JPH1131111A - Electronic mail item managing system and medium used for the same - Google Patents

Abstract

PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To efficiently support item management by list-displaying a mail containing ID similar to an item ID of a designated mail. SOLUTION: An electronic mail item management system 60 is provided with an item management part 62 in addition to the ordinary function of a mail management system by using message API(application programming interface) 61 which OS supplies. The item management part 62 manages item DB (data base) 63. For supporting item management, an item ID is automatically given to the mail when the first mail in the transfer of the mail constituting the item is transmitted or received. Then, the item ID is shared by the mail contained in the same transfer. Mails belonging to the same items are displayed on a mail list display means by separate item for the respective items identified by the item IDs. A mail group is moved from one holder to another holder for every item based on the item ID.

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

[0001]

[0001] 1. Field of the Invention [0002] The present invention relates to case management in an electronic mail system, and more particularly to a help desk support technology for electronic mail.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art In addition to sending and receiving e-mails, an e-mail system includes a folder creating function for organizing sent and received e-mails, a mail deleting function, a mail address managing function,
Automatic tagging function for return and forwarding mail tags,
It has a function of saving a copy of transmission, a function of automatically sorting into folders, and the like. In addition, some of them have a function of setting an access right to a mail such as reading.

[0003]

The functions described above are:
Although it is sufficient for ordinary users to use it normally, there is a problem that the following functions are insufficient or difficult to use for purposes such as managing inquiry cases that require management of a large amount of mail. For example, tags that display the attributes of mail are only available to indicate replies and forwards, and cannot be used to represent replies to reply or forwarded replies. Had to see. Further, if the pending matter is stored in one folder, it is necessary to manually move the mail received for the case, a copy of the transmitted mail, and the like to the folder. Also, when the matter was resolved, all emails related to the matter had to be moved to another folder.

[0004] On the other hand, there is also a problem that even when the mail list is viewed, the contents cannot be easily remembered because the title is inappropriate. In the end, the automatic sorting function for folders according to the above-described prior art is based on whether or not a character string such as a subject and a sender matches a character string registered in advance, so that sorting can be performed for each sender. However, there was a problem that semantically inappropriate sorting was unavoidable in the case of a subject with high arbitrariness. The present invention has been made in view of the above circumstances, and its purpose is to solve the above-described problems in the conventional technology and to manage inquiries by e-mail and the like in fields where mass mail management is required. Another object of the present invention is to provide an electronic mail case management system that facilitates the organization and display of mail data and efficiently supports case management.

[0005]

The present invention has the following characteristic configuration for supporting case management. That is, in the invention according to claim 1, in order to support the case management, when the first mail in the exchange of the mails constituting the case is transmitted or received, the case ID is automatically given to this mail. There is provided a means for sharing the case ID with mails included in the same exchange, and a case-by-case mail list display means for displaying, for each case identified by the case ID, mail belonging to the case ID. In the invention according to claim 2, for the purpose of case management support,
In addition to the means for sharing the case ID described above, this case ID
Means for setting, referring to and displaying the case attributes such as the case title and case type for each case identified by, and the mail within the case such as the mail title and the type indicating the history in the case for each mail belonging to the case Means for setting, referencing and displaying attributes are provided. In the invention according to claim 3,
In order to support the case management, in addition to the means for sharing the case ID described above, based on this case ID, regardless of whether the e-mail is sent or received, the mail group is stored in one folder for each case. Means for storing and means for moving the mail group from one folder to another for each case are provided. Things.

[0006]

According to the first aspect of the present invention, since each mail has a case ID to which the mail belongs, a list of mails having the same ID as the case ID of the designated mail is displayed. In addition, it is possible to display a list of emails by case, and to easily execute the case management.
Further, in the invention according to claim 2, since the in-case mail attributes such as the case title, the case type, the attribute type of the mail in the case, and the mail title can be set, referred to and displayed, these are displayed in a case-by-case mail list or the like. This makes it easy to grasp the contents of the case. According to the third aspect of the present invention, regardless of whether the mail is sent or received, each case can be stored in one folder, so that mail belonging to the same case is scattered in a plurality of folders as in the related art. Eliminates the need for manual assembly. In addition, since the transfer between folders can be performed for each case, it is not necessary to perform the move operation a plurality of times.

Hereinafter, embodiments of the present invention will be described in detail with reference to the drawings. First, FIG. 11 and FIG. 12 are a diagram showing an overall configuration of an electronic mail system according to the present invention and a diagram showing a specific hardware configuration of each workstation in the system. A program for achieving the present invention is stored in a recording medium such as a CD-ROM or a floppy disk. The computer reads this program to operate the e-mail system. Hereinafter, this program will be described.

