JP2002091876A - Electronic mail system and electronic mail display method - Google Patents

Abstract

PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To provide an electronic mail system, with which the progress of a discussion can be easily grasped by summarily displaying the discussion performed among plural users by electronic mail concerning a certain topic. SOLUTION: In the electronic mail system for transmitting/receiving electronic mail and storing the transmitted electronic mail, a mail managing part 3 retrieves electronic mail corresponding to reply mail out of transmitted electronic mail stored in a mail storage part 4, an extraction part 5 extracts correspondent quotation relation information from the retrieved relevant electronic mail and the reply mail, a quotation relation managing part 6 stores this quotation relation information in a quotation relation storage part 7. In the case of display the quotation relation managing part 6 retrieves required quotation relation information from the quotation relation storage part 7 and based on the quotation relation information, a display processing part 11 makes the text in the correspondent portion of correspondent electronic mail into form requested by a user and displays it on a display device 10.

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to an electronic mail system for transmitting and receiving electronic mail, and more particularly to an electronic mail system capable of displaying a received reply mail in association with a corresponding transmitted electronic mail.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art In recent years, with the development of data communication such as communication via the Internet, information exchange by electronic mail is becoming commonplace. E-mail is mainly one-to-one by sending a sentence by specifying the address of the other party.
However, it is also possible for a plurality of members to discuss the same subject by broadcasting or communication using a mailing list. In broadcast transmission, the same sentence can be transmitted to a plurality of members at once by specifying a plurality of mail addresses.
In the communication using the mailing list, when an e-mail is transmitted to the representative mail address, the same e-mail is transmitted to all members participating in the mailing list. In particular, in the case of a mailing list, even if the members participating in the mailing list are not accurately grasped, e-mail can be sent to a plurality of members as long as the representative address is known, and information can be exchanged in a wide range.
In addition, both communication and broadcast using mailing lists,
In response to an e-mail sent to multiple members, the receiving member sends a reply e-mail containing opinions such as rebuttal and advice to the contents, not only to the sender but also to all the members who sent the first e-mail Can be sent.
As described above, by exchanging e-mails among a plurality of members, each member can express his / her own opinion to other members or collect each member's opinion. Also, when writing a reply email, insert the quoted article into the email using specific symbols (quotation marks) to clarify which part of the quoted source is expressing your opinion. Can be. Also, when sending a reply mail, refer to the ID (identification information) of the original mail
Because the ID is added to the reply mail, some mail systems make it easy to refer to the original mail from the reply mail. However, when discussions by e-mail are vigorously conducted, a large amount of e-mail is transmitted to each member, resulting in an enormous amount, which makes it difficult to organize them. In particular, when multiple reply e-mails are sent for one e-mail, or when a reply e-mail is sent in response to a reply e-mail, the development of discussions is widespread and the e-mail It is difficult to understand the progress of the discussion only by following the order in which they were received. As a result, there is a possibility that the opinion will be stated without understanding the gist of the discussion, or a plurality of opinions with the same gist will be transmitted, thereby hindering the development of the discussion. As a prior art for solving such a problem, Japanese Patent Laid-Open No.
There is a technique disclosed in Japanese Patent No. 39392/39. This is to grasp the history of discussion by e-mail. When discussing on an electronic bulletin board, a user who expresses an opinion selects a keyword of an article, and refers to the relationship between keywords and citations between articles and citations. By displaying articles hierarchically using, the process of discussion is organized and grasped. In the prior art disclosed in Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 9-64087, the progress of e-mail exchange is displayed hierarchically by attaching an attached file describing information on the progress of e-mail exchange to the body of the e-mail to be transmitted. , Discussions, etc., in an efficient manner.

[0003]

However, in the above-mentioned prior art, the quotation and cited relationship in mail units can be accurately grasped, but it is not possible to classify the contents that are actually being discussed. In particular, when multiple issues are raised by one email, the discussions are diverse and there are various forms of reply, such as expressing opinions only on a certain issue or expressing opinions on multiple issues. Is considered to be various, and simply displaying hierarchically by mail unit requires members to look through the entire body of each mail, and it is not possible to grasp the progress of discussion on a particular topic Have difficulty. An object of the present invention is to solve such a problem of the prior art, and to make a discussion performed by e-mail between a plurality of users by summarizing and displaying opinions on a certain problem. An object of the present invention is to provide an e-mail system capable of easily grasping the progress.

