PARAMETER HEX VALUEx10 CALENDAR COMPONENTS CTYPEJ ECLENGTH J 0ATA U S Patent Oct 8 2002 Sheet 7 of 10 US 6 463 463 B1 REDIRECTOR DETECTS NEW MESSAGE 55 154 156 i M MA MESSAGE Tipe STANDARD REDIRECTION MEETING REQUEST 158 CREATE CICAL FILE ATTACHMENT BASED ON MEETING DETAILS ADD ATTACHMENT TO EMAIL SENT TO DEVICE CONTENT TYPE SET TO CALENDAR DATA FOR ATTACHMENT Fig 8 USER OPENS MEETING REQUEST AT OEVICE Ibe CALENDAR CONTENT TYPE OF ATTACHMENT 164 TRIGGERS CALENDAR APPLICATION CALENDAR APPLICATION DISPLAYS 166 MEETING REQUEST DETAILS FOR USER 170 168 ACCEPT STORE MEETING DETAILS FROM ATTACHMENT IN CALENDAR DATABASE PROMPT TO ACCEPT DECL INE DISCARD MEETING DETAILS DEVICE RESPONDS BY SENDING CICAL ATTACHMENT 176 REDIRECTOR INENTIFIES MEETING REQUEST BASED ON Ai TACHMENT CONTENT TYPE 178 180 PROCESSES ATTACHMENT DATA UPOATING CALENDAR STATUS AND CREATES PZ MOST OUTBOX S RESPONSE TO ORGANIZER U S Patent Oct 8 2002 Sheet 8 of 10 US 6 463 463 B1 182 USER CREATES MEETING IN DEVICE CALENDAR 184 MEETING DETAILS ENCODES AS A CICAL FILE 186 CICAL FILE ATTACHMENT ADDED TO MAIL MESSAGE TO MEETING ATTENDEES 188 DEVICE SENDS EMAIL WITH ATTACHMENT TO REDIRECTOR SOFTWARE 190 REDIRECTOR RECEIVES MESSAGE AND DETECTS ATTACHMENT
7. 82 the mobile device waits for messages and signals 84 to be generated or received Assuming that the redirector software 12 operating at the user s desktop system 10 is configured to redirect upon receiving a message from the user s mobile device 24 at step 86 the user can decide to generate a command message that will start redirection If the user does so then at step 88 the redirection message is composed and sent to the desktop system 10 via the wireless network 22 through the wireless gateway 20 via the Inter net 18 to the LAN 14 and is finally routed to the desktop machine 10 In this situation where the mobile device 24 is sending a message directly to the desktop system 10 no outer wrapper is added to the message such as message C in FIGS 1 and 2 In addition to the redirection signal the mobile device 24 could transmit any number of other commands to control the operation of the host system and in particular the redirector program 12 For example the mobile 24 could transmit a command to put the host system into the preferred list mode and then could transmit addi tional commands to add or subtract certain senders from the preferred list In this manner the mobile device 24 can dynamically limit the amount of information being redi rected to it by minimizing the number of senders on the preferred list Other example commands include 1 a message to change the configuration of the host system to enable the mobile device
8. includes a content type indicator that indicates that the file attachment includes the meeting reply message information and transmitting the e mail message from the wireless mobile device to the messaging server via the wireless net work 6 The method of claim 5 further comprising the steps of receiving the e mail message at the messaging server and detecting the content type indicator in the e mail mes sage and in response to detecting that the content type indicator indicates that the file attachment includes the meeting reply message information updating a calendar appli cation data store at the messaging server associated with the user of the wireless mobile device 7 The method of claim 6 further comprising the steps of storing the meeting reply message information at the e mail account and Un 10 m 5 20 25 30 35 40 45 55 65 22 transmitting the meeting reply message from the messag ing server to the desktop system where the electronic meeting request message was generated 8 The method of claim 5 further comprising the steps of prior to providing the file attachment transforming the electronic meeting reply message from a first format in which information regarding the meeting reply is for matted using a plurality of verbose text strings into a second format in which the plurality of verbose text strings are replaced with a plurality of numerical values in order to com
9. mobile device appears similar to information on the user s host system The pre ferred repackaging method includes wrapping the user data items in an E mail envelope that corresponds to the address of the mobile data communication device although alternatively other repackaging methods could be used with the present invention such as special purpose TCP IP wrap ping techniques or other methods of wrapping the user selected data items The repackaging preferably results in E mail messages generated by the user from the mobile device to be transmitted from the host system thus enabling the user to appear to have a single E mail address such that the recipients of messages sent from the mobile communi cations device do not know where the user was physically located when the message was first sent The repackaging also permits both messages to the mobile device and sent from the mobile device to be encrypted and decrypted as well as compressed and decompressed In an alternative system and method the redirector pro gram executes on a network server and the server is programmed to detect numerous redirection event triggers over the network from multiple user desktop computers coupled to the server via a LAN The server can receive internal event triggers from each of the user desktops via the network and can also receive external event triggers such as messages from the users mobile data communication devices In response to receiving
10. system to the user s mobile data communication device where the redi rector software is operating at the user s desktop PC FIG 2 is a system diagram showing the redirection of user data items from a network server host system to the user s mobile data communication device where the redirector software is operating at the server FIG 3 is a block diagram showing the interaction of the redirector software with other components of the host sys tem in FIG 1 the user s desktop PC to enable the pushing of information from the host system to the user s mobile data communication device FIG 4 is a flow chart showing the steps carried out by the redirector software operating at the host system FIG 5 is a flow chart showing the steps carried out by the mobile data communication device to interface with the redirector software operating at the host system FIG 6 is a diagram of a preferred system for sending and receiving calendar event messages such as meeting requests to and from a portable data communication device via a wireless data network FIG 7 is a schematic of a preferred data structure for a calendar event message according to an embodiment of the present invention in which meeting requests are sent from and received by a portable data communication device FIG 8 is a flow chart showing the preferred method of receiving a meeting request at a portable data communica tion device sent from a host system FIG 9 is a flo
11. via a wireless network and one or more landline networks Due to the bandwidth limitations of wireless networks only a portion of a user selected data item is generally redirected to the user s mobile device with the user given the option of then retrieving the entire data item or some other portion of the data item from the host system Instead of warehousing or storing the user s data items at the host system and then synchronizing the mobile data communication device to data items stored at the host system when the mobile device requests that such items of information be communicated to it the present invention employs a push paradigm that continuously packages and retransmits the user selected items of information to the mobile data communication device in response to a trigger ing event detected at the host system Wireless mobile data communications devices especially those that can return a confirmation signal to the host that the pushed data has been received are especially well suited for this type of push paradigm 2 Description of the Related Art Present systems and methods for replicating information from a host system to a user s mobile data communication device are typically synchronization systems in which the user s data items are warehoused or stored at the host system for an indefinite period of time and then transmitted in bulk only in response to a user request In these types of systems and methods
12. when replication of the warehoused data items to the mobile device is desired the user typically places the mobile device in an interface cradle that is electrically connected to the host system via some form of local dedicated communication such as a serial cable or an infrared or other type of wireless link Software executing on the mobile data communication device then transmits com mands via the local communications link to the host system to cause the host to begin transmitting the user s data items for storage in a memory bank of the mobile device In these synchronization schemes the mobile unit pulls the ware housed information from the host system in a batch each time the user desires to replicate information between the two devices Therefore the two systems host and mobile 10 15 20 25 35 40 45 50 55 60 65 2 only maintain the same data items after a user initiated command sequence that causes the mobile device to down load the data items from the host system A general problem with these synchronization systems is that the only time that the user data items are replicated between the host system and the mobile data communication device is when the user commands the mobile device to download or pull the user data from the host system Five minutes later a new message could be sent to the user but the user would not receive that message until the next time the user fetches the us
13. which utilizes text strings that are long and verbose the present invention provides a com pressed data structure referred to herein as CICAL that uses numerical tags to represent the text strings Because these numerical tags are much shorter in length then the long and verbose text strings in ICAL the calendar event mes sage can be effectively compressed which is particularly useful when transferring calendar event messages over wire less data networks Another aspect of the invention provides a system for sending and receiving meeting requests on a portable data communication device The system comprises a host sys tem coupled to a host calendar wherein the host calendar stores calendar data records a portable data communication device coupled to a device calendar wherein the device calendar stores calendar data records a network coupling the host system to the portable data communication device software operating at the host system for updating a calendar data record and for generating a meeting request that is transmitted to the device and software operating at the portable data communication device for accepting and gen erating meeting requests Another aspect of the invention provides a method for receiving meeting requests via a portable communication device The method includes the steps of i a meeting request arriving at the host ii the host sending the meeting request to a redirector application iii the