FIG. 1 shows a setting screen 10 of the electronic mail case management system according to one embodiment of the present invention.
Underlined portions indicate user input. In the “mail subtitle quote part” 11, a method of assigning a mail subtitle, which is one of the case mail attributes, is set. This can be selected from "head of text", "user specified", and "no subtitle". Here, the “head of the body” means the first non-blank characters on the second and subsequent lines to exclude greetings, etc.
Point to. In the case of “user specification”, a dialog for user specification is displayed. In the example, 20 bytes at the “head of the text” are selected.

In the "history tag" 12, a method of assigning a history tag, which is one of the mail attributes in the case, is set. Specify the character string preceding the matter title for each tag category as the tag value. In the example, the outgoing mail and "incoming reply"
"Answer" is specified before the email title. A time-series number is automatically added to the end of the tag (question 1, answer 1, question 2,..., Etc.). In the “user-defined tag” 13, a tag indicating a case type, which is one of the case attributes, is set. Define a tag specialized for the field subject to matter management. In the example, as an example of a help desk in software development, a “bug report” has a tag value “BU”.
G "and the like.

Next, the "unresolved folder name" 14 stores all the mails related to the undecided matter. In the example,
Because you specified "Inbox" as an unresolved folder,
When logged in as this user, all incoming and outgoing mails will be unresolved issues until a resolved designation is made. In the "solved folder name" 15, the destination of the mail group when the matter in the unsolved folder is solved is specified. If you specify a folder that does not exist, that folder will be created automatically.

FIG. 2 shows a folder and mail list screen 20 of the electronic mail case management system according to the embodiment. If you specify an e-mail in this list and press "Open", a normal e-mail display that has nothing to do with matter management will be displayed. FIG. 3 illustrates an example of a case-specific list screen 30 of the electronic mail case management system according to the embodiment. This screen is a list of mails on the screen 20 in FIG.
(Example in bold) This is displayed when 21 is designated and "Display by case" 22 is designated. The “user-defined tag” is displayed at the head of the case title, and the “matter history tag” 31 is displayed in the tag column of the mail list.

When there are a plurality of identical values, a numerical value indicating a temporal order is added to the “case history tag” 31. Further, when "undecided" 32 is changed to "resolved" on this screen 30, all the mails displayed in the list become "resolved".
Moved to a folder. FIG. 4 shows a mail content display screen 40 of the electronic mail case management system according to the embodiment. This screen is a list of e-mails by case in the screen of FIG.
Is displayed when is specified.

On this screen 40, "undecided" 41 is changed to "resolution"
, All the mails belonging to the matter “Shared Memory Implementation Method” to which the displayed mail belongs are moved to the “solved” folder. Further, the “previous mail” 42 and the “next mail” 43 can display the mails before and after belonging to the same matter. FIG. 5 illustrates a title editing screen 50 of the electronic mail case management system according to the embodiment. This screen is displayed when "title edit" 34 or 44 is specified on the screen of FIG. 3 or FIG. Here, the case title and the mail subtitle can be edited.

The lower "mail tag" and "mail subtitle" are displayed only when the mail is specified. The underline is editable. If the matter tag and matter title are changed, even if the email is specified,
The matter tag or matter title is updated for all emails belonging to the same matter. Next, an internal process for realizing the specifications of the above embodiment will be described. FIG.
1 illustrates an internal configuration of an electronic mail case management system according to an embodiment. The system 60 uses a message API (application programming interface) 61 provided by the OS to provide a case management unit 62 in addition to the functions of a normal mail management system. Case Management Department 6
2 manages a case DB (database) 63.

FIG. 7 shows a table configuration of a case DB in the electronic mail case management system according to the embodiment. The case table 70 includes four fields of a case ID 71, a case title 72, a case type tag 73, and a state 74, and has an index using the case ID 71 as a key. The mail table 75 has a message ID 76,
Email subtitle 77, case ID 78, history tag 7
9, which has five fields of order number 80, and has an index using the message ID 76 and the case ID 78 as keys. The mail body is stored in a file managed by the message API, and the message ID 76 holds a pointer to the mail in the file.

FIG. 10 is a table image showing an example of the “case mail set” 100. The case mail set is the case ID
With the key as the key,
This is a set of mails obtained as a result of searching for items having D. Next, a reception process and a transmission process of the email item management system according to the embodiment will be described. Here, the case ID
Is given by accessing the case DB and acquiring a new ID when the first mail in the exchange of mails constituting the case is transmitted or received.

In order to share this ID in subsequent mails included in the same case, it is necessary to include the case ID in the mail data flowing on the network and to ensure that this is not edited. Here, the configuration is such that a case ID character string is included at the end of the mail title, and this is transmitted and received as a read-only attribute. Note that even if the mail management system of the other party does not support setting of access rights such as read-only, an operating agreement may be made so as not to edit this.

FIG. 8 shows a receiving process of the electronic mail case management system according to the embodiment. First, in order to determine whether the received mail is for a new case or an existing case, it is checked whether a case ID character string is added to the title of the received mail (step 81). If the received e-mail is for a new case, a new case ID is acquired by referring to the case DB (step 82), and is attached (step 83). Further, according to the setting, a subtitle is given automatically or by user inquiry (step 84), a case record and a mail record are added to the case DB, and stored in the unresolved folder (step 8).
5).

