JP4321536B2 - COMMUNICATION TERMINAL DEVICE, COMMUNICATION METHOD, AND COMMUNICATION PROGRAM - Google Patents

Description

  The present invention relates to a communication terminal device, a communication method, and a communication program, and more particularly, to an archive of electronic mail to be transmitted and received.

It is known that an electronic mail is archived in a communication terminal device such as a network multifunction peripheral (Patent Document 1). The importance of archiving is increasing so that personal information is not leaked, confidential information such as companies is thoroughly managed, or communication terminal devices are not used illegally. Regardless of the case where the communication terminal device archives within itself, when using another server as the archive destination, there is a failure in communication with the archive destination server or the archive destination server is down. In some cases, it cannot be archived. Therefore, it is possible that the e-mail is not archived when the e-mail is transmitted / received to / from the outside without being archived.
Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 2004-40600

An object of the present invention is to ensure that sent and received e-mails can be archived.
An additional problem with the present invention is to provide a specific arrangement for reliably checking that archiving can be performed.

The present invention relates to a communication terminal device that transmits and receives e-mails over a network and archives e-mails.
Confirmation means for confirming normal communication with the archiving destination server by sending and deleting the dummy file to the shared folder of the archiving destination server before sending / receiving the e-mail,
An archive processing unit for transmitting archive data to the shared folder when the confirmation unit succeeds in the confirmation;
When the checking means fails the check, characterized in that a and prohibiting means for prohibiting the sending and receiving e-mail.

In addition, the present invention provides a communication terminal device for sending and receiving e-mails over a network and archiving e-mails.
Before completing the transmission / reception of the e-mail, a confirmation means for trying to connect to the archive destination server by SMTP or FTP and confirming that the communication with the archive destination server can be normally performed because the connection is successful. ,
An archive processing unit for sending the archive data to the archive destination server via SMTP or FTP when the confirmation means succeeds in the confirmation;
Prohibiting means for prohibiting transmission / reception of electronic mail when the confirmation means fails in the confirmation is provided .
Preferably, when receiving the electronic mail, the confirmation unit maintains the connection with the archive destination server during the reception of the electronic mail even after the confirmation.

Further, the present invention provides a communication method in which an electronic mail is transmitted / received via a network and an electronic mail is archived by a communication terminal device.
  Confirmation that communication with the archiving destination server can be performed normally by sending and deleting the dummy file to the shared folder of the archiving destination server by the confirmation means provided in the communication terminal device before transmission / reception of the e-mail is completed. And
  When the confirmation is successful, the archive processing means provided in the communication terminal device transmits archive data to the shared folder, and
  When the confirmation fails, transmission / reception of an electronic mail is prohibited by a prohibition unit provided in the communication terminal device.

The present invention further provides a communication method for transmitting and receiving electronic mail via a network and archiving electronic mail by a communication terminal device.
  Before the completion of the transmission / reception of the e-mail, the confirmation means provided in the communication terminal device tries the SMTP connection or the FTP connection with the archive destination server, and the connection with the archive destination server is normal because the connection is successful. Make sure you can communicate with
  When the confirmation is successful, the archive processing means provided in the communication terminal device sends the archive data to the archive destination server via SMTP transmission or FTP transmission,
  When the confirmation fails, transmission / reception of an electronic mail is prohibited by a prohibition unit provided in the communication terminal device.

In the communication program for the communication terminal device according to the present invention for sending and receiving e-mails via a network and archiving e-mails,
  In the communication terminal device,
  A confirmation command for confirming that communication with the archiving destination server can be normally performed by sending and deleting a dummy file to the shared folder before completion of transmission and reception of the e-mail;
  An archive transmission command for transmitting archive data to the shared folder when the confirmation means succeeds in the confirmation;
  When the confirmation means fails in the confirmation, a prohibition command for prohibiting transmission / reception of electronic mail is executed.

  In the communication program for the communication terminal device of the present invention for sending and receiving e-mails over a network and archiving e-mails,
  In the communication terminal device,
  Before completing the sending and receiving of e-mails, try the SMTP connection or FTP connection with the archive destination server, and confirming that it can communicate with the archive destination server normally because the connection was successful ,
  When the confirmation means succeeds in the confirmation, the archive transmission command for transmitting the archive data to the archive destination server via SMTP or FTP, and
  When the confirmation means fails in the confirmation, a prohibition command for prohibiting transmission / reception of electronic mail is executed.

  In this specification, “before transmission / reception is completed” means transmission before transmission, for example, and reception means before completion of reception, particularly before receiving the data body. In order to confirm that communication with the archive destination can be normally performed before receiving the data body, it is preferable to delay the reception stage of the envelope before reception of the data body within a range that does not time out, for example, by reception by SMTP.