14. 24 to receive and process certain attachments and 2 a message to instruct the host system to US 6 463 463 B1 15 redirect an entire data item to the mobile device in the situation where only a portion of a particular data item has been redirected Turning back to FIG 5 if the user signal or message is not a direct message to the desktop system 10 to begin redirec tion or some other command then control is passed to step 90 which determines if a message has been received If a message is received by the mobile and it is a message from the user s desktop 10 as determined at step 92 then at step 94 a desktop redirection flag is set on for this message and control passes to step 96 where the outer envelope is removed Following step 96 or in the situation where the message is not from the user s desktop as determined at step 92 control passes to step 98 which displays the message for the user on the mobile device s display The mobile unit 24 then returns to step 82 and waits for additional messages or signals If the mobile device 24 determines that a message has not been received at step 90 then control passes to step 100 where the mobile determines whether there is a message to send If not then the mobile unit returns to step 82 and waits for additional messages or signals If there is at least one message to send then at step 102 the mobile determines whether it is a reply message to a message that was received by th
15. 3 463 B1 28 REDIRECTION SERVER SOFTWARE 30 dE c FAX OR VOICE MACHINE Je D WIRELESS GATEWAY 20 EK MPU gt 24 Fig 2 U S Patent Oct 8 2002 Sheet 3 of 10 US 6 463 463 B1 LOCAL AREA NETWORK LAN TCP IP E MAIL SUB SYSTEM PRIMARY STORE SUB SYSTEM ALTERNATE LINK MAIN LINK REDIRECTOR PROGRAM SETUP EVENTS SETUP EVENTS TRIGGER TRIGGER SCREEN SAVER KEYBOARD SUB SYSTEM SUB SYSTEM DESKTOP COMPUTER Fig 3 U S Patent Oct 8 2002 Sheet 4 of 10 US 6 463 463 B1 REDIRECTION SOF TWARE STARTED INSTALL TRIGGER POINTS IN SYSTEM 7 9 MESSAGE AND NA WAIT FOR SIGNALS MESSAGES AND Gd SIGNALS FORWARD TO USER ADD OUTER ENVELOPE 64 IS TRIGGER FIREO FLAG ON OTHER EVENTS TO BE REOS DIEN Fig 4 U S Patent Oct 8 2002 Sheet 5 of 10 US 6 463 463 B1 80 MOBILE SOFTWARE STARTED y amp MESSAGE AND SIGNALS WAIT FOR MESSAGES AND SIGNALS MESSAGE 70 USER RECEIVED DESKTOP REMOVE OUTER ENVELOPE SET DESKTOP REDIRECTION FLAG ON MESSAGE IS USER USING DESKTOP SOF TWARE SEND TO DEST INATION ADDRESS 108 PUT OUTER ENVELOPE ON MESSAGE AND ADDRESS TO DESKTOP IS DESKTOP REDIRECT ION FLAG ON Fig 9 U S Patent Oct 8 2002 Sheet 6 of 10 US 6
16. 5 18 RRULE MONTH 0x12 RRULE_DAYOFMONTH 0x13 RRULE_COUNT 0x14 RRULE_INTERVAL 0x15 RRULE_BYSETPOSITION 0x16 CICAL_EXDATE 0x17 CICAL_DESCRIPTION 0x18 CICAL_RECURRENCEID 0x19 CICAL_XREVISION 0x1A UNDEFINED 03FF Consider now the following example transformation from a standard format ICAL message according to RFC 2445 to a message formatting according to the CICAL format of the present invention Calendar message taken from RFC2445 BEGIN VCALENDAR METHOD PUBLISH BEGIN VEVENT SEQUENCE 0 UID 3735928559 ORGANIZER MAILTO jdoe host1 com ATTENDEE cn John Smith MAILTO Jsmith host1 com PARSTST ACCEPTED DTSTART 19970324T123000Z DTEND 19970324T210000Z SUMMARY Calendaring Interoperability Planning Meet ing DESCRIPTION Discuss how we can test c amp s interoperability n using iCalendar and other IETF standards LOCATION LDB Lobby END VEVENT END VCALENDAR In the following CICAL version of the above calendar message each byte code is represented by a word inside square brackets For example Summary would represent a one byte value assigned to represent the SUMMARY token Literal binary values are simply placed between the brackets For example 0 represents a NULL character A structure of the form n is a variable length structure defined elsewhere in this document representing a length of n bytes Any newlines and tabs in the transformed message are for the sake of readability only The transformed message woul
17. 79 A 12 2000 Dean et al 705 9 5 436 960 A 77 1995 Campana Jr et al 6 222 942 Bl 4 2001 Martin 382 232 5 438 611 A 8 1995 Campana Jr et al 6 240 088 B1 5 2001 Gayton et al 29454096 E Albert 6 249 820 B1 6 2001 Dobbins et al 5 479 472 A 12 1995 Campana Jr et al 6 256 666 B1 7 2001 Singhal 5 493 692 A 2 1996 Theimer et al 455 26 1 6272545 B1 8 2001 Flanagin 709 228 5 495 484 A 2 1996 Self et al 6 275 848 B1 8 2001 Arnold 5 559 800 A 9 1996 Mousseau et al 6 275 850 B1 8 2001 Beyda et al or MM 6 327 046 B1 12 2001 Miyamoto et al 358 1 15 5 579 472 A 11 1996 Keyworth II et al 6 332 156 B1 12 2001 Cho al 709 206 A T2 1996 Will 6 363 352 B1 3 2002 Dailey et al 705 9 5 598 536 A 1 1997 Slaughter III et al 6 370 566 B2 4 2002 Discolo et al 709 206 5 603 054 A 2 1997 Theimer et al 2001 0001552 A1 5 2001 Vong et 340 691 1 5 625 670 A 4 1997 Campana Jr et al 2001 0029531 Al 10 2001 Ohta 5 627 829 A 5 1997 Gleeson et al 2001 0040693 A1 11 2001 Saito et al 5 633 810 A 5 1997 Mandal et al 2001 0042093 A1 11 2001 Saito et al 5 641 946 A 61997 Campana Jr et al 2001 0054072 Al 12 2001 Saito et al 5 666 530 A 9 1997 Clark et al 2002 0010748 1 2002 Kobayashi et al 709 206 5 666 553 A 9 1997 Crozier 5 673 322 A 9 1997 Pe
18. L data from the attachment The Calendar application then displays the meeting data in step 166 The Device then prompts a user to accept or decline the meeting request in step 168 If the user accepts the meeting request then Device stores the meeting in a Calendar database at step 170 If the user declines the meeting request however then at step 172 the Device discards the meeting request At step 174 the Device sends a reply with the user s response in an e mail with a CICAL attachment of content type calendar At step 176 the redirector 12 detects the calendar content type of the meeting response At step 178 the redirector 12 processes the attachment data and either deletes or updates the calendar item corresponding to the meeting depending on the user response The redirector 12 also sends the response to the meeting organizer i e the system that generated the meeting request At step 180 the meeting response appears in the host outbox FIG 9 is a flow diagram that describes the method of sending a meeting request from the Device At step 182 a user creates a meeting request on the Device At step 184 the Device translates the meeting details into a CICAL attachment The attachment is added to an e mail message in 10 15 20 25 30 35 40 45 50 55 60 65 20 step 186 The Device then sends the e mail to the Redirector 12 at step 188 The Redirector 12 receives the message and dete
19. M 5 00 PM lt GMT 05 00 gt Eastern Time US amp Canada gt Fig 12 OE TEE no dc nde dne ok e denk Meeting Request Hide Menu Wed May 17 33e Reminder oe nvited Notes SCH When Wednesday May 17 2000 PM 5 00 lt GMT 05 00 gt Eastern Time lt US amp Canada gt tet tet tet tet leur tet i US 6 463 463 B1 1 SYSTEM AND METHOD FOR PUSHING CALENDAR EVENT MESSAGES FROM A HOST SYSTEM TO A MOBILE DATA COMMUNICATION DEVICE CROSS REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATION This application is a continuation in part of U S patent application Ser No 09 087 623 titled System and Method for Pushing Information from a Host System to a Mobile Data Communication Device filed on May 29 1998 now U S Pat No 6 219 694 BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1 Field of the Invention The present invention is directed toward the field of replicating information from a host system where the infor mation is normally stored to a mobile data communication device In particular the system and method of the present invention provide an event driven redirection computer pro gram redirector program operating at the host system which upon sensing a particular user defined event has occurred redirects user selected data items such as calendar event messages from the host system to the user s mobile data communication device The mobile data communica tion device is preferably coupled to the host system
20. US006463463B1 US 6 463 463 B1 Oct 8 2002 a United States Patent Godfrey et al 10 Patent No 45 Date of Patent 54 SYSTEM AND METHOD FOR PUSHING EP 0736989 10 1996 CALENDAR EVENT MESSAGES FROM A EP 0772327 5 1997 HOST SYSTEM TO A MOBILE DATA d GE ee COMMUNICATION DEVICE 8 1997 75 Inventors James Godfrey Hugh R Hind Gary r Mousseau Mihal Lazaridis all of List continued on next page Waterloo CA OTHER PUBLICATIONS 73 Assignee Research In Motion Limited Waterloo CA Mosher The Microsoft Exchange User s Handbook 1997 Duke Communications pp 412 423 Notice Subject to any disclaimer the term of this Dawson et al RFC 2445 Internet Calendaring and Sched patent is extended or adjusted under 35 uling Core Object Specification iCalendar from http U S C 154 b by 0 days www cis ohiostate edu cgi bin rfc rfc2445 html pp 1 130 Nov 1998 21 Appl No 09 649 755 List ti d t 1 22 Filed Aug 28 2000 Qumext page Related U S Application Data Primary Examiner Glenton B Burgess Assistant Examiner Bradley Edelman 63 Continuation in part of application No 09 087 623 filed on 74 Attorney Agent or Firm Jones Day Reavis amp May 29 1998 now Pat No 6 219 694 Pogue Krishna K Pathiyal Esq Charles B Meyer Esq 51 Intl GO06F 15 16 57 ABSTRACT 52 US EE 709 206 709 247 705 9 67 340 7 21 340 7 29 A system and method for pus
21. bile data communication device 24 and preferably uses industry standard mail protocols such as SMTP POP IMAP MIME and RFC 822 to name but a few The E Mail sub system 44 can receive messages A from external com puters on the LAN 14 or can receive messages C from some external network such as the Internet 18 or a wireless data communication network 22 and stores these messages in the primary data store 40 Assuming that the redirector 12 has been triggered to redirect messages of this type the redi rector detects the presence of any new messages and instructs the E Mail system 44 to repackage the message by placing an outer wrapper B about the original message A or C and by providing the addressing information of the mobile data communication device 24 on the outer wrapper B As noted above this outer wrapper B is removed by the mobile device 24 and the original message A or C is then recovered thus making the mobile device 24 appear to be the desktop system 10 In addition the E Mail sub system 44 receives messages back from the mobile device 24 having an outer wrapper with the addressing information of the desktop system 10 and strips this information away so that the message can be routed to the proper sender of the original message A or C The E Mail sub system also receives command messages C from the mobile device 24 that are directed to the desktop system 10 to trigger redirection or to carry out some other function Th
