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Earth's Mightiest Burlesque Show
- 11293 Air Park Road, Ashland, VA 23005
- Dates: July 6, 2019
- Venue: Center of the Universe
- Phone: (804) 536-6546
- Time: 7:00 PM to 9:30 PM
- Price: $10.00 general admission $15 general admission with beer $20 VIP $100 party booth for 6 with beers
- Visit Website
- Send E-Mail
Greetings, true believers! Ellie Quinn Presents has assembled a team of heroic and villainous burlesque performers to pay tribute to Earth's Mightiest!
Diving into the deepest depths of nerdlesque, Earth's Mightiest Burlesque Show is going to offer a unique blend of storytelling with tantalizing performances by some of the most colorful characters. Aiming to tease, tantalize, and tremor every bone in your body, this will be one crossover event that will make you shout "excelsior"!
Burton Quinn
Ellie Quinn
Isabel Astrum
Jo'Rie Tigerlily
Lottie Ellington
Molly Mayberry
Sally Stardust
Scarlet Starlet
Selene Noire
Doors 7pm Show 7:30pm
Ages 21 and up
Tiers of ticketing:
$10 general admission
$15 general admission with a beer included
$20 VIP (reserved seat with beer included)
$100 party booth (reserved seating for 6 with beers included)
Day of show:
$12 general admission
$120 party booth


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subset: commoncrawl


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How to Get It: Sylvan Learning (Tutoring.SylvanLearning.com), Tutor.com, TutorVista.com and Tutorzilla (Tutorzilla.com) all offer a good cross section of the kinds of remote-based tutoring jobs out there, and they all have great reputations with students and teachers. Since you will be working with children, you can expect a background check before you are hired.
Advertising Disclosure: TheSimpleDollar.com has an advertising relationship with some of the offers included on this page. However, the rankings and listings of our reviews, tools and all other content are based on objective analysis. The Simple Dollar does not include all card/financial services companies or all card/financial services offers available in the marketplace. For more information and a complete list of our advertising partners, please check out our full Advertising Disclosure. TheSimpleDollar.com strives to keep its information accurate and up to date. The information in our reviews could be different from what you find when visiting a financial institution, service provider or a specific product's website. All products are presented without warranty.
A real estate appraisal business can be operated from home, on a part-time basis, making for a fun side business idea if you have the credentials to back it up. A perfect option if you want to keep your day job while earning a little extra on the side. You won't need a college degree to start in on this business idea, but you'll need bankable appraiser credentials (including relevant training and professional licenses), strong knowledge of the sector, and a growing network of industry players including mortgage brokers, real estate agents, banks, and fellow appraisers that'll want to utilize your services.
When I used to work at CreativeLive, I regularly paid $250-$500 (or even much more depending upon audience size) per episode for 90 seconds worth of advertisements on relevant podcasts like The Tim Ferriss Show, the #1 business podcast right now from the 4-Hour Workweek author, Tim Ferriss. The podcast has even helped Tim launch his latest New York Times bestseller, Tools of Titans to a wider readership.
As you start regularly putting out content, you'll hopefully start to build a bit of an audience. But to start seeing real money from YouTube you need to market your videos elsewhere. Share your channel on Twitter and Facebook. Distribute videos anywhere else you can think of. Also, interact with comments and build a community around the videos you're making so people will share it with their friends.
Clayburn Griffin, a digital marketer who finds remote work suits him best, hopes more companies see the benefits that can be gleamed from remote workers, "I really hope employers start to realize this and offer more time to their employees to work from home. I think they don't because they're afraid of abuse and because it feels like there is no oversight. You can't see what an employee is doing, and that feels like giving up some control. All that should matter, though, is that they're getting the work done."
Advertising Disclosure: TheSimpleDollar.com has an advertising relationship with some of the offers included on this page. However, the rankings and listings of our reviews, tools and all other content are based on objective analysis. The Simple Dollar does not include all card/financial services companies or all card/financial services offers available in the marketplace. For more information and a complete list of our advertising partners, please check out our full Advertising Disclosure. TheSimpleDollar.com strives to keep its information accurate and up to date. The information in our reviews could be different from what you find when visiting a financial institution, service provider or a specific product's website. All products are presented without warranty.
6. IZEA – IZEA works in addition to a blog or on its own. You get paid to blog, tweet, take photos and take videos. The pay is mostly based on your following, so if you want to make money with your tweets, you'll need to grow you Twitter following. Likewise, if you want to make money with blogs, you'll need substantial blog traffic (more on blogging below).
19. eBay – Of course you can't read an article about making money online that doesn't mention eBay. You can start an eBay store and get serious about it or you can just sell some stuff to declutter your home. Either way, I've made my fair share from selling on eBay and it's still a popular way to earn money. If you decide to start an actual eBay store, you'll want to find a drop-ship business like Doba that will store and ship items straight to your customers so you don't have to deal with an inventory.
Choosing the path of entrepreneurship, and working on your side business idea, is without a doubt riskier than being content with holding a 9-5 job. It requires way more sacrifice. However, once you're reaping the lifestyle benefits of being your own boss and hustling your way into making significantly more money with your business idea than you ever could at your day job, the hard work will have all been worth it. So, let's talk business ideas.
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Like recycling, this side business idea requires the willingness to get your hands a little dirty. If you enjoy working outdoors, then you can make a pretty good side income cleaning up litter outside retail, office and industrial properties—especially for businesses that have large parking lots that need regular cleaning. Property management companies need their properties maintained litter free and you can do so with an on-foot service using inexpensive equipment like this cheap pick-up tool and a broom. Charge for your time at $35 - $50 per hour and bill your clients the same contract price each month. For even more on how to get started with a litter removal side business idea, check out Cleanlots.
Phony job listings on legit job-hunting websites. One fraudulent group was listing fake jobs on CareerBuilder, which is an otherwise respectable site. The group was charging a big fee for a background check before consideration of any applicants. Federal, state and local authorities received more than 17,000 complaints filed by people who were ripped off by this particular group. And that's just the number of people who found their way to complain. Who knows how many others were taken?
FlexJobs is 100% legit. While it may not be necessary for everyone, if you have limited time available to dig around on the internet and vet companies for legitimacy it's well worth the investment. They research each job lead to make sure it is truly remote or flexible and it isn't a scam. I've had a membership for a very long time and find it well worth the small investment.
Find work. When you first start out, you may have to accept work writing about a topic you don't find all that interesting. You must keep an open mind and be willing to accept work that may not be in your desired field. However, as you continue to write, you not only learn about more topics, but you also build your reputation. With time, you can be choosier about assignments you want to accept.[19]
While remote workers can be found in a number of different industries, it's more prevalent in the tech-sphere. It could be due to the nature of most tech jobs—especially jobs for developers and programmers—that require a strong attention to detail and long hours of focus. Working from home can reduce the amount of distractions these workers face, allowing them to get more done during work hours.
