Patent ID: 7684356
Filing Date: 2010-03-23
Classification: H04L,H04M

Abstract:
1. A communications system for providing hotline and preemption features in real-time communication sessions, comprising: a presence server capable of collecting presence information and preference information on a plurality of presentities, wherein said presence information for each of said plurality of presentities includes availability of said respective presentity and said preference information for each of said plurality of presentities includes a priority level granted to one or more watchers of said respective presentity; and a communications manager connected to receive a request for a new communication session with a select one of said plurality of presentities from a select one of said watchers in a select one of a plurality of media types; wherein said communications manager is operable to extract said presence information and said preference information of said select presentity from said presence server; wherein, in response to unavailability of said select presentity due to a concurrent communication session in said select media type, said communications manager is further operable to determine said priority level of said select watcher and said priority level of said watcher involved in said concurrent communication session and preempt said concurrent communication session when said priority level of said select watcher is greater than said priority level of said watcher involved in said concurrent communication session.