22. bsystem 46 In FIG 1 the host system 10 is the user s desktop system typically located in the user s office The host system 10 is connected to a LAN 14 which also connects to other computers 26 28 that may be in the user s office or else where The LAN 14 in turn is connected to a wide area network WAN 18 preferably the Internet which is defined by the use of the Transmission Control Protocol Internet Protocol TCP IP to exchange information but which alternatively could be any other type of WAN The connection of the LAN 14 to the WAN 18 is via high bandwidth link 16 typically a or T3 connection The WAN 18 in turn is connected to a variety of gateways 20 via connections 32 A gateway forms a connection or bridge between the WAN 18 and some other type of network such as an RF wireless network cellular network satellite network or other synchronous or asynchronous land line connection In the example of FIG 1 a wireless gateway 20 is connected to the Internet for communicating via wireless link 22 to a plurality of wireless mobile data communication devices to 24 Also shown in FIG 1 is machine 30 which could be a FAX machine a printer a system for displaying images such as video or a machine capable of processing and playing audio files such as a voice mail system The present invention includes the ability to redirect certain message attachments to such an external machine 30 if the redirector progra
23. ce can receive and process attachments is initially configured by the user of that mobile device at the host system This configuration can be altered on a global or per message basis by transmitting a command message from the mobile device to the host system If the redirector is configured so that the mobile data device cannot receive and process word processor or voice attachments then the redirector routes these attachments to an external machine that is compatible with the particular attachment such as an attached printer or networked fax machine or telephone Other types of attachments could be redirected to other types of external machines in a similar fashion depending upon the capabilities of the mobile device For example if a user is traveling and receives a message with an attachment that the user s mobile device can process or display the user may from a mobile communications device send a command message to the host system indicating that that attachment is to be sent to a fax machine at a hotel where the user will be spending the evening This enables the user to receive important E mail attachments as long as the host system is provided with sufficient information about the destination where the attachment is to be forwarded Once an event has triggered redirection of the user data items the host system then repackages these items in a manner that is transparent to the mobile data communication device so that information on the
24. cludes information contained within the electronic meeting request mes sage b generating an e mail message at the messaging server addressed using a wireless network address of the wireless mobile device wherein the file attach ment that includes the meeting request message information is attached to the e mail message and the e mail message includes a content type indicator that indicates that the file attachment includes the meeting request message information and US 6 463 463 B1 21 c transmitting the e mail message from the messaging server to the wireless mobile device via the wireless network receiving the e mail message at the wireless mobile device and detecting the content type indicator in the e mail message and in response to detecting that the content type indicator indicates that the file attachment includes the meeting request message information automatically executing a calendar application program on the wireless mobile device and displaying the information from the meeting request message contained in the file attachment 2 The method of claim 1 wherein the electronic meeting request message is structured according to a first format in which information regarding the meeting is formatted using a plurality of verbose text strings further comprising the step of prior to generating the file attachment at the messaging server transforming the electronic meeting request message from the first for
25. cts the attachment in step 190 The redirector checks the content type of the attachment in step 192 If the content type is calendar the attachment contains a meeting item and is processed in step 196 If the content type is anything else then standard e mail handling is performed in step 194 At step 198 the Redirector 12 creates a meeting item in the host calendar At step 200 the host 11 sends the meeting request to the meeting attendees FIG 10 is a drawing that depicts a proposed Device screen 300 when a meeting request is received The meeting request appears as a new message FIG 11 depicts a pro posed screen 310 for the Device when the message is opened The message indicates that there is a calendar attachment 312 FIG 12 is a drawing of the proposed Device screen 320 depicting the meeting request information The information can include the meeting start time the meeting end time the location of the meeting a reminder before the meeting starts the identity of the organizer the identity of other attendees and any additional notes pertaining to the meeting This screen 320 corresponding to a Calendar application operating on the Device may be invoked manu ally by the user when an attachment is selected from the screen 310 or it may be launched automatically when the e mail having the CICAL attachment is opened FIG 13 shows a proposed Device screen 330 including a pull down menu 332 that a user would employ to reply
26. d be formatted as 0x10 Command Byte Component Type 1 0x01 VEVENT Sequence 4 0x00 0x00 0x00 0x00 UID 4 OxDETOxADTOxBE OxEF Organizer tel 0x01 14 idoe host1 com Attendee Accepted 27 ismith host1 com 0 John Smith Start Date 4 Format defined below End Date 4 lt Format defined below Summary 45 Calendaring Interoperability Planning Meeting Description 87 Discuss how we can test c amp s interoperability n using iCalendar and other IETF stan dards US 6 463 463 B1 19 Location 9 Lobby 0 0 A cursory comparison of these two structures shows how much smaller the CICAL version of the message is in comparison to the ICAL version In addition to the CICAL data structure described above the present invention provides a series of command bytes that define a particular action These command bytes include at least the following types of calendar commands 1 meeting request from portable device 2 meeting request from server 3 meeting response from portable device 4 meeting response from server 5 meeting cancel from portable device and 6 meeting cancel from server Other and additional commands could also be included FIG 8 shows a way of using the CICAL structures to send calendar information such as meeting requests over the wireless network This figure is a flow diagram that describes the method for a portable data communication device De
27. d from the host system to the US 6 463 463 B1 3 mobile data communication device and that also provides flexibility in the configuration and types of events that can serve to trigger the redirection of the user data items There remains yet an additional need for such a system and method that can operate locally on a user s desktop PC or at a distance via a network server There remains still another need for such a system and method that provides for secure transparent delivery of the user selected data items from the host system to the mobile device SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION The present invention overcomes the problems noted above and satisfies the needs in this field for a system and method of pushing user selected data items from a host system to a user s mobile data communication device upon detecting the occurrence of one or more user defined event triggers As used in this application the term host system refers to the computer where the redirector software is operating In the preferred embodiment of the present invention the host system is a user s desktop PC although alternatively the host system could be a network server connected to the user s PC via a local area network CLAN 3 or could be any other system that is in communication with the user s desktop PC A redirector program operating at the host system enables the user to redirect or mirror certain user selected data items or parts of data items from the h
28. e device is capable of receiving and processing and the address of the mobile device Once the redirector program is configured 50 the trigger points or event triggers are enabled at step 52 The program 12 then waits 56 for messages and signals 54 to begin the redirection process message could be an E Mail message or some other user data item than may have been selected for redirection and a signal could be a trigger signal or could be some other type of signal that has not been configured as 10 15 20 25 30 35 40 45 50 55 60 65 14 an event trigger When a message or signal is detected the program determines 58 whether it is one of the trigger events that has been configured by the user to signal redirection If 5 then at step 60 a trigger flag is set indicating that subsequently received user data items in the form of messages that have been selected for redirection should be pushed to the user s mobile data communication device 24 If the message or signal 54 is not a trigger event the program then determines at steps 62 68 and 66 whether the message is respectively a system alarm 62 an E Mail message 64 or some other type of information that has been selected for redirection If the message or signal is none of these three items then control returns to step 56 where the redirector waits for additional messages 54 to act upon If however the message is one of these three types of in