With apps being constantly developed, competent app developers are in high demand. Again, if you have the experience or skills to create successful apps then this could be something you could end up working on as a full-time freelancer. Check out adverts for developers on Toptal, a higher paying jobs site for experienced freelancers wanting to make money online.
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The antisemitism claims paralysing the Labour party have hindered the Palestinian cause and must be confronted through a renewed political debate about the Israeli-Palestinian issue, the former Middle East minister Peter Hain will argue.
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In what is designed to be a major intervention to persuade the party to address the roots of the problem, they add: "Labour's debilitating antisemitism crisis has so far focused upon process – are those charged with antisemitic behaviour being properly disciplined by the party's leadership or not? When actually the problem is political, and therefore requires a political not simply a procedural solution."
They also insist that those sounding alarm at antisemitism in the party are not trying to crush a debate about Israel's behaviour or echo Israeli government propaganda.


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Positioning and rendering notification heralds based on user's focus of attention and activity
The present invention relates to a system and method to facilitate providing computer users with efficient access to electronic notifications while minimizing disruption in the context of ongoing tasks. A notification system provides visual information heralds that provide summarizations of notifications to users. An information controller considers the importance or urgency of content and a user's current and/or recent activities in decisions about the rendering and positioning of the information herald on a display screen or screens in order to facilitate user processing of the summarized notifications with minimal disruption to ongoing tasks.
Latest Microsoft Patents:
This application is a continuation in part of U.S. patent application Ser. No. 10/220,550 filed on Aug. 30, 2002, entitled PRIORITIES GENERATION AND MANAGEMENT, which claims priority to PCT Application Serial No. PCT/US01/08710, filed on Mar. 16, 2001, which claims the benefit of U.S. Provisional Patent Application Ser. No. 60/189,801, filed on Mar. 16, 2000, entitled ATTENTIONAL SYSTEMS AND INTERFACES.
This application is also a continuation in part of U.S. patent application Ser. No. 10/220,419 filed on Aug. 30, 2002 now U.S. Pat. No. 7,243,130, entitled NOTIFICATION PLATFORM ARCHITECTURE, which claims priority to PCT Application Serial No. PCT/US01/08711, filed on Mar. 16, 2001, which claims the benefit of U.S. Provisional Patent Application Ser. No. 60/189,801, filed on Mar. 16, 2000, entitled ATTENTIONAL SYSTEMS AND INTERFACES. All of the aforementioned applications are incorporated herein by reference.
The present invention relates generally to systems and methods that facilitate communications between devices, systems, processes, and/or individuals. More particularly, the present invention relates to dynamically rendering information for users based upon their focus of attention, cognitive load, and activity.
As computer systems have evolved, users of such systems have had to adapt to rapidly changing technological innovations. This is apparent when considering all the different forms of desktop applications for managing information. Users can literally choose from thousands of different software options for merely utilizing applications on their desktop computers. Often users have at their disposal multiple computers and displays for interfacing to such applications as well. Modern applications range from word processors, spreadsheets, web browsers, calendar systems, email applications, CAD systems and so forth. With the ever increasing numbers of applications however users are finding it difficult to not only properly deploy respective applications but also to manage the enormous amounts of information generated therefrom.
In just one example concerning information management, users as they are working, often are bombarded with dozens of electronic interruptions per day. This can be quite demanding given that most users are quite busy trying to process a given task at hand. These interruptions can be generated from a plurality of sources such as email, scheduling notifications (e.g., generated from electronic calendaring systems), instant message notifications, electronic reminders, voice messages, as well as managing individual notices that may arise when dealing with any given application (e.g., messages that popup while running an application such as automated help or troubleshooting advice). With such disruptions, users are continually challenged to balance the given task at hand with trying to process all the information that may become available during the day.
The computer science and artificial intelligence community consider many aspects relating to how to assist users in a variety of ways with advice and support about tasks and status. In many aspects, these sciences attempt to implement computer innovations that make it easier for users to process information or alternatively to enable computers to more effectively assist users when performing computer-related tasks. Respective innovations from these disciplines however often lead to more applications that are useful in their own right, yet leave the user with an overall greater task of processing increasing amounts information from the various applications.
The challenges of handling information updates and alerts are exacerbated by the growing use of larger display surfaces and multiple display configurations. Users may be directing their attention to different regions and may find it costly to search, find, and potentially interact with graphical renderings of visual "heralds" that provide notification about messages of importance, and potentially also provide access, via one or more user gestures (such as clicking on a region of the displayed herald), to more details about messages or allow the invocation of particular viewers or other applications via gestures, and then return to the region they had been attending to continue to review or interact with other displayed items (e.g., returning to a primary word processing task displayed at a different location on the current screen or another screen). Users may also miss important notifications that are displayed in regions that are not being attended to.
Thus, explicit systems, processes, and designs need to be developed that consider the importance of information to be reviewed by users, and the ease and efficacy at which users will be able to see or have access to the information, while at the same time minimizing information overload and distractions for application users.
The following presents a simplified summary of the invention in order to provide a basic understanding of some aspects of the invention. This summary is not an extensive overview of the invention. It is not intended to identify key/critical elements of the invention or to delineate the scope of the invention. Its sole purpose is to present some concepts of the invention in a simplified form as a prelude to the more detailed description that is presented later.
The present invention relates to a system and methodology for rendering information to users based on their focus of attention and current activities. With the advent of broadening use of notification applications such as email, for example, and the growing importance of subscription-centric notification services, it is of increasing importance to provide users with tools and designs that allow users to have access to awareness of potentially important notifications at minimal cognitive load, and minimal overall disruption. Also, with the increasing size of displays and the growing use of multiple monitors, simple default placement of incoming information at a "main location" may be missed. Thus, the present invention provides attention-sensitive placement and configuration of visual heralds providing notification information, based on a user's determined activity (or other available inputs about focus of visual attention) such as via gaze and pose information.
Visual heralds are dynamically rendered in accordance with the present invention and can be associated with a prioritized messaging system that assigns an urgency value to incoming messages. Such messages can be summarized and dynamically placed in a user's workspace such as a desktop display to control how information is presented to the user and in a manner designed to minimize distraction for the user. An information controller is provided that receives feedback or input from one or more models describing the user's focus of attention and cognitive load, for example, wherein one or more dynamic controls guide various aspects of the visual herald in order to direct how and when the information is presented to the user. Such controls include dynamic positioning of the herald, dynamic sizing controls, dynamic rendering controls such as controlling shapes, colors and dimensions of the herald, dynamic audio controls, dynamic appearance controls (e.g., fading in/fading out) and/or other controls such as timing of how long information is presented to the user. By considering such factors as the user's current focus of attention, and dynamically directing information to the user that minimizes distraction based on the current focus, the present invention facilitates a user's ability to cognitively process information in an efficient manner (e.g., if incoming message is high urgency and user is determined to be not exceedingly busy on some other task based upon a predetermined threshold, move display herald to user's current focus of attention, otherwise slowly fade-out over time).
