1. The Field of the Invention
The invention relates to network-based instant connect telecommunication. More particularly, the invention relates to managing incoming voice data by allowing the recipient to apply various answer modes in network-based instant connect communications.
2. The Relevant Technology
Mobile telephones are some of the most common communication devices in use today. As the popularity of mobile telephones and other telephony-enabled wireless devices such as personal digital assistants increases, the ways in which these devices are used also grows. One application of mobile telephone technology is to use mobile telephones as if they were two-way radio devices or “walkie-talkies.” The ability to use mobile telephones as walkie-talkies is often referred to as “push-to-talk”. Communication in a push-to-talk system can be one-to-one or one-to-many. One example of a push-to-talk system is Nextel's iDEN-based Push to Talk® (also known as Direct Connect™) service.
Push-to-talk systems are typically implemented using standard voice-over Internet protocol (VoIP) technologies or other telephony technologies, where voice data is sent in digital form over data networks. Such push-to-talk systems are hereinafter referred to as “network-based instant connect systems”, and they can be deployed in various networks, including wireless and wireline networks.
Network-based instant connect communication allows a sender to speak to a recipient without the customary procedure of dialing a telephone number and waiting for the recipient to answer. Network-based instant connect communication services combine the convenience of near-instantaneous connection between users with the range and security afforded by a network. Once an instant connect session is established over the network, the voice data transmitted from a sender is played on the recipient's device without any action on the part of the recipient. This is in contrast to a regular telephone call where the recipient is required to manually respond to a ringing telephone.
Because network-based instant connect calls are designed to mimic walkie-talkie communication, the communication channel is used in a half-duplex manner, meaning that voice data can only flow in one direction at a time. The ability to transmit voice data is often referred to as “having the floor”. In a network-based instant connect communication, the sender typically sends a floor request signal to a server in the network by pressing the talk button on a suitably enabled wireless device. Once the floor is granted, the sender may speak to the recipient until the talk button is released. The recipient of the voice data who does not have the floor can merely receive the voice data and cannot take the floor until the sender relinquishes the floor.
As noted above, one general feature of network-based instant connect communications is that, if the recipient's device is powered on and is in a mode to accept incoming calls, any incoming network-based instant connect calls result in the recipient's device automatically outputting voice data. While this can be desirable in some situations, there may be times when the recipient does not want to immediately hear incoming voice data or to otherwise be interrupted by an instant connect call. For example, while the recipient may not want to risk missing an important communication by powering off the device, at the same time the recipient may not want others to hear the incoming voice data from an instant connect communication or may be in a situation where the unexpected activation of the recipient's device in response to an incoming instant connect communication would be considered an interruption. Thus, automatically outputting the voice data associated with instant connect communications may sometimes be inconvenient or undesirable.