[0004]

According to an aspect of the present invention, there is provided an e-mail system for transmitting and receiving an e-mail and storing at least the transmitted e-mail. Correspondence means is provided for associating the transmitted e-mail with a portion related to the quote from the e-mail in the reply mail to the e-mail. According to a second aspect of the present invention, in the first aspect of the present invention, there is provided extracting means for obtaining a quoted portion in the reply mail from the contents of the quoted electronic mail and extracting a reply portion, wherein the extracting means comprises: The corresponding part of the transmitted e-mail and the corresponding part of the reply e-mail are configured to correspond to each other. Claim 3
According to the invention described in claim 1, in the invention described in claim 1 or claim 2, there is provided association requesting means for requesting association,
When the association is requested by the association requesting means, the association means associates the transmitted e-mail with a portion related to the quote from the e-mail in the reply mail to the e-mail. did. Also,
According to a fourth aspect of the present invention, in the first or second aspect of the present invention, when a reply mail is received, the associating means associates the received reply mail with the stored transmitted e-mail, The reply mail is configured to be associated with a portion related to the quote from the electronic mail. According to the fifth aspect of the present invention, the second to fourth aspects of the present invention are described.
The invention according to any one of the above, further comprising a text display means for hierarchically displaying the text of the e-mail extracted by the extraction means, wherein the transmitted e-mail and the corresponding part of the reply mail to the e-mail are displayed. The text is displayed hierarchically. According to the invention of claim 6, in the invention of any of claims 2 to 5, the range information indicating the range of the cited part in the transmitted e-mail text, which is extracted by the extraction means, is stored. The text display means is included in the reply mail in the text based on the range information stored in the range storage means together with the text of the transmitted e-mail. The part is displayed so that it can be identified.
Further, in the invention according to claim 7, in the invention according to any one of claims 2 to 5, the text display means is provided for one of the cited portions in the transmitted e-mail extracted by the extraction means. Or, only the reply part in multiple reply mails is extracted and displayed. Also,
According to an eighth aspect of the present invention, in the electronic mail display method for displaying a reply mail, the electronic mail display method relates to a specific cited portion in the stored transmitted electronic mail and the cited portion in the reply mail of the electronic mail. Parts are associated with each other, and the text of each associated part is hierarchically displayed.

[0005]

According to the first aspect of the present invention, the transmitted electronic mail is associated with a portion related to the quote from the electronic mail in the reply mail to the electronic mail. According to a second aspect of the present invention, in the first aspect of the present invention, a quoted portion and a reply portion in the reply mail are extracted from the contents of the quoted electronic mail, and each of the electronic mail and the reply mail to the electronic mail is extracted. Corresponding parts are associated. In the invention according to claim 3, in the invention according to claim 1 or claim 2, when the association is requested by the user,
The transmitted electronic mail is associated with a portion related to the quote from the electronic mail in the reply mail to the electronic mail. According to a fourth aspect of the present invention, in the first or the second aspect of the present invention, when a reply mail is received, the received sent reply mail is stored in the received reply mail, The part related to the quote from the electronic mail is associated with the part. In the invention according to claim 5, in the invention according to any one of claims 2 to 4, the text of the transmitted e-mail and the corresponding part of the reply mail to the e-mail are displayed in a hierarchical manner. According to the invention described in claim 6, in the invention described in any one of claims 2 to 5, based on the range information stored together with the text of the transmitted e-mail, quote in the reply mail in the text. The displayed portion is displayed in an identifiable manner. In the invention according to claim 7, in the invention according to any one of claims 2 to 5, only a reply part in one or a plurality of reply mails for one cited part in the transmitted e-mail is extracted. ,
Is displayed. In the invention according to claim 8, a specific cited part in the transmitted e-mail and a part related to the cited part in the reply mail of the e-mail are associated with each other. The text is displayed hierarchically.

