Group Subscriber Number Management System for Messaging Services
Find Innovative SolutionsGenerate Solutions
Solution Overview
Problem
Existing group messaging services face increasing costs due to the need for a large pool of unique group subscriber numbers, which grows with the number of users and groups, leading to inefficient maintenance and variable costs for service providers.
Innovation Solution
Implementing a system that uses a small, fixed pool of group subscriber numbers, where each user is assigned a unique hash combining their individual subscriber number and a group subscriber number index, allowing multiple users to share the same group subscriber number, thus reducing the number of subscriber numbers required.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Measurement precision
If a unique group subscriber number is assigned to each group, then message routing accuracy is improved, but the quantity of subscriber numbers required increases linearly with the number of groups
Solution Approach 1:
The group subscriber number is segmented into multiple components: a shared group identifier portion and a user-specific portion. This segmentation allows multiple users to share the same group subscriber number while the system can still distinguish between different users within the group through the user-specific portion, thereby maintaining routing accuracy while reducing the total number of unique subscriber numbers needed.
Solution Approach 2:
The group subscriber number is designed to serve multiple functions simultaneously: it identifies the group, enables user-specific messaging within the group, and supports message routing. By making the subscriber number multi-functional, the system eliminates the need for separate identifiers for each user-group combination, thereby reducing the quantity of subscriber numbers required while maintaining routing precision.
2Adaptability or versatility
If a large pool of group subscriber numbers is maintained to support growing users and groups, then service scalability is improved, but maintenance complexity and costs increase
Solution Approach 1:
Multiple user-group relationships are merged into a single shared group subscriber number. Instead of maintaining separate subscriber numbers for each user within a group, the system combines them under one identifier, significantly reducing the total number of subscriber numbers that need to be maintained and managed as the service grows.
Solution Approach 2:
The system changes the parameter of subscriber number assignment from one-to-one (one number per user-group) to many-to-one (multiple users sharing one group number). This parameter change fundamentally alters the scaling behavior, allowing the service to grow without a proportional increase in the number of subscriber numbers to maintain.
3Productivity
If one message is sent to a group subscriber number, then user messaging efficiency is improved, but the service provider incurs increased costs for maintaining group subscriber numbers
Solution Approach 1:
The system creates a shared copy of the group subscriber number that can be referenced by multiple users simultaneously. Instead of requiring unique subscriber numbers for each user, the system uses this copied identifier, allowing efficient group messaging while reducing the cost of maintaining subscriber number pools.
Data Source
Figure 1
Figure 2
Figure 3
AI summary
A method for managing group subscriber numbers in a group messaging device reduces the required number of group subscriber numbers used by the messaging service. The required number of group subscriber numbers is equal to the total number of groups in which a user is permitted to be a member and not the total number of groups of users in the system.