To the accomplishment of the foregoing and related ends, certain illustrative aspects of the invention are described herein in connection with the following description and the annexed drawings. These aspects are indicative of various ways in which the invention may be practiced, all of which are intended to be covered by the present invention. Other advantages and novel features of the invention may become apparent from the following detailed description of the invention when considered in conjunction with the drawings.
The present invention relates to a system and method to facilitate efficient and automated processing of electronic notifications by users. A notification system includes an information herald or display object that presents summarized notifications to the users. An information controller receives attentional inputs associated with a respective user to dynamically generate or render the information herald on a display screen or screens in order to facilitate user processing of the summarized notifications. The attentional inputs can be derived from systems such as gaze or head-pose tracking devices wherein such systems can be analyzed by models in order to determine the user's current focus of attention and/or cognitive load. Depending on the attention and/load, the information herald can employ a plurality of dynamic adjustments to facilitate presentation and timing of information to the user. Also, a messaging system such as a prioritization system or notification system, for example, operates in conjunction with the information controller in order to prioritize messages and thus further control operations therein.
As used in this application, the terms "component," "model," "controller," "herald," "system," and the like are intended to refer to a computer-related entity, either hardware, a combination of hardware and software, software, or software in execution. For example, a component may be, but is not limited to being, a process running on a processor, a processor, an object, an executable, a thread of execution, a program, and/or a computer. By way of illustration, both an application running on a server and the server can be a component. One or more components may reside within a process and/or thread of execution and a component may be localized on one computer and/or distributed between two or more computers.
As used herein, the term "inference" refers generally to the process of reasoning about or inferring states of the system, environment, and/or user from a set of observations as captured via events and/or data. Inference can be employed to identify a specific context or action, or can generate a probability distribution over states, for example. The inference can be probabilistic—that is, the computation of a probability distribution over states of interest based on a consideration of data and events. Inference can also refer to techniques for executing rule-based, logical policies, or methods employed for composing higher-level events from a set of events and/or data. Such inference results in the construction of new events or actions from a set of observed events and/or stored event data, whether or not the events are correlated in close temporal proximity, and whether the events and data come from one or several event and data sources.
Referring initially to
The system 100 provides attention-sensitive placement and configuration of the information herald 160, based on a user's activity such as via the attention models 140 and/or other available inputs about focus of visual attention such as gaze and pose information described below. In general, the system 100 provides various notification display processes to enable a user to review at the high level, summaries of decisions about how much to attend to incoming messages 110 (e.g., whether to drill down to access the messages in more detail). Various components such as the information controller 130 also, provide an elegant mechanism for automatically "getting the information herald 160 out of the way," (e.g., via a fading away or timing out of the herald after some time of being displayed without user hover or drill down operations). Such timing out after a wait period, allows users to continue to work as they would be working with or without a glance at the herald—allowing users to send an implicit signal that they are not interested by information presented in the herald 160, i.e., without requiring an explicit user action.
It is noted that the herald 160 can be adapted as a selectable portal to getting more details, e.g., for email, the herald can include just the sender, recipients, subject title and an initial line of an email, but clicking on the message brings up the details at the same location, or jogged slightly away from the current work region.
The user controls 144 can include a plurality of controls for driving/directing the information herald 160 to the user. These can include dynamic positioning controls for controlling coordinate locations of the herald (in the workspace 160 and/or other displays 170), dynamic sizing controls for changing the size of the herald, dynamic content controls for changing the information appearing within or associated with the herald (e.g., on large messages providing summary info, on smaller messages displaying whole message), dynamic rendering controls for changing the appearance of the herald or content therein (e.g., colors, shapes, fonts, dimensions 2D to 3D, and so forth), changing audio cues as described below, and/or providing other dynamic controls such as controlling timing of information display and fading the herald in and out.
Other aspects of the invention include providing an entry point into the controls for decisions about the policies for the rendering of heralds 160, and the positioning and rendering of the heralds inside respective heralds, (e.g., a particular region or button at the right lower, right-hand side of the herald) that allows entry into controls for adjustment in general or for the case at hand (e.g., notice that the user has been typing in the top window, and also working in a Word application, and having available as a state when controls are invoked).
As an example, the heralds 160 can be displayed and controlled by specifying the following user options about the influence of contextual considerations in the position-sensitive rendering of heralds about important information:
- [ ] All Times
- [ ] When I am in any desktop Application
- [x] Only when I using Microsoft Word
- [ ] When I've been typing
More generally, these options can be made available to users to select at any time, via a rich control panel for specifying preferences about heralds, (e.g., with regard to the attention-sensitive positioning). Also, an option can be added that when the herald 160 is accessed and its information is displayed, and if the information or configuration of information is complex, then other open windows or structures associated with the current or other tasks can be moved to the side, or collapsed and minimized in a particular iconic structure or other symbolic representation. When the information from the herald is closed, then the task is restored to what it was like before the herald was accessed (e.g., task jogged back to the position it was in, or "re-hydrated" back up to full size and position it was in). Other controls include herald or general gestures or control that lets a user say, "no, not now" to the herald 160. That is, instead of just going away, the herald can be told to come back again soon when user has a bit more time or has finished something. This can also be coupled with a "snooze" feature, allowing user to say, "later" or "in 5 minutes, please" (come up again in 5 minutes, not now).
In another aspect, the display of information and items associated with hovering or clicking on the herald 160 can be a complex structure which can be provided with one or more "handles" on the structure for closing it all at once. That is, the herald 160 can be analogized to the case of accessing a single email message when clicking on the herald about an important email, and then seeing a single email message, and then closing it. A complex set of windows for other graphical items can also be brought up as part of the structure, and users may be given a way of "closing the whole thing" after some interaction (e.g., via interacting with a selection graphic to close entire structure).
Based upon message urgency for example, the herald can change positions in the appropriate location. For example, the herald position for important information is displayed in the lower right-hand corner of the active window, the window that contains the content that is currently (or was just recently) being worked on active, but if the time for activity has passed and some threshold time has been reached, the item is displayed in the center of the last active monitor, if more time passes, the herald is displayed at a default location (lower right hand side of left most display), and/or if more time passes, user is assumed to be away and the herald is logged via a mechanism that will display important unseen heralds to the user in a particular location when they are sensed as "arriving back" at a system.