[0006]

Embodiments of the present invention will be described below in detail with reference to the drawings. FIG. 1 is a configuration block diagram of an electronic mail system showing an example of an embodiment of the present invention.
As shown in the figure, the e-mail system according to this embodiment includes a transmitting unit 1, a receiving unit 2, a mail managing unit 3, a mail storing unit 4, an extracting unit 5, a citation relation managing unit 6, a citation relation storing unit 7, an operation A display unit 8, an input device 9, a display device 10, and the like; Then, the transmission unit 1 transmits the e-mail created by the user via the network, the reception unit 2 receives the e-mail transmitted via the network, and passes the e-mail to the mail management unit 3. . In addition, the mail management unit 3 performs e-mail management for storing the e-mail passed from the reception unit 2 in the e-mail storage unit 4 and searching for the e-mail stored in the e-mail storage unit 4. The mail storage unit 4 is composed of a partial area such as a hard disk device, and stores various kinds of e-mails, such as received e-mails, e-mails being created, and transmitted (sent) e-mails. Keep it. The extraction unit 5
Extracts a quoted part and a reply part corresponding to the quoted part from the reply mail based on the text information of the sent electronic mail of the quoted source. Further, the citation relation management unit 6 receives citation relation information on the citation part extracted by the extraction unit 5 and its reply part from the extraction unit 5 and stores the citation relation storage unit 7. The operation / display unit 8 includes a display processing unit.
11 and an input processing unit 12, and the display processing unit 11 sends information about the e-mail from the mail management unit 3,
And performs various kinds of display processing based on the information, and passes the processed display information to the display device 10.
The input processing unit 12 receives a user's instruction from the input device 9 and requests information necessary for display from the mail management unit 3 and the citation relation management unit 6. The input device 9 includes a keyboard and a pointing device such as a mouse.

In this embodiment, the associating means, extracting means, associating request means, text display means, and range storage means are respectively provided in the order of the extracting unit 5 and the citation relation managing unit 6 in this order. , The extraction unit 5, the input device 9, the input processing unit 12, the display device 10, the display processing unit 11, and the citation relation storage unit 7. The mail management unit 3, the extraction unit 5, and the citation relationship management unit 6 include a shared memory for temporarily storing data and programs, a shared CPU that operates in accordance with the programs, and the like. The unit 2 and the operation / display unit 8 include the memory, CPU, dedicated circuit, and the like. With such a configuration, in the electronic mail system of this embodiment, all the electronic mails are stored (stored) in the mail storage unit 4. Normal transmission and reception of mails, management of received mails, and the like are performed by the transmission unit 1, the reception unit 2, and the mail management unit 3. Each email has unique identification information (hereafter, ID
When sending a reply e-mail to a certain e-mail, it has the ID of the original e-mail as a reference ID. When extracting the citation relationship, the mail management unit 3 searches for an e-mail corresponding to the reply mail from the transmitted e-mails, and passes the relevant e-mail to the extraction unit 5. The extraction unit 5 extracts quotation-related information from the quoted electronic mail and the quoted reply mail, and passes the extracted quotation-related information to the quotation-related management unit 6. The citation relation information is stored in the citation relation storage unit 7, and when displaying the citation relation information, the citation relation management unit 6 searches the citation relation storage unit 7 for necessary citation relation information and passes it to the display processing unit 11. As a result, the display processing unit 11 processes the main body information (text) of the electronic mail (hereinafter abbreviated to mail) based on the passed citation-related information, and transfers it to the display device 10 in a form desired by the user. Further, when a display switching instruction is given from the user, the input processing unit 12 requests and obtains necessary information from the mail management unit 3 and the citation relation management unit 6.

The operation when the user requests the display of the relationship between mails will be described below with reference to FIG.
First, the user selects an e-mail from which a reply status and the development of a discussion are to be grasped from the e-mail list displayed on the display device 10 (S1). Note that the mail storage unit 4 of the e-mail system used by the user has a configuration shown in FIGS.
It is assumed that the mail as shown in FIG. The mails in FIGS. 3 to 6 are mails transmitted to one mailing list and distributed. Now, it is assumed that the user selects the mail in FIG. Thereby, the mail management unit 3 acquires the ID of the mail selected by the user, searches the mail storage unit 4 for a reply mail having the ID as the reference ID (S2), and if there is a corresponding reply mail ( S3
Yes), the original mail and the text (contents) of the retrieved reply mail are passed to the extraction unit 5. For example, in the example shown in FIG. 3, the ID of the selected e-mail is "1001".
A mail with an ID of “1001” is searched, and as a search result, a mail of “ID: 1002” shown in FIG. 4 and a mail of “ID: 1003” shown in FIG.
Is obtained, and the texts of these three mails are passed to the extraction unit 5. Subsequently, the extraction unit 5 compares the original mail obtained from the mail management unit 3 with the body of the reply mail,
The quoted portion in the reply mail is extracted, and the quoted portion in the original mail is extracted (S4). Further, a block of sentences (for example, a paragraph) immediately after the quoted portion in the reply mail is extracted as a reply portion (S4), and the ID of each mail, range information indicating the cited portion of the quote source, the quoted portion and the reply portion are extracted. The range information and the like shown are passed to the citation relation management unit 6. If there is no quoted part, only the ID of the reply mail is passed to the quote relation management unit 6. The range information is information indicating a start position and an end position.