29. e functionality of the E Mail sub system 44 is controlled by the redirector program 12 The TCP IP sub system 42 is an alternative repackaging system It includes all of the functionality of the E Mail sub system 44 but instead of repackaging the user selected data items as standard E mail messages this system repack ages the data items using special purpose TCP IP packaging techniques This type of special purpose sub system is use ful in situations where security and improved speed are important to the user The provision of a special purpose wrapper that can only be removed by special software on the mobile device 24 provides the added security and the bypassing of E mail store and forward systems can improve speed and real time delivery As described previously the present invention can be triggered to begin redirection upon detecting numerous external internal and networked events or trigger points Examples of external events include receiving a command message from the user s mobile data communication device US 6 463 463 B1 13 24 to begin redirection receiving a similar message from some external computer sensing that the user is no longer in the vicinity of the host system or any other event that is external to the host system Internal events could be a calendar alarm screen saver activation keyboard timeout programmable timer or any other user defined event that is internal to the host system Networked events ar
30. e invention could be beneficially used in a one and one half or acknowledg ment paging environment or even with a one way paging system The mobile data communication device 24 includes software program instructions that work in conjunction with the redirector program 12 to enable the seamless transparent redirection of user selected data items FIG 4 describes the basic method steps of the redirector program 12 and FIG 5 describes the steps of the corresponding program operating at the mobile device 24 In an alternative embodiment of the present invention not explicitly shown in the drawings the mobile device 24 also includes a redirector program In this embodiment user selected data items can be replicated from the host to the mobile device and vice versa The configuration and opera tion of the mobile device 24 having a redirector program is similar to that described herein with respect to FIGS 1 4 A user of the present invention can configure the redirec tor program 12 to push certain user selected data items to the users mobile data communication device 24 when the redirector 12 detects that a particular user defined event trigger or trigger point has taken place User selected data items preferably include E mail messages calendar events meeting notifications address entries journal entries per sonal alerts alarms warnings stock quotes news bulletins etc but could alternatively include any other type of mes
31. e mobile unit If the message to send is a reply message then at step 108 the mobile determines whether the desktop redirection flag is on for this message If the redirection flag is not on then at step 106 the reply message is simply transmitted from the mobile device to the destination address via the wireless network 22 If however the redi rection flag is on then at step 110 the reply message is repackaged with the outer envelope having the addressing information of the user s desktop system 10 and the repack aged message is then transmitted to the desktop system 10 at step 106 As described above the redirector program 12 executing at the desktop system then strips the outer enve lope and routes the reply message to the appropriate desti nation address using the address of the desktop system as the from field so that to the recipient of the redirected message it appears as though it originated from the user s desktop system rather than the mobile data communication device If at step 102 the mobile determines that the message is not a reply message but an original message then control passes to step 104 where the mobile determines if the user is using the redirector software 12 at the desktop system 10 by checking the mobile unit s configuration If the user is not using the redirector software 12 then the message is simply transmitted to the destination address at step 106 If however the mobile determines that the use
32. e the amount of data transmitted is reduced The compressed data structure referred to herein as CICAL compresses infor mation about the meeting such as attendees time that the meeting starts and ends location of the meeting the identity of the meeting organizer a time for reminder notification and any additional notes about the meeting The proposed transformation of the ICAL data to a CICAL structure exploits the inherent binary nature of the wireless transport protocol In order to reduce the complex ity on the wireless mail gateway 20 the transformation is designed to be easily reversible Assuming the receiver reverses the transformation before it is submitted to the calendar application the transformation becomes a transparent presentation layer compression method Therefore applications that prefer to use the stan dard Internet message encoding receive the same benefits as the applications that prefer to use the transformed contents directly The general encoding rules for the CICAL data structure are as follows 1 Convert enumerated types into byte codes 2 Use a type length encoding for fields rather than terminators e g LF and or CR 3 Undo content transfer encoding base64 quoted printable etc and 4 Use the length in bytes of the calendar instead of a unique boundary string The preferred format of a CICAL message includes the following segments as shown in FIG 7 Command Byte 140 Version Number 142
33. e user defined messages that are transmitted to the host system from another computer that is connected to the host system via a network to initiate redirection The screen saver and keyboard sub systems 46 48 are examples of systems that are capable of generating internal events Functionally the redirector program 12 provides the user with the ability to configure the screen saver and keyboard systems so that under certain conditions an event trigger will be generated that can be detected by the redi rector 12 to start the redirection process For example the Screen saver system can be configured so that when the screen saver is activated after for example 10 minutes of inactivity on the desktop system an event trigger is trans mitted to the redirector 12 which starts redirecting the previously selected user data items In a similar manner the keyboard sub system can be configured to generate event triggers when no key has been depressed for a particular period of time thus indicating that redirection should com mence These are just two examples of the numerous appli cation programs and hardware systems internal to the host system 10 that can be used to generate internal event triggers FIGS 4 and 5 set forth respectively flow charts showing the steps carried out by the redirector software 12 operating at the host system 10 and the steps carried out by the mobile data communication device 24 in order to interface with the hos
34. eiman Jean Paul Roubelat pp 1 173 US 6 463 463 B1 Page 3 Book Internetwork Mobility The CDPD Approach by Mark S Taylor William Waung and Mohsen Banan Jun 11 1996 News Release Motorola Rings in 1995 with the Launch of the Marco Wireless Communicator Jan 4 1995 4 pgs Timeline FLEX Technology Timeline 3 pgs General Magic Inc Corporate Backgrounder 2001 2 pgs Pegasus Email Settings ABSnet Internet Services Inc 4 pgs Motorola Inc emailVClient 2001 4 pages News Release Motorola Announces Pagewriter 250 The World s Smallest Pager with Full Keyboard Feb 27 1997 2 pgs Dewey Barney Communications Strategies for Newton 2 0 Newton Technology Journal p 10 Jun 1996 Press Release Motorola Announces New Solutions to Provide Consumers with Wireless Access to Personal and Enterprise E mail Accounts Mar 21 2001 4 pgs Motorola s Marco Wireless Communication http ww w msu edu luckie gallery marco htm Jun 14 2001 3 pgs News Release CE Software Announces Mobile Vision Editorial Contacts CE Software Inc 1995 3 pgs News Release CE Software Ship MobileVision Jun 20 1995 3 pgs Newton Reference Communications 1996 1997 4 pgs PC Pro Issue 31 Realworld Computing PDA Column Jul 30 1997 7 pgs Enterprise Solutions for Email Overload Founder Publica tions http www amikanow com corporte p
35. em 10 and the user has redirection capabilities then the server 11 detects the mes sage C repackages it using electronic envelope B and redirects the repackaged message C in B to the user s mobile device 24 If the message C is a command message from the user s mobile device 24 then the server 11 simply acts upon the command message Turning now to FIG 3 a block diagram showing the interaction of the redirector software 12 with additional components of the host system 10 of FIG 1 the desktop PC to enable more fully the pushing of information from the host system 10 to the user s mobile data communication device 24 is set forth These additional components are illustrative of the type of event generating systems that can be configured and used with the redirector software 12 and of the type of repackaging systems that can be used to interface with the mobile communication device 24 to make it appear transparent to the user The desktop system 10 is connected to LAN 14 and can send and receive data messages signals event triggers etc to and from other systems connected to the LAN 14 and to external networks 18 22 such as the Internet or a wireless data network which are also coupled to the LAN 14 In addition to the standard hardware operating system and application programs associated with a typical microcom puter or workstation the desktop system 10 includes the redirector program 12 a TCP IP sub system 42 an E mail s
36. er data items Thus a user may fail to respond to an emergency update or message because the user only periodically synchronizes the system such as once per day Other problems with these systems include 1 the amount of data to be reconciled between the host and the mobile device can become large if the user does not syn chronize on a daily or hourly basis leading to bandwidth difficulties particularly when the mobile device is commu nicating via a wireless packet switched network and 2 reconciling large amounts of data as can accrue in these batch mode synchronization systems can require a great deal of communication between the host and the mobile device thus leading to a more complex costly and energy inefficient system A more automated continuous efficient and reliable system of ensuring that user data items such as calendar messages are replicated at the user s mobile device is therefore needed Calendar event messages such as meeting requests are typically organized according to a particular calendar data structure For example RFC2445 iCalendar also referred to as ICAL provides such a structure and standard method for defining calendar related data messages When com bined with RFC2446 iTIP which defines a transport independent means for exchanging ICAL objects a mecha nism is provided to allow calendar systems on multiple platforms to inter operate ICAL uses verbose text strings and values to repr