Other herald aspects include alerting functions such as a "while you were away, you missed these notices" function. For heralds that would have been displayed if the user was around, when the user returns after time away (e.g., after some time of no activity on system, or in more sophisticated systems, after not being seen to have gazed at the system, or no office activity detected (e.g., acoustical), then, is seen to be back with gaze or other presence, or moves a mouse and breaks a screen saver, etc.), user is displayed with a list of heralds of missed information in some location (e.g., in default spot, where mouse is now, in active initial window, etc.) These options can be coupled with a timing out of importance of heralds, e.g., only the messages from the last 1 hour are showed explicitly, others are clustered into closed links (e.g., labeled "Older than 1 hr"). Sound localization methods, such as stereo acoustical renderings can cognitively localize the audio associated with a herald in a position at or near the location of the physical rendering of the herald.
Attention-sensitive heralds can also appear in lower, right-hand side of an active window (or other locations) and then inch up along the right hand edge of a window toward the middle of the window linearly (or some other function) with the increasing importance of the message. This can also be designed as inching up toward the level of the current or most recent (within time horizon) mouse cursor location (for active mouse). Also, ancillary information (e.g., an email message) can be displayed automatically for very important (without a click or gesture) or automatically after a time if a user doesn't actively click or say, "no" or "not now" etc.
It is to be appreciated that the present invention can employ substantially any coordinate system, including multidimensional coordinate systems, and employ substantially any display format for the information herald 160, wherein the display format can include substantially any shape, color, dimension, code format—including embedded executables, and include combinations of these and other respective formats or attributes. In addition, information retrieved from a message 110 can be directed to substantially any portion of the workspace 150 and/or 170 regardless of any apparent display orderings depicted in the system 100. It is noted that display content can be transformed as it is placed on the workspace 150 and/or 170. For example, the content or information herald 160 could be scaled in a smaller manner such as generating an iconic representation of the content.
The information herald can be provided as part of the graphical user interface in association with the information controller 130 and can be provided as part of and/or in association with the display 150 or 170. The display 150, 170 and/or information herald 160 can be configured via interfaces regarding various aspects of display or content preferences, configurations and/or desired information formatting by the user. The display 150, 170 and/or information herald 160 can include display objects (e.g., icons, buttons, sliders, input boxes, selection options, menus, tabs, and so forth) having multiple dimensions, shapes, colors, text, data and sounds to facilitate optimal control, sizing/resizing, format and/or display of the herald. This can include such aspects as dimensioning the herald, providing feedback regarding displayed content or models, and controlling herald updates. In addition, various menus and alternative screens or display outputs can be provided that perform a plurality of aspects of the present invention. These aspects can also include a plurality of inputs for adjusting and configuring one or more aspects of the present invention. This can include receiving user commands from a mouse, keyboard, speech input and/or other device to effect operations of the display 150, 170 via an associated graphical user interface.
Referring now to
In a basic approach, a visual herald appears in a particular location (e.g., the lower right-hand screen of the right most monitor) when a message with a particular property, e.g., exceeding a preset threshold, arrives. Beyond basic control, the system 200 allows the user to indicate, in a control panel, that the system should employ an "Attention-Sensitive Herald." via user controls 240. This feature is illustrated in a user interface 300 of
Referring now to
At 520, dwell time of the herald can be shortened or lengthened depending on where the herald is being displayed and/or the user's workload. For example, it may be valuable to extend the time that a herald is displayed when it is being displayed in a default location, potentially far from where the user is working—especially in multiple-monitor situations. If the user is busy, it may be useful to hold up the message for a longer period of time to give the user a chance to review and then make a decision, if the user is interested, to further drill down on the message. At 530, any visual herald that is allowed to fade away without more detailed inspection can be appended to a herald journal or folder that allows a user to inspect the herald later in an efficient manner. The entries of such a journal can be given a lifespan and/or a maximum size, if desired. Such an inspect-able, expandable journal can reduce the need to rush to access the information in a herald if a user happens to be busy.
Proceeding to 602, a notification herald's appearance and location are automatically determined. As noted above, this can include summarizing a notification and placing it within a small display having substantially any form or shape. At 604, message urgency is automatically determined. As described below, one or more classifiers may be employed to automatically assign an urgency value for a message. At 608, the notification herald is automatically placed in a default location within the user's workspace or workspaces. Controls can be provided to enable users to set respective default locations. At 612, user activities are monitored. As noted above, this can include defining attention models that describe/determine the user's focus of attention or other activity.
At 616, a determination is made regarding whether or not the user is ignoring the herald placed at 608. If so, the process proceeds to 620 whereby the herald can be slowly faded over time and dynamically placed into a journal, if desired at 624. If the user is not ignoring the herald at 616, another determination is made regarding message urgency at 628. If a notification is determined to be urgent, the process proceeds to 632 in order to dynamically move the herald closer to the user's focus of attention before proceeding back to 616. If the message is not determined particularly urgent (as defined by a predetermined threshold), the process proceeds back to 620, wherein the herald can be faded and/or placed into a journal at 624.
Spatial and temporal constraints can be considered based on the type of software application, the configuration of displayed information associated with the application, and the current or recent specific interactions with the content, so as to ensure that a herald will not obfuscate important content or disrupt a current interaction, so as to minimize the disruptiveness of the rendering of the herald. For example, the output of a system that moves a herald up towards the height of the position of a current interaction, along the right-hand edge of the active window can be modified to ensure that the herald will not be placed in a position that will overlay the position where a user is currently typing, e.g. a "repellent force field" can be positioned over a user's current work position to ensure that there will not be obfuscation. Thus, a herald can inch up to be as close as possible to the user but avoid being overlayed in a disruptive position. Likewise the current activity can be considered, and a brief "temporal force field" can be applied to delay the rendering. For example, the rendering can be delayed until the current typing sequence comes to an end in a Word processing application, or until a graphic being moved in a graphics application is positioned.
A goal of the models of attention is to infer the cost of different types of interruption given that a user is of a particular attentional state. To achieve this, the present invention considers the utility, u(Di, Aj), capturing the cost of a user in attentional state Aj being disrupted by task or communication event Di. This cost can be assessed as the willingness to pay to avoid a disruption in dollars for each combination. Given a set of dollar values to avoid disruptions, and a probability distribution being inferred over the attentional state of a user, an expected cost of interruption (ECI) can be computed by summing over the utilities, weighted by the likelihood of each state of attention, conditioned on the stream of incoming sensory information. That is, the ECI is
wherein p(Aj|E) is the probability of the attentional state, conditioned on an evidence stream E.