For example, when extracting quotes and cited contents in the mails shown in FIGS. 3 and 4, first, in FIG.
Is searched for a character string included in the body of the mail shown in FIG. 3 in the mail shown in FIG. At this time, if a specific quotation mark (">" in this case) is added, the search is performed after removing it. As a result of the search, the e-mail shown in Fig. 3 shows "Q1.
2． Until next time ... "is extracted as the cited part. In the mail shown in Fig. 4, the paragraph between the first and second cited parts," I am ... You. The paragraph up to "response to the first quotation", the paragraph after the second quotation to "last time, please"
It is considered the response to the second citation. The citation relation management unit 6 stores the citation relation information received from the extraction unit 5 in the citation relation storage unit 7 (S5). As shown in FIG. 7, as a table for each original document ID, the citation relation storage unit 7
To memorize it. In FIG. 7, as an example, a quoted portion,
The start and end of the response part are stored as coordinate values.
The mail management unit 3 recursively searches for a reply mail in response to the searched reply mail, and terminates the search when there is no longer a reply connection. Since the reply mail shown in FIG. 6 exists for the mail shown in FIG. 4, the mail shown in FIG. 4 is repeated as the original mail, and the mail shown in FIG.

Next, a description will be given of an operation for extracting a citation relationship between mails for all mails each time a mail arrives without a user's instruction. First, when the receiving unit 2 receives a new mail, it passes the mail to the mail managing unit 3. Thereby, the mail management unit 3 checks the header part of the received mail, and if there is a reference ID, that is, if it is a reply mail,
From the mail stored in the mail storage unit 4, the reference ID
Search for mail with. When the mail shown in FIG. 5 arrives as a newly received mail in a state where the mail shown in FIG. 3 is stored in the mail storage unit 4, the reference ID is "100".
1 ", which is the same as the mail ID shown in FIG. 3, the mail shown in FIG. 5 is regarded as a reply mail of the mail shown in FIG. If there is no mail having the ID in the mail storage unit 4, the subsequent processing is not performed.If there is a reference ID and the mail having the ID exists in the mail storage unit 4, then the mail management unit 3
Passes the retrieved original mail and the new mail corresponding to the reply mail to the extraction unit 5. Hereinafter, the extraction operation in the extraction unit 5 is the same as the operation in step S4. Next, a description will be given of a display operation in a case where a relation between mails is displayed in a list to the user after extracting a citation relation, with reference to an operation flow shown in FIG. First, the user issues a list display request including the relation between received mails through the input device 9 (S11). As a result, the mail management unit 3 searches the mail stored in the mail storage unit 4 for a mail having no reference ID, that is, for a newly transmitted original mail instead of a reply (S12). For example, when the mails shown in FIGS. 3 to 6 are stored, the mail shown in FIG. 3 is searched as the original mail. And of the email
The ID is passed to the citation relation management unit 6. The user can request a list display only for a specific mail. In this case, the user passes only the ID of the specified mail to the citation relation management unit 6. Subsequently, the citation relation management unit 6 searches the citation relation storage unit 7 based on the ID passed from the mail management unit 3, and searches for the ID.
Ask for ID of reply mail to. Furthermore, the citation relation storage unit 7 is similarly searched for the obtained mail ID, and if there is a reply mail, the ID is obtained. When all citation relations have been searched, the ID and citation relation information are passed to the display processing unit 11 (S13). In the email example shown in FIG.
As a result of the citation relation search, "ID: 1002" and "ID: 1003" are obtained as reply mails to "ID: 1001" from the table shown in FIG. Ten
“ID: 1004” is obtained as a reply mail to “02”, and those IDs, quote range information, and reply range information are displayed in the display processing unit 11.
(S13). In order to obtain the text, the citation relation managing unit 6 passes the obtained ID to the mail managing unit 3. The mail management unit 3 is passed from the citation relation management unit 6
The reply mail stored in the mail storage unit 4 is searched based on the ID (S14), and is sent to the display processing unit 11. Subsequently, the display processing unit 11 shapes display items for indenting mails having a citation relationship so that the citation relationship can be clearly understood (S15), and transmits the transmitted e-mail and the e-mail. The display device 10 hierarchically displays a list composed of the corresponding portions of the reply mails to (step S16). Display examples are shown in FIG. 9 and FIG. Figure
Numeral 10 shows a reply mail to the original mail, in which the relationship between citations and citations is displayed with the text (content) for each content. When a reply is made to each of a plurality of parts of the original mail as in the mail shown in FIG. 4, the respective parts are displayed as separate replies.