37. esent electronic calendar data The RFC 2445 standard for struc turing ICAL messages does not make any attempt to reduce the size of the control information passed in the ICAL message According to this known calendar message standard message size is not as important as is readability of the message contents The problem with using standards such as ICAL relates to sending calendar event messages over narrow bandwidth channels like a wireless packet data network In such a network it is critical to reduce the size of the message as much as possible Therefore there is a need for a system and method for sending and receiving and structuring calendar event messages such as meeting requests to and from a portable data communication devices over a wireless data network Furthermore there remains a general need in this art for a system and method of continuously pushing user selected data items or certain portions of the selected data items such as calendar event messages stored at a host system to a user s mobile data communication device There remains a more particular need for such a system and method where user selected data items are continuously pushed from the host system to the mobile data commu nication device upon the occurrence of one or more user defined triggering events There remains an additional need for such a system and method that provides flexibility in the types and quantities of user data items that are pushe
38. fined event that is internal to the host system Networked events are user defined messages that are transmitted to the host system from another com puter coupled to the host system via a network to initiate redirection These are just some of the events that could be used with the present invention to initiate replication of the user selected data items from the host system 10 to the mobile device 24 FIG 1 shows an E mail message A being communicated over LAN 14 from computer 26 to the user s desktop system 10 also shown in FIG 1 is an external message C which US 6 463 463 B1 9 could be an E mail message from an Internet user or could be a command message from the user s mobile device 24 Once the message A or C reaches the primary message store of the host system 10 it can be detected and acted upon by the redirection software 12 The redirection software 12 can use many methods of detecting new messages The preferred method of detecting new messages is using Microsoft s amp Messaging API MAPI in which programs such as the redirector program 12 register for notifications or advise syncs when changes to a mailbox take place Other methods of detecting new messages could also be used with the present invention Assuming that the redirector program 12 is activated and has been configured by the user either through the sensing of an internal network or external event to replicate certain user data items including
39. formation then the program 12 determines at step 68 whether the trigger flag has been set indicating that the user wants these items redirected to the mobile device If the trigger flag is set then at step 70 the redirector 12 causes the repackaging system E Mail or TCP IP to add the outer envelope to the user data item and at step 72 the repackaged data item is then redirected to the user s mobile data communication device 24 via LAN 14 WAN 18 wireless gateway 20 and wireless network 22 Control then returns to step 56 where the program waits for additional messages and signals to act upon Although not shown explicitly in FIG 4 after step 68 the program could if operating in the preferred list mode determine whether the sender of a particular data item is on the preferred list and if not then the program would skip over steps 70 and 72 and proceed directly back to step 56 If the sender was on the preferred list then control would similarly pass to steps 70 and 72 for repackaging and transmission of the message from the preferred list sender FIG 5 sets forth the method steps carried out by the user s mobile data communication device 24 in order to interface to the redirector program 12 of the present invention At step 0 the mobile software is started and the mobile device 24 is configured to operate with the system of the present invention including for example storing the address of the user s desktop system 10 At step
40. hing information such as 58 Field of Search 709 206 247 calendar event messages from a host system to a mobile 709 238 340 7 29 7 43 7 51 7 57 7 21 data communication device upon sensing a triggering event 705 9 is disclosed A redirector program operating at the host system enables a user to continuously redirect calendar 56 References Cited event messages such as meeting reminders and notices U S PATENT DOCUMENTS from the host system to the user s mobile data communica tion device upon detecting that one or more user defined 5 086 502 A 2 1992 Malcolm triggering events has occurred The redirector program oper 5 159 592 A 10 1992 Perkins ates in connection with event generating applications and 5 313 582 A 5 1994 Hendel et al repackaging systems at the host system to configure and 5 392 390 A 2 1995 Crozier detect a particular user defined event and then to repackage E ise Sa et al j the calendar event messages in an electronic wrapper prior HOA A 713239 Dulaney HT etae to pushing the data items to the mobile device An optimized List continued on next page data structure for storing the calendar event messages is also rovided FOREIGN PATENT DOCUMENTS a EP 0617373 9 1994 17 Claims 10 Drawing Sheets xr 57 77 REQUEST EMAIL WITH 1208 US 6 463 463 B1 Page 2 U S PATENT DOCUMENTS 6 157 950 A 12 2000 Krishman 6 167 3
41. host system or any other event that is external to the host system Internal events could be a calendar alarm screen saver activation keyboard timeout programmable timer or any other user defined event that is internal to the host system Networked events are user defined messages that are trans mitted to the host system from another computer coupled to the host system via a network to initiate redirection These are just some of the examples of the types of user defined events that can trigger the redirector program to push data items from the host to the mobile device Although in the preferred embodiment it is anticipated that the configuration that specifies which data items will be redirected and in what form will be set at the host system it is within the scope of 10 15 20 25 30 35 40 45 50 55 60 65 4 this invention that such configuration may be set or modified through data sent from the mobile communications device In addition to the functionality noted above the redirector program provides a set of software implemented control functions for determining the type of mobile data commu nication device and its address for programming a preferred list of message types that are to be redirected and for determining whether the mobile device can receive and process certain types of message attachments such as word processor or voice attachments The determination of whether a particular mobile devi
42. m configuration data reflects that the mobile device 24 cannot receive and process the attachments or if the user has specified that certain attach ments are not to be forwarded to mobile device 24 even if such device can process those attachments By way of example consider an E mail sent to a user that includes three attachments a word processing document a video clip and an audio clip The redirection program could be configured to send the text of the E mail to the remote device to send the word processing document to a net worked printer located near the user to send the video clip to a store accessible through a secure connection through the internet and to send the audio clip to the user s voice mail system This example is not intended to limit the breadth and scope of the invention but rather to illustrate the variety of possibilities embodied in the redirection concept The preferred mobile data communication device 24 is a hand held two way wireless paging computer a wirelessly enabled palm top computer a mobile telephone with data 10 15 20 25 30 35 40 45 50 55 60 65 8 messaging capabilities or a wirelessly enabled laptop computer but could alternatively be other types of mobile data communication devices capable of sending and receiv ing messages via a network connection 22 Although it is preferable for the system to operate in a two way commu nications mode certain aspects of th
43. mat into a second format in which the plurality of verbose text strings are replaced with a plurality of numerical values in order to com press the electronic meeting request message 3 The method of claim 2 further comprising the step of prior to displaying the information from the meeting request message at the wireless mobile device decom pressing the file attachment by transforming it from the second format to the first format 4 The method of claim 1 further comprising the steps of prompting a user of the wireless mobile device to respond to the electronic meeting request message if the user responds affirmatively to the electronic meeting request message then storing the electronic meeting request message information in a calendar database associated with the wireless mobile device and if the user responds negatively to the electronic meeting request message then discarding the meeting request information 5 The method of claim 1 further comprising the steps of generating an electronic meeting reply message at the wireless mobile device and providing a file attachment that includes information contained within the elec tronic meeting reply message generating an e mail message at the wireless mobile device addressed to the e mail account maintained by the messaging server wherein the file attachment that includes the meeting reply message information is attached to the e mail message and the e mail message
44. messages of type A or C to the mobile device 24 when the message A is received at the host system 10 the redirector program 12 detects its presence and prepares the message for redirection to the mobile device 24 In preparing the message for redirection the redirector program 12 could compress the original message A could compress the message header or could encrypt the entire message A to create a secure link to the mobile device 24 Also programmed into the redirector 12 is the address of the user s mobile data communication device 24 the type of device and whether the device 24 can accept certain types of attachments such as word processing or voice attach ments If the user s type of mobile device cannot accept these types of attachments then the redirector 12 can be programmed to route the attachments to a fax or voice number where the user is located using an attached fax or voice machine 30 The redirector may also be programmed with a preferred list mode that is configured by the user either at the host system 10 or remotely from the user s mobile data com munication device by transmitting a command message C The preferred list contains a list of senders other users whose messages are to be redirected or a list of message characteristics that determine whether a message is to be redirected If activated the preferred list mode causes the redirector program 12 to operate like a filter only redirecting certain user data ite
