JP2009212661A - Automatic mail reply system for portable terminal - Google Patents

Abstract

<P>PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To provide an automatic mail reply system for a portable terminal in which the needs for special operations on the part of the user is eliminated, when automatically transmitting a reply mail. <P>SOLUTION: In the automatic mail reply system for a portable terminal, including a mailer 103 corresponding to automatic reception of mail, and a portable terminal common part 102 for performing common processings for a portable terminal 101, the mailer 103 is provided with the means for: requesting the portable terminal common part 102 for starting a timer when the user can not perform a reply operation on receiving mail; associating a reception mail ID with a timer ID acquired from the portable terminal common part 102 and storing them in a timer management DB 112, when the timer starts; and retrieving and checking whether a timer ID exists in the timer management DB 112, when receiving the timer ID of an expired timer from the portable terminal common part 102, and preparing reply mail to the reception mail of the received mail, and automatically transmit a reply mail, when there is a timer ID. <P>COPYRIGHT: (C)2009,JPO&INPIT

Description

  The present invention relates to an automatic mail reply system for a mobile terminal having an automatic mail receiving function among mobile terminals having a communication function such as a mobile phone and a PHS.

When a mail is received by a portable terminal having an automatic mail reception function such as a mobile phone or PHS, the mail transmitted by the sender can be received almost immediately by the receiver. From this, the sender side expects the reply mail for the sent mail to arrive as soon as possible. However, when it is difficult for the receiver side to reply the mail immediately such as during a meeting or driving, the sender side waits for a long time to receive the reply mail. As a method for solving such a problem, Patent Document 1 describes means for automatically responding to a reply mail in accordance with the recipient's situation.
JP 2002-354076 A

However, in the technique in Patent Document 1, a reply mail is automatically transmitted based on setting conditions for automatic reply set by the receiver. In this case, even if the recipient starts replying to the received mail, if the condition of the automatic reply set in advance is met, the reply mail is automatically sent to all received mail. There is a possibility that both the reply mail sent by the user and the reply mail created automatically are transmitted together. Also, extra network load and communication charges occur.
Furthermore, in the technique of Patent Document 1, since a general mobile terminal possessed by a general mobile terminal such as a manner mode for turning off a ringtone or a drive mode indicating driving is not used, these are not used. Another problem is that the user needs to set a state for automatic transmission of a reply mail, and the setting is complicated.

  In view of the above situation, the present invention eliminates the need for a special operation by the user for setting a state for automatic reply, and avoids automatic transmission of reply mail when a user operation is performed on received mail. It is an object of the present invention to provide an automatic mail reply system for a portable terminal that can prevent the reply mail from being sent and the extra network load and billing associated therewith.

In order to solve the above problems, the present invention provides the following configurations.
The invention according to claim 1 is an automatic mail reply system for a portable terminal including a mailer unit corresponding to automatic reception of mail and a portable terminal common part for performing common processing of the portable terminal,
The mailer unit is configured to inquire about the state of the entire mobile terminal to the mobile terminal common unit when the reception of the mail is started or the reception of the mail is completed.
As a result of inquiries, if the user cannot reply in the manner mode or drive mode, search for whether the sender email address of the received email exists in the email address book. Means to confirm,
Means for checking whether the timer has started by searching for the received mail ID of the mail received in the timer management DB and the timer ID when the sender mail address exists,
If the timer for the received mail has already been started, means for not starting the timer, or restarting the timer again after stopping the already started timer,
If the timer is not already started, means for requesting the timer start to the mobile terminal common unit,
When the timer is started, the received mail ID is associated with the timer ID acquired from the mobile terminal common unit and stored in the timer management DB,
Means for searching and checking whether the timer ID is in the timer management DB when receiving the timer ID of the expired timer from the portable terminal common unit;
When the timer ID exists in the timer management DB, an automatic mail reply system for a portable terminal is provided that includes means for automatically creating and sending a reply mail to the received mail with the received mail ID. To do.