On the other hand, if the received mail is related to an existing case, a case ID is obtained from the mail title (step 86), a case mail set is created based on the case ID, and a history tag of the received mail is determined (step 86). 87), a subtitle is given according to the setting (step 84), a mail record is added to the case DB, and stored in the unresolved folder (step 85). FIG. 9 illustrates a transmission process of the electronic mail case management system according to the embodiment. If the e-mail to be transmitted is a new case mail, the new case ID is acquired with reference to the case DB (steps 91 and 92), and the character string of this case ID is added to the mail title (step 93).

On the other hand, if it is an existing case mail, a history tag is added (step 97), and in any case, a subtitle is determined and added according to the setting (step 94), and the case DB
Update and store in unresolved folder and send
(Steps 95 and 96). Next, an internal process associated with a screen transition of the system according to the present embodiment will be described. When the case-specific display button 22 is pressed on the mail list screen 20, the case DB mail table 75 is searched by the message ID, and the case mail set 10 is searched from the case ID 78 of the found record.
0 is created and the case-specific mail list screen 30 is displayed.

When a mail is specified on the mail list screen 30 by case and "Open" is pressed, the case mail set 1 created earlier
The message ID of the mail is obtained from 00, the mail content is obtained via the message API, and the case mail content display screen 40 is displayed. Similarly, when the “previous mail” 42 and the “next mail” 43 are pressed on the case mail content display screen 40, the message I
D is obtained, the corresponding mail content is obtained via the message API, and displayed on the screen.

The title editing screen 50 transits from the screens of FIGS. 3 and 4 described above. When the case title 51 and the mail subtitle 52 are edited and confirmed, the case mail set 100 is updated, and based on this, the case DB 63
To update. When the status of a case (undecided / solved) is changed on the case-by-case mail list screen 30 and the case mail content display screen 40, the case information of the case mail set 100 is updated, and the case DB 63 is updated based on this. You. Further, the storage position of the mail content of all the mails of the case is changed from the message ID of each mail of the case mail set 100 via the message API.

The above embodiment is merely an example of the present invention, and it goes without saying that the present invention is not limited to this. For example, in an electronic mail system including a plurality of workstations as shown in FIG. 11, a program having the configuration shown in FIG. 1 is stored in a recording medium such as a CD-ROM or a floppy disk, and is stored in a computer of each workstation. As described above, the present invention may be realized by reading and processing the.

[0024]

As described above in detail, according to the present invention, in a field where mass mail management is required, such as management of inquiry cases by e-mail, mail data can be easily arranged and displayed, and case management can be achieved. This has a remarkable effect that an electronic mail case management system that efficiently supports the above can be realized.

[Brief description of the drawings]

FIG. 1 is a diagram showing an example of a setting screen of an electronic mail case management system according to an embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 2 is a diagram illustrating an example of a case list screen of the system according to the embodiment.

FIG. 3 is a diagram showing an example of a case-specific mail list screen of the system according to the embodiment.

FIG. 4 is a diagram illustrating an example of a mail content display screen of the system according to the embodiment.

FIG. 5 is a diagram illustrating an example of a subject editing screen of the system according to the embodiment.

FIG. 6 is a block diagram illustrating an internal configuration of a system according to an embodiment.

FIG. 7 is a diagram illustrating a definition of a case DB table of the system according to the embodiment.

FIG. 8 is a diagram illustrating a flow of a reception process of the system according to the embodiment;

FIG. 9 is a diagram illustrating a flow of a transmission process of the system according to the embodiment;

FIG. 10 is a diagram illustrating an example of a case mail set of the system according to the embodiment.

FIG. 11 is a diagram showing an overall configuration of an electronic mail system to which an electronic mail date management system according to the present invention is applied.

FIG. 12 is a diagram showing a specific hardware configuration of each workstation in the system shown in FIG. 11;

[Explanation of symbols]

 10 E-mail matter management system setting screen 20 Folder and mail list screen 30 E-mail list screen by matter 40 Matter mail content display screen 50 Title edit screen 60 Mail management system 62 Matter management part 63 Matter DB

Claims (4)

[Claims] 1. An electronic mail case management system, wherein a plurality of mails composed of a series of electronic mail exchanges are regarded as one case, and a case-by-case mail list display means is provided. 2. The electronic mail case management system according to claim 1, further comprising means for setting and referring to attributes of the case and attributes of each mail in the case in addition to the means. 3. In addition to each of the above means, there is a means for storing a group of e-mails in one folder for each case, regardless of whether the e-mail is sent or received, and a group of e-mails for each case. 3. The electronic mail case management system according to claim 2, further comprising means for moving from one folder to another folder. 4. A medium storing a program for realizing each means according to claim 1.