A client event system provides an abstraction tool for coalescing patterns of low-level system events into higher-level events. The present invention considers in the models of attention both low-level and high-level events. For example, low-level states can be captured as the application being used, whether the user is typing, clicking with the mouse, as well as a set of higher-level events such as the pattern of switching among applications (e.g., single application focus versus switching among applications), indications of task completion (e.g., a message being sent, a file being closed, an application being closed, etc.).
For the calendar events, whether a meeting is in progress can be considered, the length of time until the meeting is over, and the location of the meeting. For the acoustical and visual analysis, it can be determined whether conversation or other signal is identified, and whether a user is present near a desktop system, and if so, if the user is gazing at or away from the computer.
An output 2320 depicts inferences about the expected cost of interruption over time for different disruptions Di. In this case, it can be computed, from the inferred probability distribution over the coarse user attentional states the expected dollars a user would be willing to pay to avoid different communication events. The curves in the diagram 2320 represent, from top to bottom, the expected costs associated with six different interruptions, including a telephone call, a pager, a full visual alert with audio chime herald, a thumbnail display with audio chime, a full visual alert without the chime, and a thumbnail display without chime.
Referring to
According to another aspect of the present invention, a notification platform 2517 can be employed in conjunction with the prioritization system 2512 to direct prioritized messages to one or more notification sinks accessible to users. As will be described in more detail below, the notification platform 2517 can be adapted to receive the prioritized messages 2516 and make decisions regarding when, where, and how to notify the user, for example. As an example, the notification platform 2517 can determine a communications modality (e.g., current notification sink 2518 of the user such as a cell phone, or Personal Digital Assistant (PDA)) and likely location and/or likely focus of attention of the user. If a high importance e-mail were received, for example, the notification platform 2517 can determine the users location/focus and direct/reformat the message to the notification-sink 2518 associated with the user. If a lower priority message 2516 were received, the notification platform 2517 can be configured to leave the e-mail in the user's in-box for later review as desired, for example. As will be described in more detail below, other routing and/or alerting systems 2519 may be utilized to direct prioritized messages 2516 to users and/or other systems.
Turning now to
The context analyzer 2622 stores/analyzes information regarding variables and parameters of a user that influence notification decision-making. For example, the parameters may include contextual information, such as the user's typical locations and attentional focus or activities per the time of day and the day of the week, and additional parameters conditioned on such parameters, such as the devices users tend to have access to in different locations. Such parameters may also be functions of observations made autonomously via one or more sensors. For example, one or more profiles (not shown) may be selected or modified based on information about a user's location as can be provided by a global positioning system (GPS) subsystem, on information about the type of device being used and/or the pattern of usage of the device, and the last time a device of a particular type was accessed by the user. Furthermore, as is described in more detail below, automated inference may also be employed, to dynamically infer parameters or states such as location and attention. The profile parameters may be stored as a user profile that can be edited by the user. Beyond relying on sets of predefined profiles or dynamic inference, the notification architecture can enable users to specify in real-time his or her state, such as the user not being available except for important notifications for the next "x" hours, or until a given time, for example.
The parameters can also include default notification preference parameters regarding a user's preference as to being disturbed by notifications of different types in different settings, which can be used as the basis from which to make notification decisions by the notification engine 2624, and upon which a user can initiate changes. The parameters may include default parameters as to how the user wishes to be notified in different situations (e.g., such as by cell phone, by pager). The parameters can include such assessments as the costs of disruption associated with being notified by different modes in different settings. This can include contextual parameters indicating the likelihoods that the user is in different locations, the likelihoods that different devices are available, and the likelihoods of his or her attentional status at a given time, as well as notification parameters indicating how the user desires to be notified at a given time.
Information stored by the context analyzer 2622, according to one aspect of the present invention is inclusive of contextual information determined by the analyzer. The contextual information is determined by the analyzer 2622 by discerning the user's location and attentional status based on one or more contextual information sources (not shown), as is described in more detail in a later section of the description. The context analyzer 2622, for example, may be able to determine with precision the actual location of the user via a global positioning system (GPS) that is a part of a user's car or cell phone. The analyzer may also employ a statistical model to determine the likelihood that the user is in a given state of attention by considering background assessments and/or observations gathered through considering such information as the type of day, the time of day, the data in the user's calendar, and observations about the user's activity. The given state of attention can include whether the user is open to receiving notification, busy and not open to receiving notification, and can include other considerations such as weekdays, weekends, holidays, and/or other occasions/periods.
The sources 2626-2628, 2630 generate notifications intended for the user and/or other entity. For example, the sources 2626-2628 may include communications, such as Internet and network-based communications, and telephony communications, as well as software services. Notification sources are defined generally herein as that which generates events, which can also be referred to as notifications and alerts, intended to alert a user, or a proxy for the user, about information, services, and/or a system or world event. A notification source can also be referred to as an event source.
For example, e-mail may be generated as notifications by the prioritization system 2630 such that it is prioritized, wherein an application program or system generating the notification assigns the e-mail with a relative priority corresponding to the likely importance or urgency of the e-mail to the user. The e-mail may also be sent without regard to the relative importance to the user. Internet-related services can include notifications including information that the user has subscribed to, such as headlines of current news every so often, and stock quotes, for example.
Notification sources 2626-2628 can themselves be push-type or pull-type sources. Push-type sources are those that automatically generate and send information without a corresponding request, such as headline news and other Internet-related services that send information automatically after being subscribed to. Pull-type sources are those that send information in response to a request, such as e-mail being received after a mail server is polled. Still other notification sources include the following:
- e-mail desktop applications such as calendar systems;
- computer systems (e.g., that may alert the user with messages that information about alerts about system activity or problems);
- Internet-related services, appointment information, scheduling queries;
- changes in documents or numbers of certain kinds of documents in one or more shared folders;
- availability of new documents in response to standing or persistent queries for information; and/or,
- information sources for information about people and their presence, their change in location, their proximity (e.g., let me know when I am traveling if another coworker or friend is within 10 miles of me"), or their availability (e.g., let me know when Steve is available for a conversation and is near a high-speed link that can support full video teleconferencing").
The notification sinks 2636-2638 are able to provide notifications to the user. For example, such notification sinks 2636-2638 can include computers, such as desktop and/or laptop computers, handheld computers, cell phones, landline phones, pagers, automotive-based computers, as well as other systems/applications as can be appreciated. It is noted that some of the sinks 2636-2638 can convey notifications more richly than other of the sinks. For example, a desktop computer typically has speakers and a relatively large color display coupled thereto, as well as having a higher bandwidth for receiving information when coupled to a local network or to the Internet. Thus, notifications can be conveyed by the desktop computer to the user in a relatively rich manner. Conversely, many cell phones have a smaller display that can be black and white, and receive information at a relatively lower bandwidth, for example. Correspondingly, the information associated with notifications conveyed by cell phones may generally be shorter and geared towards the phone's interface capabilities, for example. Thus, the content of a notification may differ depending on whether it is to be sent to a cell phone or a desktop computer. According to one aspect of the present invention, a notification sink can refer to that which subscribes, via an event subscription service, for example, to events or notifications.