  In this specification, the description regarding the communication terminal apparatus also applies to the communication method and the communication program as it is, and conversely, the description regarding the communication method also applies to the communication terminal apparatus and the communication program. In the embodiment, a network multifunction peripheral that includes a scanner and a printer and transmits and receives image data via e-mail via a network will be described. However, the type of communication terminal device itself is arbitrary.

  According to the present invention, before sending / receiving an e-mail, it is checked whether or not the communication with the archive destination server can be normally performed. For this reason, it is possible to extremely reduce the possibility of archiving e-mails that have been sent / received due to the server being archived down or communication failure.

  Here, using the ICMP (Internet Control Message Protocol) ping command, you can easily check whether you can communicate normally with the archive destination server. However, the ping command does not know that it can communicate normally with the archiving server. For example, when setting to archive with SMTP, it cannot be checked even if the SMTP server function of the archiving destination is down.

  To check whether the archiving destination server can archive normally, for example, when the archiving destination is a shared folder and the SMB (server message block) protocol is used for archiving, for example, a simple file is sent as a dummy file and shared Check if you can write to the folder and delete it. Then you can check whether you can actually archive to the shared folder based on the success or failure of writing. This technique can also be applied to FTP (File Transfer Protocol).

In addition, sending to the archiving destination server may be done by SMTP or FTP. In this case, the confirmation means tries SMTP connection or FTP connection before the completion of sending and receiving e-mails, and the archive is determined from the availability of the connection. Determine if it is possible. A successful connection via SMTP or FTP should be more successful than the ping command.
Furthermore, if the connection is maintained while receiving e-mail after successful connection by SMTP or FTP, there is no need to reconnect before sending the archive, and the archiving destination server goes down or archives while receiving e-mail. When a failure occurs in communication with the previous server, it is often possible to quickly detect this and perform processing such as stopping the reception of the e-mail.

  In the following, an optimum embodiment for carrying out the present invention will be shown.

  1 to 6 show an embodiment of the network multifunction device 2 as an example. The network MFP 2 is connected to a client 6 such as a personal computer, a mail server 8 and an archive destination server 10 via a LAN 4. The archive destination server 10 includes a shared folder according to the SMB (Server Message Block) protocol, or receives and stores data for archiving by SMTP, FTP, or the like. The LAN 4 is connected to the Internet 14 via the router 12. The network MFP 2 includes a LAN interface 16, a scanner 17, and a printer 18. A G3 facsimile processing unit 19 transmits and receives G3 facsimile via a PSTN (public telephone network) 20. Note that the data to be archived is an electronic mail transmitted / received through at least the LAN interface 16, which includes Internet facsimiles, and G3 facsimile documents may also be archived.

  The network MFP 2 includes an HTTP server function processing unit 21, an SMTP server function processing unit 22, and an Internet facsimile function processing unit 23. The network multifunction peripheral 2 provides a Web page to the client 6 as an HTTP server, sends / receives e-mail to / from an external terminal connected to the client 6 or the Internet 14, and an image read by the scanner 17 by the Internet facsimile function processing unit 23. Data, image data received from the public telephone line network 20, and the like are transmitted as an Internet facsimile in an e-mail format. Similarly, the Internet facsimile function processing unit 23 receives an Internet facsimile in an electronic mail format, prints it with the printer 18, transfers it to the client 6, and performs G3 facsimile transfer from the G3 facsimile processing unit 19.

  The archive processing unit 24 archives e-mails to be transmitted / received, and also archives G3 facsimiles transmitted / received by the G3 facsimile processing unit 19. The archive data is stored in the archive destination server 10, and as the data to be archived, e-mail or G3 facsimile may be used as they are, or the image data portion in these data may be compressed. The protocol used for archive transmission is, for example, SMB, SMTP, or FTP. The archive destination check unit 25 checks whether or not communication with the archive destination server 10 can be normally performed via the LAN interface 16 before performing transmission / reception of e-mail or G3 facsimile. The unit 24 prohibits transmission / reception of electronic mail and transmission / reception of G3 facsimile.

  The image memory 26 stores image data read by the scanner 17, image data to be printed by the printer 18, and the like, and the communication memory 27 stores data communicated via the LAN interface 16 and G3 facsimile data. The G3 facsimile processing unit 19 may not be provided, and the embodiment may be applied to an archive such as a personal computer or the mail server 8.