45. ms based on whether the data item was sent from a sender on the preferred list or has certain message characteristics that if present will trigger or sup press redirection of the message In the example of FIG 1 if desktop system 26 was operated by a user on the preferred list of host system 10 and the preferred list option was activated then message A would be redirected If however desktop 26 was operated by a user not on the host system s preferred list then message A would not be redirected even if the user of the host system had configured the redirector to push messages of type A The user of the host system 10 can configure the preferred list directly from the desktop system or alternatively the user can then send a command message such as C from the mobile device 24 to the desktop system 10 to activate the preferred list mode or to add or delete certain senders or message characteristics from the preferred list that was previously configured It should be appreciated that a redirection program could combine mes sage characteristics and preferred sender lists to result in a more finely tuned filter Messages marked as low priority or that are simple return receipts or message read receipts for example could always be suppressed from redirection while messages from a particular sender would always be redi rected After the redirector has determined that a particular message should be redirected and it has prepared the 10
46. ntribute to the length they allow for implementations where certain length structures are expected to comprise a fixed number of bytes For imple mentations conforming to the current specification support form length structures up to and including five bytes is required Example 0x80 0x3A is a two byte length structure with the decimal value 58 Calendar Components 144 The calendar components segment 144 has the following format Component properties NULL Terminator after last property Component properties are type length encoded Each com ponent property has the following general format type length lt data gt where type is a single byte with one of the values listed below length is a length structure comprising a variable number of bytes and lt data gt represents the contents of the property and is exactly the number of bytes specified by the length structure Type Byte The list of preferred defined type bytes is given below RESERVED 0x00 CICAL__COMPONENT 0x01 CICAL_UID 0x02 CICAL_SEQUENCE 0x03 CICAL CALENDAR ID 0x04 CICAL RELATED TO 0x05 CICAL ORGANIZER 0x06 CICAL__ACCEPTED 0x07 CICAL__DECLINED 0x08 CICAL TENTATIVE 0x09 CICAL_NEEDSACTION 0x0A CICAL__DSTART 0x0B CICAL_DTEND 0x0C CICAL_SUMMARY 0x0D CICAL_LOCATION 0x0E CICAL__TRIGGER 0x0F RRULE_FREQUENCY 0x10 RRULE_DAYOFWEEK 0x11 5 10 15 20 25 30 35 40 45 50 55 60 6
47. ode will repackage the reply and resend it to the user s mobile data device as described above FIG 2 is an alternative system diagram showing the redirection of user data items from a network server 11 to the users mobile data communication device 24 where the redirector software 12 is operating at the server 11 This configuration is particularly advantageous for use with mes sage servers such as Microsoft s amp Exchange Server which is normally operated so that all user messages are kept in one central location or mailbox store on the server instead of in astore within each user s desktop PC This configuration has the additional advantage of allowing a single system admin istrator to configure and keep track of all users having messages redirected If the system includes encryption keys these too can be kept at one place for management and update purposes US 6 463 463 B1 11 In this alternative configuration server 11 preferably maintains a user profile for each user s desktop system 10 26 28 including information such as whether a particular user can have data items redirected which types of message and information to redirect what events will trigger redirection the address of the users mobile data commu nication device 24 the type of mobile device and the user s preferred list if any The event triggers are preferably detected at the user s desktop system 10 26 28 and can be any of the external internal or ne
48. on David B Scalable and Robust Internetwork Routing for Mobile Hosts IEEE Computer Society pp 2 11 1994 Perkins Charles IMHP A Mobile Host Protocol for the Internet Computer Networks and ISDN System vol 27 pp 479 491 1994 Proceedings of the IEEE 7th International Workshop on Network and Operating System Support for Digital Audio and Video Innsbrook Estates Conference Center May 19 21 1997 pp 135 146 Lucent Technologies Bell Labs Technical Journal vol 2 No 3 pp 152 163 Summer 1997 Lavana Hemang et al Internet Based Workflows A Para digm for Dynamically Reconfigurable Desktop Environ ments Group 97 pp 204 213 1997 Perkins Charles E et al Mobility Support in IPv6 Mobicom 96 pp 27 37 1996 Goldszmidt German et al ShockAbsorber A TCP Con nection Router IEEE vol 3 pp 1919 1923 1997 Feibus A Desktop In Your Palm Informationweek Aug 25 1997 pp 65ff Behr Handheld Solutions Informationweek Oct 27 1997 pp 106 113 Copy of DTS Wireless Website located at D R L http www dtswireless com 3Com PalmPilot Gets Wireless Link for E Mail Spooner John G PC Week Dec 8 1997 Have Your Pager Call My Pager Sullivan Kristina B PC Week Dec 8 1997 cited by examiner U S Patent Oct 8 2002 Sheet 1 of 10 US 6 463 463 B1 sn DESKTOP TOMPUTER D U S Patent Oct 8 2002 Sheet 2 of 10 US 6 46
49. on regarding the meeting request is formatted using a plurality of verbose text strings into a second format in which the plurality of verbose text strings are replaced with a plurality of numerical values in order to compress the electronic meeting request message 11 A method of transmitting meeting request messages from a host system to a wireless mobile device comprising the steps of receiving a meeting request message at the host system wherein the host system is a messaging server generating a file attachment at the host system the file attachment including the meeting request message generating an e mail message at the host system wherein the file attachment with the meeting request message is attached to the e mail message and wherein the e mail message includes a content type indicator that indicates that the file attachment includes the meeting request message transmitting the e mail message from the host system to the wireless mobile device via a wireless gateway coupling the host system to a wireless data network receiving the e mail message at the wireless mobile device and detecting the content type indicator in the e mail message and US 6 463 463 B1 23 in response to detecting that the content type indicator indicates that the file attachment to the e mail message includes the meeting request message executing a calendar application on the wireless mobile device and displaying the meeting request message 12
50. one of these triggers the server redirects the user s data items to the proper mobile data communication device The user data items and addressing information for a particular mobile device can be stored at the server or at the user s PC Using this alternative configuration one redirector program can serve a plurality US 6 463 463 B1 5 of users This alternative configuration could also include an internet or intranet based redirector program that could be accessible through a secure webpage or other user interface The redirector program could be located on an Internet Service Provider s system and accessible only through the Internet In another alternative configuration of the present invention a redirector program operates at both the host system and at the user s mobile data communication device In this configuration the user s mobile device operates similarly to the host system described below and is config ured in a similar fashion to push certain user selected data items from the mobile device to the user s host system or some other computer upon detecting an event trigger at the mobile device This configuration provides two way push ing of information from the host to the mobile device and from the mobile device to the host Another aspect of the invention provides a new data structure for calendar events The structure is based on a standard calendar data structure such as ICAL However unlike the ICAL structure
51. ost system to the user s mobile data communication device upon detecting that one or more user defined triggering events has occurred Also operating at the host system are various sub systems that can be configured to create triggering events such as a screen saver sub system or a keyboard sub system as well as sub systems for repackaging the user s data items for trans parent delivery to the mobile data device such as a TCP IP sub system or one or more E Mail sub systems Other sub systems for creating triggering events and repackaging the user s data items could also be present at the host system The host system also includes a primary memory store where the user s data items are normally stored Using the redirector program the user can select certain data items for redirection such as E mail messages calendar events meeting notifications address entries journal entries personal reminders etc Having selected the data items for redirection the user can then configure one or more event triggers to be sensed by the redirector program to initiate redirection of the user data items These user defined trigger points or event triggers include external events internal events and networked events Examples of external events include receiving a message from the user s mobile data communication device to begin redirection receiving a similar message from some external computer sensing that the user is no longer in the vicinity of the
52. pe et al FOREIGN PATENT DOCUMENTS 5 727 202 A 3 1998 Kucala 5 729 735 A 3 1998 Meyering EP 0793387 9 1997 5 737 531 A 4 1998 Ehley EP 0825788 2 1998 5 742 905 A 4 1998 Pepe et al EP 0838774 4 1998 5 751 971 A 5 1998 Dobbins et al EP 0838934 4 1998 5 754 954 A 5 1998 Cannon et al EP 0772327 2 1999 5 757 901 A 5 1998 Hiroshige EP 0930766 7 1999 5 761 416 A 6 1998 Mandal et al WO 9619064 6 1996 5 765 170 A 6 1998 Morikawa WO 9726709 7 1997 5 781 901 A 7 1998 Kuzma WO 9727717 7 1997 5 790 790 A 8 1998 Smith et al WO 973341 9 1997 5 790 974 A 8 1998 Tognazzini WO 9732251 9 1997 5 812 819 A 9 1998 Rodwin et al WO 9741654 11 1997 5 813 016 A 9 1998 Sumimoto WO 9744942 11 1997 5 819 172 A 10 1998 Campana Jr et al WO 9800787 1 1998 5 819 284 A 10 1998 Farber et al WO 9821911 5 1998 5 822 434 A 10 1998 Caronni et al WO 9823108 5 1998 5 826 062 A 10 1998 Fake Jr et al WO 9848560 10 1998 5 838 926 A 11 1998 Yamagishi WO 9919988 4 1999 5 850 219 A 12 1998 Kumomura WO 9945484 9 1999 5 867 660 A 2 1999 Schmidt et al WO 9948312 9 1999 5 878 434 A 3 1999 Draper et al WO 9950974 10 1999 5 903 723 A 5 1999 Beck et al 5 928 329 A 7 999 Clark et al OTHER PUBLICATIONS 5 961 590 A 10 1999 Mendez al berkeley edu iang ecash encoding last updated May 17 5 974 238 A 10 1999 Chase Jr 1996 5 978 837 A 11 1999 Foladare et al BlackBerry Technical White Paper Research In Motion 5 995 597 A 11 1999 Woltz et al Ltd Version 1 0 1998 1999