The notification engine 2624 accesses the information stored and/or determined by the context analyzer, and determines which of the notifications received from the sources 2626-2628 to convey to which of the sinks 2636-2638. Furthermore, the notification engine 2624 can determine how the notification is to be conveyed, depending on which of the sinks 2636-2638 has been selected to send the information to. For example, it may be determined that notifications should be summarized before being provided to a selected sinks 2636-2638.
The invention is not limited to how the engine 2624 makes its decisions as to which of the notifications to convey to which of the notification sinks, and in what manner the notifications are conveyed. In accordance with one aspect, a decision-theoretic analysis can be utilized. For example, the notification engine 2624 can be adapted to infer important uncertainties about variables including a user's location, attention, device availability, and amount of time until the user will access the information if there were no alert. The notification engine 2624 can then make notification decisions about whether to alert a user to a notification, and if so, the nature of the summarization and the suitable device or devices to employ for relaying the notification. In general, the notification engine 2624 determines the net expected value of a notification. In doing so, it can consider the following:
- the fidelity and transmission reliability of each available notification sink;
- the attentional cost of disturbing the user;
- the novelty of the information to the user;
- the time until the user will review the information on his or her own;
- the potentially context-sensitive value of the information; and/or,
- the increasing and/or decreasing value over time of the information contained within the notification.
Inferences made about uncertainties thus may be generated as expected likelihoods of values such as the cost of disruption to the user with the use of a particular mode of a particular device given some attentional state of the user, for example. The notification engine 2624 can make decisions as to one or more of the following:
- what the user is currently attending to and doing (based on, for example, contextual information, including head pose and/or gaze as tracked by gaze tracking machinery);
- where the user currently is;
- how important the information is;
- what is the cost of deferring the notification;
- how distracting would a notification be;
- what is the likelihood of getting through to the user; and,
- what is the fidelity loss associated with the use of a specific mode of a given notification sink.
Therefore, the notification engine 2624 can perform an analysis, such as a decision-theoretic analysis, of pending and active notifications, evaluates context-dependent variables provided by information sinks and sources, and infers selected uncertainties, such as the time until a user is likely to review information and the user's location and current attentional state.
Furthermore, the notification engine 2624 can access information stored in a user profile by the context analyzer 2622 in lieu of or to support a personalized decision-theoretic analysis. For example, the user profile may indicate that at a given time, the user prefers to be notified via a pager, and only if the notification has a predetermined importance level. Such information can be utilized as a baseline from which to start a decision-theoretic analysis, or can be the manner by which the notification engine 2624 determines how and whether to notify the user.
According to one aspect of the present invention, the notification platform architecture 2600 can be configured as a layer that resides over an eventing or messaging infrastructure. However, the invention is not limited to any particular eventing infrastructure.
Furthermore, the architecture can be configured as a layer that resides over a flexible distributed computational infrastructure, as can be appreciated by those of ordinary skill within the art. Thus, the notification platform architecture can utilize an underlying infrastructure as a manner by which sources send notifications, alerts and events, and as a manner by which sinks such as endpoint devices receive notifications, alerts and events, for example. The present invention is not so limited, however.
With reference to
The system bus 2718 can be any of several types of bus structure(s) including the memory bus or memory controller, a peripheral bus or external bus, and/or a local bus using any variety of available bus architectures including, but not limited to, 11-bit bus, Industrial Standard Architecture (ISA), Micro-Channel Architecture (MSA), Extended ISA (EISA), Intelligent Drive Electronics (IDE), VESA Local Bus (VLB), Peripheral Component Interconnect (PCI), Universal Serial Bus (USB), Advanced Graphics Port (AGP), Personal Computer Memory Card International Association bus (PCMCIA), and Small Computer Systems Interface (SCSI).
The system memory 2716 includes volatile memory 2720 and nonvolatile memory 2722. The basic input/output system (BIOS), containing the basic routines to transfer information between elements within the computer 2712, such as during start-up, is stored in nonvolatile memory 2722. By way of illustration, and not limitation, nonvolatile memory 2722 can include read only memory (ROM), programmable ROM (PROM), electrically programmable ROM (EPROM), electrically erasable ROM (EEPROM), or flash memory. Volatile memory 2720 includes random access memory (RAM), which acts as external cache memory. By way of illustration and not limitation, RAM is available in many forms such as synchronous RAM (SRAM), dynamic RAM (DRAM), synchronous DRAM (SDRAM), double data rate SDRAM (DDR SDRAM), enhanced SDRAM (ESDRAM), Synchlink DRAM (SLDRAM), and direct Rambus RAM (DRRAM).
Computer 2712 also includes removable/non-removable, volatile/non-volatile computer storage media.
It is to be appreciated that
A user enters commands or information into the computer 2712 through input device(s) 2736. Input devices 2736 include, but are not limited to, a pointing device such as a mouse, trackball, stylus, touch pad, keyboard, microphone, joystick, game pad, satellite dish, scanner, TV tuner card, digital camera, digital video camera, web camera, and the like. These and other input devices connect to the processing unit 2714 through the system bus 2718 via interface port(s) 2738. Interface port(s) 2738 include, for example, a serial port, a parallel port, a game port, and a universal serial bus (USB). Output device(s) 2740 use some of the same type of ports as input device(s) 2736. Thus, for example, a USB port may be used to provide input to computer 2712, and to output information from computer 2712 to an output device 2740. Output adapter 2742 is provided to illustrate that there are some output devices 2740 like monitors, speakers, and printers, among other output devices 2740 that require special adapters. The output adapters 2742 include, by way of illustration and not limitation, video and sound cards that provide a means of connection between the output device 2740 and the system bus 2718. It should be noted that other devices and/or systems of devices provide both input and output capabilities such as remote computer(s) 2744.