In the invention according to claim 2, the mailer unit searches the timer management DB whether or not the received mail ID of the received mail and the timer ID exist at the start of an operation on the received mail by the user, Means for checking whether a timer for the received mail is running;
2. An automatic mail reply system for a mobile terminal according to claim 1, further comprising means for requesting the mobile terminal common unit to stop the timer when the timer has been started. .

  According to the first aspect of the present invention, by inquiring about the state of the mobile terminal as a whole, a special operation by the user of setting the state for automatic reply is unnecessary, and when the user receives a mail, Provided is an automatic mail reply system for a mobile terminal that can automatically reply to a mail that needs a reply after a certain time when a reply operation is impossible.

  According to the second aspect of the present invention, when a user operation is performed on the received mail within a certain time by the timer measurement, the automatic transmission of the reply mail is avoided, the redundant reply mail is transmitted, and the extra accompanying this It is possible to provide an automatic mail reply system for a portable terminal that can prevent a heavy network load and billing.

Hereinafter, embodiments of the present invention will be described with reference to the drawings showing examples.
FIG. 1 is a system configuration diagram of a mobile terminal that realizes an automatic mail reply system for a mobile terminal according to the present invention. The mobile terminal 101 includes a mailer unit 103 that supports automatic mail reception and a mobile terminal common unit 102 that performs processing common to mobile terminals. The mailer unit 103 includes a menu processing unit 107 that determines a process according to a user operation, an address book unit 108 that stores an email address, a mail display / editing unit 109 that displays / edits a mail, and a mobile terminal It comprises a state management unit 110 that determines the state and determines timer start / stop and a mail transmission / reception unit 111 that performs mail transmission / reception processing.

  The state management unit 110 has a timer management DB (Database) 112 that is a database for managing the association between the sender address of the received mail and the active timer and the list of active timers. The mobile terminal common unit 102 includes a mobile terminal state management unit 104 that manages a state that is valid for the entire mobile terminal such as a manner mode and a drive mode, a timer processing unit 105 that performs timer start / stop processing, a TCP / UDP The communication processing unit 106 is configured to perform socket communication and incoming mail processing.

  FIG. 2 is a diagram showing an example of the data contents of the timer management DB 112 held in the state management unit 110. As shown in the figure, the data in the timer management DB 112 is composed of a mail ID (IDentifier Number) 21 and a timer ID 22 for identifying the received mail. When receiving the mail and starting the timer, the state management unit 110 stores the combination data 23 of the received mail ID 21 and the timer ID 22 for identifying the started timer.

FIG. 3 is a flowchart showing an outline of the processing of the present invention.
When the mail transmission / reception unit 111 starts or completes reception according to a reception instruction from the communication processing unit 106, a mail reception flow is started. The mail transmission / reception unit 111 notifies the state management unit 110 when the reception of the mail is started or the reception of the mail is completed, and the state management unit 110 inquires of the mobile terminal state management unit 104 about the state of the entire mobile terminal (step 301). As a result of the inquiry, if the reply operation by the user such as the manner mode or the drive mode is impossible, the subsequent flow is continued. When the state of the entire mobile terminal is in a state where a user can perform a reply operation, this flow ends and automatic transmission of a reply mail is not performed.

  Next, in order to avoid starting a timer for mail that does not require a reply such as spam mail or mail magazine, check whether the sender mail address of the received mail exists in the mail address book section 108 (Step 302). If it is not in the address book, it is regarded as a mail that does not require a reply, and this flow ends and automatic transmission of the reply mail is not performed. If it exists in the address book, the subsequent flow is continued.

  Next, in order to prevent multiple timers from being started due to continuous reception from the same sender, the timer management DB 112 is searched to confirm whether the timer has already been started (step 303). If the timer for the received mail from the sender has already been started, the timer is not started, or the timer that has already been started is temporarily stopped and then restarted. When the timer is restarted, the value of the timer management DB 112 is updated (step 304). If the timer has not been started, the timer processing unit 105 is requested (requested) to start the timer (step 305). The value of the timer at this time is a realistic fixed value indicating the time from when mail is received until reply mail is automatically transmitted, or a value that can be changed by the user. When the timer is started, the received mail ID 21 is associated with the timer ID 22 acquired from the timer processing unit 105 and stored in the timer management DB 112 (step 306). The flow at the time of mail reception is thus completed.

