Patent ID: 7809843

Claim:
A personal computing device for use within a communications network, the device comprising: a communications application, being executed by a processor of the personal computing device, that can establish a communication session with a communications application of another personal computing device over a communications network; the communications application further comprising a session manager and a library that generates a globally unique random number identifier wherein, for each communication session, a globally unique random number identifier is generated that uniquely identifies each communication session and wherein the session manager generates a compressed globally unique identification, from the globally unique random number identifier, that is appended to each data packet exchanged with another session manager, the compressed globally unique identification having a length that is less than the length of the globally unique random number identifier and being generated based on any other active communication sessions associated with the communication application so that the compressed globally unique identification, for a particular communication session between the personal computing device and another personal computing device, may be different from the compressed globally unique identification of the other personal computing device.