Computer 2712 can operate in a networked environment using logical connections to one or more remote computers, such as remote computer(s) 2744. The remote computer(s) 2744 can be a personal computer, a server, a router, a network PC, a workstation, a microprocessor based appliance, a peer device or other common network node and the like, and typically includes many or all of the elements described relative to computer 2712. For purposes of brevity, only a memory storage device 2746 is illustrated with remote computer(s) 2744. Remote computer(s) 2744 is logically connected to computer 2712 through a network interface 2748 and then physically connected via communication connection 2750. Network interface 2748 encompasses communication networks such as local-area networks (LAN) and wide-area networks (WAN). LAN technologies include Fiber Distributed Data Interface (FDDI), Copper Distributed Data Interface (CDDI), Ethernet/IEEE 1102.3, Token Ring/IEEE 1102.5 and the like. WAN technologies include, but are not limited to, point-to-point links, circuit switching networks like Integrated Services Digital Networks (ISDN) and variations thereon, packet switching networks, and Digital Subscriber Lines (DSL).
Communication connection(s) 2750 refers to the hardware/software employed to connect the network interface 2748 to the bus 2718. While communication connection 2750 is shown for illustrative clarity inside computer 2712, it can also be external to computer 2712. The hardware/software necessary for connection to the network interface 2748 includes, for exemplary purposes only, internal and external technologies such as, modems including regular telephone grade modems, cable modems and DSL modems, ISDN adapters, and Ethernet cards.
What has been described above includes examples of the present invention. It is, of course, not possible to describe every conceivable combination of components or methodologies for purposes of describing the present invention, but one of ordinary skill in the art may recognize that many further combinations and permutations of the present invention are possible. Accordingly, the present invention is intended to embrace all such alterations, modifications and variations that fall within the spirit and scope of the appended claims. Furthermore, to the extent that the term "includes" is used in either the detailed description or the claims, such term is intended to be inclusive in a manner similar to the term "comprising" as "comprising" is interpreted when employed as a transitional word in a claim.
1. A notification system embodied on a computer-readable storage medium, comprising computer-executable instructions that, when executed on a computer, implement:
- a component that generates a notification to a user of the computer when displayed on a display screen of one or more display screens of the computer, the notification being associated with a message having an assigned urgency; and
- an information controller that: receives attentional inputs associated with the user and determines the user's current activity and focus of attention based on the attentional inputs, dynamically selects a location on the one or more display screens based on the user's current activity and focus of attention and the assigned urgency; and presents an information herald representing the notification in the selected location, wherein the selected location is such that the distance of the information herald from the user's focus of attention decreases as the urgency increases.
2. The system of claim 1, the information controller receives inputs regarding user activities and employs one or more attention models to generate one or more dynamic outputs to control how the information herald is provided to users at a workspace.
3. The system of claim 2, the information herald operates at various locations in the workspace and receives dynamically adjustable data from the information controller in order to control the location and format of the information herald.
4. The system of claim 2, the information controller provides attention-sensitive placement and configuration of the information herald based on a user's activity via the attention models or other inputs about focus of visual attention including gaze and pose information.
5. The system of claim 1, the information controller removes the information herald after some threshold time or fades the information herald from view over time.
6. The system of claim 1, the information herald provides more detailed information when a user selects the information herald via an input command.
7. The system of claim 6, the input command includes at least one of a keystroke, mouse click, a mouse hover, and or voice command.
8. The system of claim 1, the information controller includes controls for timing out after a wait period, allowing users to continue to work with or without a glance at the information herald.
9. The system of claim 8, the information controller processes an implicit signal from users that they are not interested by information presented in the information herald without requiring an explicit user action.
10. The system of claim 1, the information controller includes at least one of a dynamic positioning control, a dynamic sizing control, a dynamic content control, a dynamic rendering control, a dynamic audio control, a dynamic timing control, and or a dynamic fading control.
11. The system of claim 10, the dynamic rendering control changes the appearance of the information herald or content therein based on the urgency value and the user's determined activity, the appearance including at least one of colors, shapes, and or fonts.
12. The system of claim 1, the information herald is dynamically adjusted to an iconic form based upon the summarized notification or an action by the user.
13. The system of claim 1, the summarized notifications include at least one of a line of message, a message chunk, or a message outline.
14. The system of claim 1, the information herald is dynamically positioned based upon an automatically determined urgency value for a notification.
15. The system of claim 1, further comprising an audio herald that is controlled by the information controller using auditory cues that represent the urgency of an incoming message.
16. The system of claim 15, the information controller only uses the audio herald, or adds an audio cue when no user is detected.
17. The system of claim 1, the information controller employs a dwell time for display of the information herald whose duration dynamically adjusts based on at least one of the distance of the herald's display location from the user's focus of attention or the user's workload.
18. The system of claim 17, the information herald is appended to a herald journal or folder after a predetermined time, the herald journal or folder allowing a user to inspect the information herald at a later time.
19. A system embodied on a computer-readable storage medium that facilitates message processing by a user, comprising:
- means for automatically prioritizing a message;
- means for generating a herald containing a summary of the message;
- means for determining a user's current focus of attention;
- means for dynamically locating the herald in a user's workspace;
- means for expanding the information relating to the message presented in the user's workspace based on a user input involving the herald,
- wherein: the priority of the message increases as time passes without the user providing the user input involving the herald; and the means for dynamically locating the herald locates the herald such that the distance between the herald location and the user's focus of attention decreases with increasing message priority.
20. The system of claim 19, further comprising means for analyzing the users activities in order to dynamically locate the message.
21. A method for automatically notifying a user, comprising:
- operating a processor to perform a method comprising: automatically determining an output region of a display for a message; automatically determining a priority for the message; automatically placing the message in the output region; automatically determining a focus of attention of a user; automatically placing the output region in a default region of a workspace; increasing the priority of the message based on a passage of time; and dynamically moving the output region, the output region being spaced relative to the determined focus of attention such that: the separation between the output region and the focus of attention decreases as the priority of the message increases; and the output region is separated from the focus of attention such that the output region does not overlay a current work position.
22. The method of claim 21, further comprising automatically locating the output region based upon the priority.
23. The method of claim 21, further comprising automatically changing the appearance of the output region based upon at least one of the priority or the user's detected activities.
24. The method of claim 21, further comprising automatically applying at least one control to dynamically change the output region, the at least one control associated with at least one of a position, a size, a content, an appearance, a sound, or a time.
25. The method of claim 21, further comprising automatically summarizing the message prior to placing the message in the output region.
26. The method of claim 21, further comprising automatically moving content associated with the output region to an electronic journal for deferred review.
27. The method of claim 21, the detected activities are determined in accordance with the model.
28. The method of claim 27, the model processes at least one of a location, a visual pose, a calendar, a time, an appointment status, an acoustical signal, an application in focus, an inspection interval, an application usage pattern, and or user device activity to determine an attentional focus of a user.