  FIG. 2 shows an archive program 30 of the embodiment. The archive destination check command 31 checks whether or not the connection with the archive destination server 10 in FIG. 1 is possible before completion of transmission / reception of the e-mail, and the connection maintenance command 32 is when the connection with the archive destination server 10 is based on SMTP or FTP. The connection is maintained until the e-mail is received and the archive is sent. For example, the archive transmission command 33 causes the archive data to be transmitted after the e-mail is received or before the e-mail is transmitted. In addition to this, the archive program 30 may include various commands necessary for communication via the LAN 4 or the Internet 14.

  FIG. 3 shows an archive for POP reception, FIG. 4 shows an archive for SMTP reception, and FIG. 5 shows an archive for SMTP transmission. FIG. 6 shows an archive destination check procedure. In FIG. 3, when the network MFP performs POP reception, when a POP reception request is generated from the standby state in Step 1 (Step 2), the archive destination check shown in FIG. If archiving is not possible (step 4), the POP server is not requested to receive and the process returns to the standby state of step 1. If archiving is possible, POP reception is executed in step 5, and when the POP reception is completed in step 6, the e-mail received in step 7 is archived. In the case of POP reception, since it is possible to select whether or not the received data remains in the POP server, after completion of archive transmission in step 7, the POP server is requested to delete the received electronic data.

  In the case of the SMTP reception of FIG. 4, when an SMTP connection is requested in step 12 from the standby state in step 11, the archive destination check is executed in step 3 above. Return to 11). If archiving is possible, return the SYN and ACK to the sender SMTP server or SMTP client and proceed with the reception procedure (step 14), then execute SMTP reception (reception of the e-mail itself) (step 15). The e-mail is sent to the archive destination server (step 16).

  When SMTP transmission is performed from the network multifunction device, the archive destination check is performed when jumping from the standby state (step 21) in FIG. If archiving is not possible, the process returns to the standby state in step 23, and if archiving is possible, the electronic mail is archived first in step 24, and then SMTP transmission is performed in step 25.

  FIG. 6 shows the contents of the archive destination check. Depending on whether the archive destination is a shared folder, SMTP server or FTP server, in other words, whether to use the SMB protocol, SMTP or FTP for archive transmission. If the shared folder is an archive destination, a dummy file consisting of a short file is written in the shared folder in step 32, whether or not the writing is successful is checked in step 33, and deletion of the dummy file is requested in step 34. If it can be archived in the shared folder, the writing in step 33 should succeed and the deletion in step 35 should succeed. Therefore, in step 33 and step 35, it can be checked in advance twice whether or not the archive can be archived, but only one of them may be checked. When it is confirmed that the dummy file can be written to and deleted from the shared folder, archiving is enabled in step 43. If writing or deletion of the dummy file to the shared folder fails, the process proceeds from connector 1 to step 44, and archiving is disabled.

  When SMTP transmission is used for archiving, for example, a ping command is used to check whether communication with the archiving destination server is possible. However, there are servers that do not support the ping command, and the ping command reveals that normal communication is possible, but it does not know whether it can function as an SMTP server. Therefore, it is preferably checked whether or not SMTP connection to the archive destination server is possible.

  When SMTP transmission is performed to the archive destination server, it is checked in step 36 whether SMTP connection is possible. For example, a HELO command or EHLO command is transmitted, and a 250 response (OK) is returned from the archive destination server. It is checked whether or not (step 37). If a 250 response is not obtained, the process proceeds to step 44 because the connection is impossible. If a 250 response is obtained, the connection may be immediately released, but the connection is preferably maintained until archive transmission (step 37). In the case of SMTP transmission, there are several steps from the first 250 responses to the actual transmission of data, which can be done while receiving e-mail to maintain communication with the archiving destination SMTP server. Check if the destination SMTP server is down. When such an abnormality occurs, for example, SMTP reception is interrupted.

  When archiving by FTP, it is checked in step 38 whether login to the FTP server is possible, in step 39 it is checked whether it is possible to move to the archive destination directory, in step 40 it is checked whether data connection can be started, and in step 41 a dummy file is checked. Check if you can write and delete If an error occurs in any of step 38 to step 41, archiving is disabled, and if all steps are successful, archiving is enabled, and the connection is maintained until archive transmission as in step 37 (step 42). It is not necessary to perform all the checks from step 38 to step 41. For example, only the check in step 38 may be performed. Further, the maintenance of the connection until the archive transmission in step 37 or step 42 may be omitted.

In the embodiment, the following effects can be obtained.
(1) Immediately before sending / receiving an e-mail, it is checked whether communication with the archive destination can be performed normally.
(2) By using the ping command, you can simply check whether normal communication with the archive destination is possible.
(3) By writing a dummy file to the archive destination, you can easily check whether the archive data can actually be saved to the archive destination.
(4) Checking whether archiving is possible based on whether SMTP connection or FTP connection is possible can also check whether the archiving destination is operating normally as an SMTP server or FTP server. A little more.
(5) When archiving is performed by SMTP or FTP, if the connection made for checking the archive destination is maintained until archive transmission, there is no need to reconnect at the time of archive transmission. In addition, it is possible to interrupt the reception of an e-mail by detecting, for example, when the archive destination server is down during the e-mail reception.

