Contact priority reordering
View Patent ↗A method is disclosed that provides a way to manage the registrations of telecommunications endpoints, and to prioritize those registered endpoints, or “contacts,” that belong to a user, without some of the disadvantages in the prior art. The technique of the illustrative embodiment, which is referred to as “contact priority reordering,” prioritizes the contacts that are associated with a Session Initiation Protocol (SIP) public address of a user, without having to modify any endpoints. Moreover, the technique is interoperable with any SIP endpoint. The technique can be regarded as a reordering process because it overrides any endpoint ordering that occurs at a registrar server as a consequence of the registrations and re-registrations of the individual endpoints. Advantageously, the technique prioritizes the contacts that are associated with a particular public address without requiring that any changes be made to the registrar server—or to any other SIP servers.
1. A method comprising:
receiving at a data processing system, from a registrar server, a first indication that a first telecommunications endpoint has registered, wherein the first telecommunications endpoint is identified by a first contact address, and wherein the registrar server operates in accordance with the Session Initiation Protocol; and
transmitting from the data processing system, to the registrar server and in response to the receiving of the first indication, a first plurality of q-values that are based on at least one conditional rule having been evaluated in response to the receiving of the first indication;
wherein the first plurality of q-values determines the order in which the first telecommunications endpoint and a second telecommunications endpoint that is identified by a second contact address, receive notification of an incoming call with respect to each other; and
wherein the first contact address and the second contact address are associated with a public address.
2. The method of claim 1 wherein a first q-value had been provided by the first telecommunications endpoint when it registered with the registrar server.
3. The method of claim 1 further comprising:
receiving, from the registrar server, a second indication that a third telecommunications endpoint has registered, wherein the third telecommunications endpoint is identified by a third contact address; and
transmitting, to the registrar server and in response to the receiving of the second indication, a second plurality of q-values
wherein the second plurality of q-values determines the order in which the first telecommunications endpoint, the second telecommunications endpoint, and the third telecommunications endpoint, receive notification of the incoming call with respect to each other; and
wherein the third contact address is also associated with the public address.
4. The method of claim 3 wherein the conditional rule is also based on the communications capability of one or more telecommunications endpoints that are identified by the contact addresses associated with the public address.
5. The method of claim 3 wherein the conditional rule is also based on how often each contact address that is associated with the public address is used as the originating address of a call.
6. The method of claim 1 wherein the conditional rule also is based on the calendrical time.
7. The method of claim 1 wherein the registrar server transmits the indication that a first endpoint has registered in response to receiving a registration message from the first endpoint.
8. The method of claim 1 wherein the conditional rule is also such that a voice communications capability results in a higher-ranked q-value than does a non-voice communications capability.
9. The method of claim 1 wherein the conditional rule is also based on how often each contact address that is associated with the public address is involved in calls.
10. The method of claim 1 wherein the conditional rule is also based on whether one or more telecommunications endpoints are to be taken out of service.
11. The method of claim 1 wherein the conditional rule is also based on the type of forking to be performed on the incoming call to the public address.
12. The method of claim 1 wherein the conditional rule is also based on the availability of a user to whom the public address is assigned.
13. The method of claim 1 wherein the conditional rule is also based on the location of the user.
14. The method of claim 1 wherein the conditional rule is also based on the resource utilization of one of the first endpoint and the second endpoint.
15. A method comprising:
receiving a priority setting request for a plurality of endpoints at a data processing system;
determining the priority of the plurality of endpoints based on at least one conditional rule that is based on utilization of a hardware component of an endpoint from the plurality, wherein the priority of the plurality of endpoints determines the order in which multiple telecommunications endpoints, with respect to one another, receive notification of an incoming call to a public address associated with each of the telecommunications endpoints; and
transmitting, from the data processing system, an indication of the priority of a contact associated with a telecommunications endpoint to a Session Initiation Protocol (SIP) registrar server, wherein
the registrar server is managing the public address,
the registrar server operates in accordance with the Session Initiation Protocol, and
the indication of the priority is transmitted inside a Session Initiation Protocol (SIP) REGISTER message.
16. The method of claim 15 further comprising transmitting a first plurality of q-values to the registrar server, wherein the first plurality of q-values reflects the prioritized order of the plurality of endpoints.
17. The method of claim 15 wherein the hardware component is one of processor and memory.
18. The method of claim 15 wherein the request to determine the priority is transmitted by a Session Initiation Protocol (SIP) proxy server in response to an incoming call.