Next, according to the operation flow shown in FIG.
The operation for displaying the relationship between mails in detail will be described. First, the user uses the input device 9 to select a specific mail, and requests a detailed display of the text and citation information.
For the display screen as shown in FIGS. 9 and 10, a detailed display is requested by clicking a figure (square mark, frame, or the like) representing a desired mail with a pointing device such as a mouse (S21). . As a result, the input processing unit 12 sends the information for the next display to be switched to the display processing unit 11 if the information is held, and sends the information to the mail management unit 3 and the citation relationship management unit 6 otherwise. Request (S22). Then, in the latter case, the mail management unit 3 obtains the ID of the mail selected by the user, searches the mail storage unit 4 based on the ID, and sends the acquired mail text to the display processing unit 11. Hand over (S23). The e-mail ID is passed to the citation relation management unit 6 (S23). Subsequently, the citation relation management unit 6 uses the passed ID to store the citation relation storage unit 7.
Is searched, and the citation relation table of the specified mail (FIG. 7)
Is passed to the display processing unit 11 (S24). In this way, the display processing unit 11 changes the display as instructed by the user by combining the information of the mail body from the mail management unit 3 with the citation-related information passed from the citation-related management unit 6, or Is newly displayed in the window (S2
Five). This display example is shown in FIG. 12 and FIG. In FIG. 12, when displaying the text of the original mail, a portion quoted by the reply mail is displayed with marker information such as a frame. In other words, the quoted part in the reply mail is displayed in an identifiable manner. Instead of the marker information such as the frame, it is displayed in a different color, highlighted, or displayed in a different font type. May be. In the example shown in FIG. 12, a list of reply mails is displayed, and the body of the reply mail is displayed by pressing a button or the like. In addition, when it is desired to grasp the development of the discussion on a specific topic, a marker part (selection part) in the list display (see FIGS. 9 and 10) is designated, and as shown in FIG. Lists only the agenda and the reply part of the reply mail. If a reply is further present in the sentence displayed as a reply, the reply can be further referred to by attaching a marker to that part.

[0012]

As described above, the present invention has the following effects. According to the first aspect of the present invention, the transmitted e-mail is associated with the portion related to the quote from the e-mail in the reply e-mail to the e-mail. It is possible to see at a glance only the discussion points to be performed, and therefore, it is possible to easily grasp the progress of the discussion. Further, in the invention according to claim 2, in the invention according to claim 1, a quoted portion and a reply portion in the reply mail are extracted from the contents of the quoted electronic mail, and the e-mail and the reply mail to the e-mail are extracted. Since the corresponding parts are associated with each other, the effect of the invention described in claim 1 can be easily realized. According to the third aspect of the present invention, in the first or second aspect of the invention, when the user requests the association, the designated transmitted e-mail and the reply mail to the e-mail Since the portion related to the quote from the electronic mail is associated with the electronic mail, only the electronic mail relating to the electronic mail specified by the user is associated with the electronic mail. An increase can be prevented. According to a fourth aspect of the present invention, in the first or second aspect of the present invention, when the reply mail is received, the received reply mail is stored in the stored transmitted e-mail and the reply mail. Since the portion related to the quotation from the electronic mail in the above is correlated, when the user tries to browse the correlated text, he can quickly see it. Further, in the invention according to claim 5, in the invention according to any one of claims 2 to 4, the text of the transmitted e-mail and the part of the reply mail corresponding to the e-mail are displayed in a hierarchical manner. Therefore, the user can grasp the development of the discussion more easily.