Block diagram of the network multifunction device of the embodiment Block diagram of the archive program of the embodiment Example block diagram showing the archiving procedure for POP reception Example block diagram showing the archiving procedure when receiving SMTP Example block diagram showing the archiving procedure for SMTP transmission Block diagram showing the archive destination check procedure in the embodiment

Explanation of symbols

2 Network MFP 4 LAN
6 Client 8 Mail Server 10 Archive Destination Server 12 Router 14 Internet 16 LAN Interface 17 Scanner 18 Printer 19 G3 Facsimile Processing Unit 20 PSTN (Public Telephone Network)
21 HTTP server function processing unit 22 SMTP server function processing unit 23 Internet facsimile function processing unit 24 Archive processing unit 25 Archive destination check unit 26 Image memory 27 Communication memory 30 Archive program 31 Archive destination check command 32 Connection maintenance command 33 Archive transmission command

Claims (7)

In a communication terminal device for sending and receiving e-mails over a network and archiving e-mails,
Confirmation means for confirming normal communication with the archiving server by sending and deleting a dummy file to the shared folder of the archiving server before completion of sending and receiving e-mail;
An archive processing unit for transmitting archive data to the shared folder when the confirmation unit succeeds in the confirmation;
A communication terminal apparatus, comprising: a prohibiting means for prohibiting transmission / reception of an electronic mail when the confirmation means fails in the confirmation. In a communication terminal device for sending and receiving e-mails over a network and archiving e-mails,
Before completing the transmission / reception of e-mail, the SMTP means or FTP connection with the archive destination server is tried, and the confirmation means for confirming that the communication with the archive destination server can be normally performed because the connection is successful. ,
An archive processing unit for sending the archive data to the archive destination server via SMTP or FTP when the confirmation means succeeds in the confirmation;
A communication terminal apparatus , comprising: a prohibiting means for prohibiting transmission / reception of an electronic mail when the confirmation means fails in the confirmation . 3. The communication terminal apparatus according to claim 2 , wherein, when receiving the e-mail, the confirmation unit maintains a connection with the archive destination server during the reception of the e-mail even after the confirmation. In a communication method for sending and receiving e-mails via a network and archiving e-mails by a communication terminal device,
  Confirmation that communication with the archiving destination server can be performed normally by sending and deleting the dummy file to the shared folder of the archiving destination server by the confirmation means provided in the communication terminal device before transmission / reception of the e-mail is completed. And
  When the confirmation is successful, the archive processing means provided in the communication terminal device transmits archive data to the shared folder, and
  A communication method characterized by prohibiting transmission / reception of an electronic mail by prohibiting means provided in the communication terminal device when the confirmation fails. In a communication method for sending and receiving e-mails via a network and archiving e-mails by a communication terminal device ,
By the confirmation means provided in the communication terminal device, before completion of the transmission / reception of the e-mail, the connection with the archive destination server by SMTP or FTP is tried, and the connection with the archive destination server is normal because the connection is successful. Make sure you can communicate with
When the confirmation is successful, the archive processing means provided in the communication terminal device sends the archive data to the archive destination server via SMTP transmission or FTP transmission,
A communication method characterized by prohibiting transmission / reception of an electronic mail by prohibiting means provided in the communication terminal device when the confirmation fails. A communication program for a communication terminal device for sending and receiving e-mails via a network and archiving e-mails,
  In the communication terminal device,
  A confirmation command for confirming that communication with the archiving destination server can be normally performed by sending and deleting a dummy file to the shared folder before completion of transmission and reception of the e-mail;
  An archive transmission command for transmitting archive data to the shared folder when the confirmation means succeeds in the confirmation;
  A communication program for executing a prohibition command for prohibiting transmission / reception of an electronic mail when the confirmation means fails in the confirmation. A communication program for a communication terminal device for sending and receiving e-mails via a network and archiving e-mails,
  In the communication terminal device,
  Before completing the sending and receiving of e-mails, try the SMTP connection or FTP connection with the archive destination server, and confirming that it can communicate with the archive destination server normally because the connection was successful ,
  When the confirmation means succeeds in the confirmation, the archive transmission command for transmitting the archive data to the archive destination server via SMTP or FTP, and
  A communication program for executing a prohibition command for prohibiting transmission / reception of an electronic mail when the confirmation means fails in the confirmation.

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