53. pes that are to be redirected or preferred senders whose messages are to be redirected 2 flexibility in configuring the system to respond to numerous internal external and to networked triggering events 3 transparent repackaging of the user data items in a variety of ways such that the mobile data communication device appears as though it were the host system 4 integration with other host system components such as E mail TCP IP keyboard screen saver webpages and certain programs that can either create user data items or be configured to provide trigger points and 5 the ability to operate locally on a user s desktop system or at a distance via a network server These are just a few of the many advantages of the present invention as described in more detail below As will be appreciated the invention is capable of other and different embodiments and its several details are capable of modifi cations in various respects all without departing from the spirit of the invention Accordingly the drawings and description of the preferred embodiments set forth below are to be regarded as illustrative in nature and not restrictive BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS The present invention satisfies the needs noted above as will become apparent from the following description when read in conjunction with the accompanying drawings wherein FIG 1 is a system diagram showing the redirection of user data items from a user s desktop PC host
54. press the electronic meeting reply message 9 A method of redirecting a plurality of message types from a messaging server to a wireless mobile device com prising the steps of receiving an electronic message at a first message store coupled to the messaging server determining whether the electronic message is an e mail message or a meeting request message if the electronic message is an e mail message then redirecting the e mail message from the first message store to the wireless mobile device via a wireless gateway coupling the messaging server to a wireless data network and if the electronic message is a meeting request message then providing a file attachment including information contained within the meeting request message and generating an e mail message at the messaging server wherein the file attachment that includes the meeting request message information is attached to the e mail message and the e mail message includes a content type indicator that indicates that the file attachment includes the meeting request message information and transmitting the e mail message with the file attach ment from the messaging server to the wireless mobile device via the wireless gateway coupling the messaging server to the wireless data network 10 The method of claim 9 further comprising the steps of prior to providing the file attachment transforming the electronic meeting request message from a first format in which informati
55. r is using the redirector software 12 at the desktop system 10 then control passes to step 110 where the outer envelope is added to the message The repackaged original message is then transmit ted to the desktop system 10 at step 106 which as described previously strips the outer envelope and routes the message to the correct destination Following transmission of the message at step 106 control of the mobile returns to step 82 and waits for additional messages or signals FIG 6 is a diagram of a preferred system for sending and receiving calendar event messages such as meeting requests between a host inbox 120 and a portable data communication device Device 24 via a wireless network In the preferred environment shown in FIG 6 the host system 11 is in communication with the portable commu nications device 24 via a TCP IP network 18 such as the Internet for communicating RF messages to and from the Device 24 10 15 20 25 30 35 40 45 50 55 65 16 As shown in FIG 6 and described in more detail below the present invention preferably includes hardware software and data structures for enabling the receiving and sending of meeting requests 120A to a Device 24 In the preferred embodiment shown in FIG 6 the system includes at least one host inbox 120 and at least one portable communication device 24 Associated data structures including a meeting request 120A are stored in the host inbox 120 Sof
56. red to redirect messages of type C then in a similar manner to message A message C would be repackaged with an outer envelope B and transmitted to the user s mobile device 24 In the case where message C is representative of a command message from the user s mobile device 24 to the host system 10 the command message C is not redirected but is acted upon by the host system 10 If the redirected user data item is an E mail message as described above the user at the mobile device 24 sees the original subject sender s address destination address car bon copy and blind carbon copy When the user replies to this message or when the user authors a new message the software operating at the mobile device 24 adds a similar outer envelope to the reply message or the new message to cause the message to be routed first to the user s host system 10 which then removes the outer envelope and redirects the message to the final destination such as back to computer 26 In the preferred embodiment this results in the outgoing redirected message from the user s host system 10 being sent using the E mail address of the host mailbox rather than the address of the mobile device so that it appears to the recipient of the message that the message originated from the user s desktop system 10 rather than the mobile data communication device Any replies to the redirected message will then be sent to the desktop system 10 which if it is still in redirector m
57. redirector appli cation converting the meeting request into an e mail with an attachment containing the meeting details iv the redirector application sending to the device the e mail with the attachment v the device opening the attachment vi the user of the device accepting or declining the meeting request vii sending a response in an e mail with an attachment containing the reply and viii converting the e mail into a meeting response item and sending the meeting response item to the original sender of the meeting request Another aspect of the invention provides a method for sending meeting requests from a portable data communica tion device comprising the steps of 1 creating a meeting request on the device ii translating the meeting request to an e mail with a CICAL attachment iii sending the e mail to the redirector iv the redirector processing the CICAL attachment v sending the meeting request to the host vi the host sending the meeting requests to the attendees The primary advantage of the present invention is that it provides a system and method for triggering the continuous 10 15 20 30 40 45 50 55 60 65 6 and real time redirection of user selected data items from a host system to a mobile data communication device Other advantages of the present invention include 1 flexibility in defining the types of user data to redirect and in defining a preferred list of message ty
58. sage that is transmitted to the host system 10 or that the host system 10 acquires through the use of intelligent agents such as data that is received after the host system 10 initiates a search of a database or a website or a bulletin board In some instances only a portion of the data item is transmitted to the mobile device 24 in order to minimize the amount of data transmitted via the wireless network 22 In these instances the mobile device 24 can optionally send a command message to the host system to receive more or all of the data item if the user desires to receive it Among the user defined event triggers that can be detected by the redirector program 12 are in the preferred embodiment external events internal events and networked events External events preferably include 1 receiving a command message such as message C from the user s mobile data communication device to begin redirection or to execute some other command at the host such as a command to enable the preferred list mode or to add or subtract a particular sender from the preferred list 2 receiving a similar message from some external computer and 3 sensing that the user is no longer in the vicinity of the host system although alternatively an external event can be any other detectable occurrence that is external to the host system Internal events could be a calendar alarm screen saver activation keyboard timeout programmable timer or any other user de
59. t system Turning first to FIG 4 at step 50 the redirector program 12 is started and initially configured The initial configuration of the redirector 12 includes 1 defining the event triggers that the user has determined will trigger redirection 2 selecting the user data items for redirection 3 selecting the repackaging sub system either standard E Mail or special purpose technique 4 selecting the type of data communication device indicating whether and what type of attachments the device is capable of receiving and processing and inputting the address of the mobile device and 5 configuring the preferred list of user selected senders whose messages are to be redirected FIG 4 sets forth the basic steps of the redirector program 12 assuming it is operating at a desktop system 10 such as shown in FIG 1 If the redirector 12 is operating at a network server 11 as shown in FIG 2 then additional configuration steps may be necessary to enable redirection for a particular desktop system 10 26 28 connected to the server including 1 setting up a profile for the desktop system indicating its address events that will trigger redirection and the data items that are to be redirected upon detecting an event 2 maintaining a storage area at the server for the data items and 3 storing the type of data communication device to which the desktop system s data items are to be redirected whether and what type of attach ments th
