Method and Apparatus for High Performance Low Latency Real Time Notification Delivery

Abstract

A method for real time notification delivery comprises providing to an application server event notifications directed to a plurality of user agents that are at a site remote from an application server and that receive event notifications through a first network device that is capable of receiving aggregated notification messages, aggregating a plurality of event notifications directed to a plurality of user agents to create an aggregated notification message directed to a first network device, and routing an aggregated notification message to a first network device via a communications network.

We claim: 
     
         1 . A method for real time notification delivery comprising:
 providing to an application server event notifications directed to a plurality of user agents, the user agents being at a site remote from the application server and receiving event notifications through a first network device that is capable of receiving aggregated notification messages;   aggregating a plurality of event notifications directed to the plurality of user agents to create an aggregated notification message directed to the first network device, each of the plurality of event notifications being associated with a user agent of the plurality of user agents; and   routing the aggregated notification message to the first network device via a communications network.   
     
     
         2 . The method of  claim 1  further comprising parsing the aggregated notification message into the plurality of event notifications for the plurality of user agents and transmitting each event notification to at least one of the plurality of user agents. 
     
     
         3 . The method of  claim 1  further comprising aggregating the plurality of event notifications using a first event notification of the plurality of event notifications to aggregate the remaining plurality of event notifications. 
     
     
         4 . The method of  claim 3  wherein aggregating the plurality of event notifications further comprises using an identifier for a location of the first network device such that the aggregated notification message includes the identifier for the first network device. 
     
     
         5 . The method of  claim 1  further comprising receiving user agent notification subscriptions comprising an identifier for a location of the first network device. 
     
     
         6 . The method of  claim 1  further comprising receiving user agent notification subscriptions and generating the plurality of event notifications based on the received notification subscriptions. 
     
     
         7 . The method of  claim 6  wherein the aggregated notification message comprises an identifier for a location of the first network device. 
     
     
         8 . The method of  claim 7  wherein aggregating a plurality of event notifications comprises using an index for aggregating each event notification, the index comprising information regarding the user agent to which each event notification is directed and wherein the aggregated notification message does not include the index. 
     
     
         9 . The method of  claim 1  wherein aggregating the plurality of event notifications comprises packaging all of the plurality of event notifications into a body of the aggregated notification message. 
     
     
         10 . The method of  claim 9  wherein the body of the aggregated notification message comprises a compressed text format that includes Session Initiation Protocol (“SIP”) information. 
     
     
         11 . The method of  claim 1  wherein routing the aggregated notification message comprises a message aggregator sending the aggregated notification message to a transport function and the transport function transmitting the aggregated notification message to the first network device via a communication network. 
     
     
         12 . The method of  claim 1  wherein routing the aggregated notification message comprises routing the aggregated notification message according to Transport Layer Security (“TLS”) transport protocol. 
     
     
         13 . The method of  claim 1  further comprising creating a template for each of the plurality of event notifications, the template comprising notification dialog data contained in each of the event notifications and a list of each type of notification dialog data contained in the event notifications. 
     
     
         14 . The method of  claim 1  further comprising receiving the notification aggregated message at the first network device and the first network device processing the aggregated notification message according to the plurality of event notifications. 
     
     
         15 . The method of  claim 1  further comprising the first network device sending option messages at a predefined interval to the application server and updating a capability attribute associated with the first network device upon receipt of an option message comprising aggregated notification message capability information. 
     
     
         16 . The method of  claim 1  further comprising determining whether the first network device associated with the user agents is capable of receiving aggregated notification messages. 
     
     
         17 . The method of  claim 1  wherein aggregating the plurality of event notifications comprises the application server sending a first plurality of event notifications to a message aggregator, each of the first plurality of event notifications being associated with a user agent of the plurality of user agents, and the message aggregator receiving the first plurality of event notifications and aggregating the first plurality of event notifications based on the first network device, the aggregated first plurality of event notifications comprising the aggregated notification message. 
     
     
         18 . The method of  claim 17  wherein aggregating the plurality of event notifications further comprises using an identifier for a location of the first network device such that the aggregated notification message includes the identifier for the first network device. 
     
     
         19 . An apparatus for real time notification delivery comprising:
 an application server; and   the application server being capable of receiving event notifications directed to a plurality of user agents, the user agents being at a site remote from the application server and receiving event notifications through a first network device that is capable of receiving aggregated notification messages;   the application server aggregating a plurality of event notifications directed to the plurality of user agents to create an aggregated notification message directed to the first network device, each of the plurality of event notifications being associated with a user agent of the plurality of user agents; and   the application server routing the aggregated notification message to the first network device via a communications network.   
     
     
         20 . The apparatus of  claim 19  wherein the application server aggregates the plurality of event notifications by packaging all of the plurality of event notifications into a body of the aggregated notification message. 
     
     
         21 . The apparatus of  claim 20  wherein the body of the aggregated notification message comprises a compressed text format that includes Session Initiation Protocol (“SIP”) information. 
     
     
         22 . The apparatus of  claim 19  wherein the application server receives user agent notification subscription information and aggregates the plurality of event notifications based on the received notification subscriptions. 
     
     
         23 . The apparatus of  claim 19  wherein the first network device is an SIP proxy server.