Further, according to the invention described in claim 6, according to claim 2,
In the invention according to any one of the first to fifth aspects, based on the range information stored together with the text of the transmitted e-mail,
Since the part quoted in the reply mail in the text is displayed in an identifiable manner, the topic part can be easily grasped in relation to the whole. Also, in the invention according to claim 7, in the invention according to any one of claims 2 to 5, only the reply part in one or more reply mails to one cited part in the transmitted e-mail is omitted. Since it is issued and displayed, it is possible to efficiently grasp the entire development of the discussion on the narrowed topic. In the invention according to claim 8, a specific cited part in the transmitted e-mail and a part related to the cited part in the reply mail of the e-mail are associated with each other, Since the text of the portion is displayed in a hierarchical manner, the same effect as the invention according to claim 7 can be obtained.

[Brief description of the drawings]

FIG. 1 is a configuration block diagram of an electronic mail system showing an example of an embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 2 is an operation flowchart of an electronic mail system showing an example of an embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 3 is an explanatory diagram of an electronic mail system showing an example of an embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 4 is another explanatory diagram of the electronic mail system showing an example of the embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 5 is another explanatory diagram of the electronic mail system showing an example of the embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 6 is another explanatory diagram of the electronic mail system showing an example of the embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 7 is a data configuration diagram of a main part of an electronic mail system showing an example of an embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 8 is another operation flow diagram of the electronic mail system showing an example of the embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 9 is a screen view of an electronic mail system showing an example of an embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 10 is another screen view of the e-mail system showing an example of the embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 11 is another operation flow chart of the electronic mail system showing an example of the embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 12 is another screen view of the electronic mail system showing an example of the embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 13 is another screen view of the electronic mail system showing an example of the embodiment of the present invention.

[Explanation of symbols]

 DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 1 Transmission part 2 Receiving part 3 Mail management part 4 Mail storage part 5 Extraction part 6 Citation relation management part 7 Citation relation storage part 8 Operation / display part 9 Input device 10 Display device 11 Display processing part 12 Input processing part

Claims (8)

[Claims] Claims: 1. An electronic mail transmission / reception,
In an e-mail system for storing at least transmitted e-mails, there is provided an associating means for associating the transmitted e-mails with a portion related to a quote from the e-mails in a reply mail to the e-mails An e-mail system characterized by the following. 2. The electronic mail system according to claim 1, further comprising: extracting means for obtaining a quoted portion in the reply mail from the contents of the quoted electronic mail and extracting a reply portion, wherein the extracting means transmits the quoted portion. An e-mail system wherein an e-mail and a corresponding part of a reply e-mail corresponding to the e-mail are associated with each other. 3. The electronic mail system according to claim 1, further comprising: association request means for requesting an association, wherein when the association is requested by said association request means, said association means. Has a structure in which a transmitted e-mail is associated with a portion related to a quote from the e-mail in a reply mail to the e-mail. 4. The electronic mail system according to claim 1, wherein when a reply mail is received, the correspondence unit associates the received reply mail with the stored transmitted mail, An electronic mail system, wherein a part related to a quote from the electronic mail in the reply mail is associated with the electronic mail. 5. The electronic mail system according to claim 2, further comprising: a text display means for hierarchically displaying the text of the e-mail extracted by the extraction means; An e-mail system, wherein a mail and a corresponding part of a reply mail corresponding to the e-mail are displayed in a hierarchical manner in a body. 6. The electronic mail system according to claim 2, wherein range information indicating a range of a cited portion in the transmitted electronic mail text, extracted by the extracting unit, is stored. The text display means is included in the reply mail in the text based on the range information stored in the range storage means together with the text of the transmitted e-mail. An electronic mail system characterized in that parts are displayed so as to be identifiable. 7. The electronic mail system according to claim 2, wherein the text display unit is configured to output one of the cited portions in the transmitted electronic mail extracted by the extraction unit. Alternatively, an electronic mail system characterized in that only a reply part in a plurality of reply mails is extracted and displayed. 8. An e-mail display method for displaying a reply e-mail, wherein a specific cited part in the stored transmitted e-mail and a part related to the cited part in the reply e-mail of the e-mail are displayed. An e-mail display method characterized by displaying the body of each associated part in a hierarchical manner.