60. to the meeting request The user is given the option of accepting or refusing the meeting request This pull down menu 332 could be accessed by the user through a series of keystrokes on a keyboard or through a thumbwheel Having described in detail the preferred embodiments of the present invention including the preferred methods of operation it is to be understood that this operation could be carried out with different elements and steps This preferred embodiment is presented only by way of example and is not meant to limit the scope of the present invention which is defined by the following claims What is claimed 1 A method of redirecting electronic meeting request messages from a messaging server to a wireless mobile device via a wireless data network comprising the steps of generating an electronic meeting request message at a desktop system wherein the electronic meeting request message is directed to an e mail account maintained by the messaging server receiving the electronic meeting request message at the e mail account determining whether the e mail account 5 associated with the wireless mobile device if the e mail account is associated with the wireless mobile device and the messaging server has been configured to redirect electronic meeting request mes sages from the e mail account to the wireless mobile device then a generating a file attachment at the messaging server wherein the file attachment in
61. ttachment is a meeting reply message and storing the meeting reply message in an electronic mail box coupled to the host system and transmitting the meeting reply message to a generator of a meeting request message and updating a calendar database at the host system using information contained in the meeting reply message UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE CERTIFICATE OF CORRECTION PATENT NO 6 463 463 B1 Page 1 of 1 DATED October 8 2002 INVENTOR S Godfrey et al It is certified that error appears in the above identified patent and that said Letters Patent is hereby corrected as shown below Title page Item 56 References Cited U S PATENT DOCUMENTS Patent No 6 092 114 change Shimbo et al to Shaffer et al Column 22 Lines 52 and 53 change receiving a meeting request message at the host system wherein the host system is a messaging server to receiving a meeting request message at the host system wherein the host system is a messaging server Signed and Sealed this Third Day of June 2003 JAMES E ROGAN Director of the United States Patent and Trademark Office
62. tware executing at the portable device 24 and at the host system 11 enables the meeting requests to be sent from and received by a device 24 Operationally one of the systems 26 28 coupled to the LAN 14 may generate a meeting request 120A which is preferably stored in the host inbox 120 The redirector server software operating at the server 11 has access to the host inbox 120 and detects the arrival of the new meeting request 120A The redirector software 12 then transforms the format of the meeting request 120A from a first format such as the ICAL format in which information regarding the meeting is formatted using verbose text strings into a second format As described in more detail below according to this second format the verbose text strings of the first format are converted into corresponding numerical values thereby compressing the information associated with the meeting request 120A This compressed meeting request is then attached to an e mail and communicated via network 16 18 32 20 and 22 to the portable data communication devices 24 that are associated with the meeting request FIG 7 describes the preferred calendar event data struc ture associated with the second format This structure is based on a standard ICAL structure but the long text strings associated with ICAL are compressed using numerical val ues to represent the text strings This structure allows for easier transmission over the wireless networks becaus
63. twork events listed above The desktop systems 10 26 28 preferably detect these events and then transmit a message to the server computer 11 via LAN 14 to initiate redirection Although the user data items are preferably stored at the server computer 11 in this embodiment they could alternatively be stored at each user s desktop system 10 26 28 which would then transmit them to the server computer 11 after an event has triggered redirection As shown in FIG 2 desktop system 26 generates a message A that is transmitted to and stored at the host system 11 which is the network server operating the redirector program 12 The message A is for desktop system 10 but in this embodiment user messages are stored at the network server 11 When an event occurs at desktop system 10 an event trigger is generated and transmitted to the network server 11 which then determines who the trigger is from whether that desktop has redirection capabilities and if so the server operating the redirector program uses the stored configuration information to redirect message A to the mobile computer 24 associated with the user of desktop system 10 As described above with reference to FIG 1 message C could be either a command message from a user s mobile data communication device 24 or it could be a message from an external computer such as a computer connected to the Internet 18 If the message C is from an Internet computer to the user s desktop syst
64. ub system 44 a primary data storage device 40 a screen saver sub system 48 and a keyboard sub system 46 The TCP IP and E mail subsystems 42 44 are examples of repackaging systems that can be used to achieve the trans 10 15 20 25 30 35 40 45 50 55 60 65 12 parency of the present invention and the screen saver and keyboard sub systems 46 48 are examples of event gener ating systems that can be configured to generate event messages or signals that trigger redirection of the user selected data items The method steps carried out by the redirector program 12 are described in more detail in FIG 4 The basic functions of this program are 1 configure and setup the user defined event trigger points that will start redirection 2 configure the types of user data items for redirection and optionally configure a preferred list of senders whose messages are to be redirected 3 configure the type and capabilities of the user s mobile data communication device 4 receive mes sages and signals from the repackaging systems and the event generating systems and 5 command and control the redirection of the user selected data items to the mobile data communication device via the repackaging systems Other functions not specifically enumerated could also be inte grated into this program The E Mail sub system 44 is the preferred link to repack aging the user selected data items for transmission to the mo
65. ublications htm Aug 6 2001 9 pgs Motorola s Marco Wireless Communicator http ww w msu edu luckie gallery marco htm Aug 6 2001 2 pgs Press Release Apple Agrees to License Newton Technol ogy to Schlumberger Digital Ocean Nov 3 1995 3 pgs Frezza Bill PDA PDA Wherefore Art Thou PDA Freewire Aug 6 2001 6 pgs Black Lauren et al Personal Digital Assistants Mac world Reviews Aug 6 2001 5 pgs Reference Mobile Vision Direct Wireless Connection to Your LAN Based Electronic Mailbox CE Software Inc pp 1 3 5 7 9 11 13 15 17 19 21 1995 User Manual MobileVision Direct Wireless Connection to Your LAN Based Electronic Mailbox CE Software Inc 1995 Johnson David B Ubiquitous Mobile Host Internetwork ing Fourth Workshop on Workstation Operating Systems pp 85 90 Oct 14 15 1993 Johnson David B Mobile Host Internetworking Using IP Loose Source Routing School of Computer Science Car negie Mellon University pp 1 14 Feb 1993 Schoettle Bob IP Address Management on LANs Byte pp 199 200 Feb 1996 Cheshire Stuart et al Internet Mobility 4x4 Computer Science Department Stanford University pp 1 12 Aug 1996 Yeom Hoen Y et al IP Mutliplexing by Transparent Port Address Translator Proceedings of the Tenth USENIX System Administration Conference pp 113 122 Sep 29 Oct 4 1996 Johns
66. vice to receive a meeting request In step 150 the host inbox 120 receives a meeting request At step 152 the redirector application 12 detects the presence of the new message in the host inbox 120 At step 154 the redirector 12 determines the type of message present in the host inbox 120 for example by a message class provided by the Host mail system If the message class indicates the item is a standard e mail message normal e mail redirection is per formed at step 156 If the redirector 12 determines the message class of the item corresponds with a meeting request however then the redirector 12 translates the meet ing details information into the CICAL format and gen erates an attachment in step 158 with the corresponding CICAL information At step 160 the redirector sends the Device an e mail having the CICAL attachment with a content type indicat ing the data is calendar related for example calendar representing the meeting request enclosed As described above a command byte is also included with the CICAL attachment indicating the type of calendar command i e meeting request meeting reply or meeting cancel At step 162 the Device opens the message having the attachment in an associated Messaging application operating at the Device At step 164 the Message application detects the content type of the attachment as calendar and launches a Calendar application providing the Calendar application with the CICA
67. w chart showing the preferred method of sending a meeting request from a portable data communi cation device to the host system FIGS 10 13 set forth a preferred set of graphical user interface screens for the portable data communication device showing the steps of receiving and accepting a meeting request US 6 463 463 B1 7 DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS Referring now to the drawings FIG 1 is an example system diagram showing the redirection of user data items such as message A or C from a user s office PC host system 10 to the user s mobile data communication device 24 where the redirector software 12 is operating at the users PC Message A in FIG 1 represents an internal message sent from desktop 26 to the user s host system 10 via LAN 14 Message C in FIG 1 represents an external message from a sender that is not directly connected to LAN 14 such as the user s mobile data communication device 24 some other user s mobile device not shown or any user connected to the Internet 18 Message C also represents a command message from the user s mobile data communi cation device 24 to the host system 10 As described in more detail in FIG 3 the host system 10 preferably includes along with the typical hardware and software associated with a workstation or desktop computer the redirector program 12 a TCP IP subsystem 42 a primary message store 40 an E mail subsystem 44 a screen saver subsystem 48 and a keyboard su

System and method for pushing calendar event messages from a

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