29. A method for controlling notifications to a user, comprising:
- operating at least one processor to perform a method comprising: monitoring a user's activities; determining an attentional state of the user based on the user's activities; determining a location on a display of the user's current focus of attention; constructing an attention model to analyze the user's activities, the attention model analyzes a utility capturing a cost of a user in an attentional state being disrupted by a task or communication event; selecting a distance based at least in part on the utility generated from the attention model; and dynamically placing information alerts within a workspace at the selected distance from the user's current focus of attention.
30. The method of claim 29, the cost is assessed as a willingness to pay to avoid a disruption in dollars for a respective combination of disruptions.
31. The method of claim 29, further comprising computing an expected cost of interruption (ECI) by summing over utilities, weighted by a likelihood of respective states of attention, conditioned on a stream of incoming sensory information, wherein ECI is stated as: ECI = ∑ j p ( A i ❘ E ) u ( D i, A j )
- wherein:
- u(Di,Aj) is the utility;
- Ai is the attentional state;
- Di is the task or communication event; and
- p(Aj|E) is the probability of an attentional state, conditioned on an evidence stream E.
32. A method for controlling notifications to a user, comprising:
- monitoring a user's activities;
- determining a focus of attention of the user based on the monitored activities;
- providing one or more user controls on a display, the user controls allowing a user to configure preferences regarding how the herald is displayed, and the preferences including at least a setting that allows a user to specify a threshold herald priority level below which a herald will remain at a periphery of the display;
- determining a priority for a received herald;
- dynamically controlling the display location of the received herald, the dynamically controlling comprising: when the priority of the received herald is below the threshold level, displaying the herald at a location on the periphery of the display; and when the priority of the received herald is above the threshold level, displaying the herald at a location that is a distance from the user's determined focus of attention selected based at least in part on the priority.
33. The method of claim 32, further comprising providing an entry point into the user controls for the herald for configuring policies regarding positioning and rendering of the heralds.
34. The method of claim 32, further comprising providing a particular region or button with the herald that allows entry into controls for adjustment in general or for the case at hand.
35. The method of claim 32, the one or more user controls comprise a rich control panel for specifying preferences about heralds.
36. The method of claim 32, further comprising controls for opening and closing complex structures associated with the herald.
37. The method of claim 32, the controls include general gestures that enables users to ignore the herald for a time period.
38. The method of claim 37, the controls are coupled with a "snooze" feature, allowing user to indicate a predetermined period for the herald to return.
39. The method of claim 32, the herald is dynamically positioned with respect to the user's determined focus of attention based upon an urgency associated with a message.
40. The method of claim 32, further comprising automatically providing a list of heralds that have been missed while a user has been detected to be away.
41. The method of claim 40, further comprising providing a time-out function based upon a determined importance of the heralds appearing in the list of herald.
42. The method of claim 41, further comprising sorting important heralds into a first folder and time-out heralds in a subsequent folder.
43. The method of claim 32, further comprising automatically analyzing spatial and temporal constraints that are based on a type of software application, a configuration of displayed information associated with the application, or current or recent specific interactions with application content.
44. The method of claim 43, the constraints are employed to ensure that a herald does not obfuscate important content or disrupt a current interaction and to minimize the disruptiveness of a rendering of the herald.
45. The method of claim 43, further comprising automatically positioning a keep out area over selected portions of a user's display or displays to ensure that a herald is not placed in a position that will overlay a position where a user is currently working.
46. The method of claim 45, further comprising processing a user's current activity and providing a brief temporal keep out area that is applied to delay a herald rendering.
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Patent History
Type: Grant
Filed: Jun 30, 2003
Date of Patent: Jun 22, 2010
Patent Publication Number: 20040098462
Assignee: Microsoft Corporation (Redmond, WA)
Inventors: Eric J. Horvitz (Kirkland, WA), Johnson T. Apacible (Redmond, WA), Chaitanya D. Sareen (Seattle, WA)
Primary Examiner: Ting Lee
Assistant Examiner: Ashraf Zahr
Attorney: Wolf, Greenfield & Sacks, P.C.
Application Number: 10/610,487
International Classification: G06F 3/048 (20060101);


text:
The manifest dreadfulness of the Syrian crisis has now driven almost 5 million people from the country, with another 7 million displaced internally. Unless the exodus is halted, Syria will be condemned to irreversible, terminal decline. This last week, however, has seen some glimmers of hope, with a ceasefire being brokered in Astana, the Kazakh capital, and Donald Trump supporting the creation of safe zones within Syria. This could be key to reconstructing that devastated land and getting meaningful amounts of aid in quickly.
The humanitarian safe zone concept recognises that the vast majority of Syrians want to remain in or return to their homeland, if it is free of the tyranny and the terror of Islamic State and President Bashar al-Assad. Trump's support could be central to getting Russia and Iran to sign up to this approach. Russia, not unexpectedly, suggests caution but does not dismiss the idea.
A pilot scheme in north-west Syria would be the best way to get the process started, with this initial zone lying between Kilis and Reyhanli in Turkey, Aleppo and Idlib. If successful, the concept could be replicated in the south on the Jordanian border, before expanding into other areas as they are liberated from Isis.
This first area, of about 1,500 sq km, is currently free of Isis and Assad regime troops, and some way from key Russian locations in Syria such as Latakia and Tartus. Predominantly controlled by the Free Syrian Army and moderate groups, it is home to about 500,000 refugees, living in abject poverty in camps near the border. These could be expanded and improved, with food, water and electricity flowing in from the many NGOs situated nearby in Turkey.
Those children who aren't lucky enough to attend the very few functioning schools, such as those run by the charity Syria Relief, would again be able to get an education. The international medical charity of which I am the security and chemical defence adviser, the Union of Medical Care and Relief Organisations (UOSSM), runs a number of effective hospitals and clinics in the area, and is preparing to increase this effort if the safe zone materialises. Some 75% of nine- to 13-year-olds in this area suffer from post-traumatic stress disorder, and they need urgent help. Our main hospital at Bab al-Hawa, just over the Turkish border near Reyhanli, has treated many of the most challenging cases from east Aleppo and continues to do so, but is short of some critical medicines and equipment.
For the safe zone to live up to its name, the Assad regime must stop dropping barrel bombs indiscriminately on civilians. Even with the ceasefire in place, places like Wadi Barada and east Ghouta are still under attack. Worst of all, Assad continues to drop chlorine (chemical) barrel bombs. As UOSSM doctors put it: "We can hide from bombs and bullets, but not gas." Trump has stated that he would not have allowed the United States to abandon its threat to intervene in Syria if chemical weapons were used, and I for one am hopeful that he will soon say that the "red line" is back in force.
The security of the first safe zone could be supported by British or American ships in the eastern Mediterranean. Their missiles and radar would negate the need for coalition aircraft to fly in "Syrian" and "Russian" air space, which is guarded by anti-aircraft weapons.