Distinguishing conference participants

摘要

Technologies are described herein for distinguishing between conference participants associated with different groups. A communication is received from a participant during a conference. The participant's group affiliation is determined and a representation attribute corresponding to the group is used to render the communication within the conference. As a result, the communications from participants of like groups are displayed with like representation attributes to visually distinguish the communications according to group affiliations. An administrator may designate the representation attributes so that all of the communications from participants of the same group are similarly distinguished without action from the participants. Participants may filter the communications as desired according to the groups and corresponding representation attributes.

主权项

1. A method for distinguishing conference participants, the method comprising:
receiving a message associated with a conference participant; determining a group of conference participants with which the conference participant is associated from a plurality of groups of conference participants with which the conference participant is associated, the group of conference participants with which the conference participant is associated being determined according to a rendering priority rule defining an order in which the plurality of groups are to be rendered; receiving a representation attribute associated with the group, the representation attribute comprising data defining a visual format for rendering messages associated with the group on a computer display; and rendering the message on the computer display in the visual format defined by the representation attribute.