  When the user performs any operation such as referring to or replying to the received mail, the flow of the received mail operation is started. When the user starts an operation on the received mail, the mail display / editing unit 109 or the menu processing unit 107 inquires of the state management unit 110 to check whether the timer for the received mail currently being processed is running (step 307). . If the timer has not been started, this flow ends. If the timer has already been started, the timer is stopped (step 308). Specifically, the mail display / editing unit 109 or the menu processing unit 107 requests the timer processing unit 105 of the portable terminal common unit 102 to stop the timer, and the user starts an operation to the state management unit 110. Request deletion of mail ID 21 and timer ID 22 of received mail. In any case, when this flow is operated, the reply mail is not automatically transmitted.

  When the state management unit 110 is notified by the timer processing unit 105 that the timer has expired, the timer expiration flow is started. At this time, the state management unit 110 receives the timer ID 22 of the timer that has expired from the timer processing unit 105. It is confirmed whether or not this timer ID 22 exists in the timer management DB 112 (step 309). If the timer ID 22 does not exist in the timer management DB 112, this flow ends and automatic reply transmission is not performed. If the timer ID 22 exists in the timer management DB 112, it indicates that no reply operation has been performed by the user, so a reply mail is created and automatically sent for the received mail ID 21 found in the timer management DB 112. (Step 310). As the reply mail, for example, it is in a manner mode, a drive mode or the like, and a message indicating that it cannot be replied immediately is returned. When the reply mail is created and automatically transmitted, the mail display / editing unit 109 or the menu processing unit 107 requests the state management unit 110 to delete the mail ID 21 and the timer ID 22 of the received mail that has automatically transmitted the reply mail. .

1 is a system configuration diagram of an automatic mail reply system for a portable terminal according to the present invention. It is a data block diagram stored in the timer management DB according to the present invention. (A) It is a flowchart figure which shows the processing flow outline | summary at the time of mail reception by this invention. (B) It is a flowchart figure which shows the processing flow outline | summary in case operations, such as reference and reply operation, are performed with respect to the mail which the user received by this invention. (C) It is a flowchart figure which shows the processing flow outline | summary when a timer expires by this invention.

Explanation of symbols

21 Mail ID
22 Timer ID
101 mobile terminal 102 mobile terminal common unit 103 mailer unit 112 timer management DB

Claims (2)

An automatic mail reply system for a mobile terminal that includes a mailer unit that supports automatic reception of mail and a mobile terminal common unit that performs processing common to mobile terminals,
The mailer unit is configured to inquire about the state of the entire mobile terminal to the mobile terminal common unit when the reception of the mail is started or the reception of the mail is completed.
As a result of inquiries, if the user cannot reply in the manner mode or drive mode, search for whether the sender email address of the received email exists in the email address book. Means to confirm,
Means for checking whether the timer has started by searching for the received mail ID of the mail received in the timer management DB and whether the timer ID exists when the sender mail address exists;
If the timer for the received mail has already been started, means for not starting the timer, or restarting the timer again after stopping the already started timer,
If the timer is not already started, means for requesting the timer start to the mobile terminal common unit,
When the timer is started, means for storing the received mail ID in association with the timer ID acquired from the mobile terminal common unit in the timer management DB,
Means for searching and checking whether the timer ID is in the timer management DB when receiving the timer ID of the expired timer from the portable terminal common unit;
An automatic mail reply system for a portable terminal, comprising: means for creating and automatically sending a reply mail to the received mail with the received mail ID when the timer ID exists in the timer management DB. The mailer unit searches the timer management DB for whether there is a received mail ID of the received mail and a timer ID when the user starts an operation on the received mail, and a timer for the received mail is being activated. Means to check whether or not
2. The mobile terminal automatic mail reply system according to claim 1, further comprising means for requesting the mobile terminal common unit to stop the timer when the timer has been started.

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