JP2764952B2 - Email system - Google Patents

Description

Description: BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION The present invention relates to an electronic mail system for transmitting and receiving documents and data created at each workstation between individuals using the workstation via a network.

[Conventional technology]

Conventionally, in this type of e-mail system, when sending an e-mail, the e-mail sent from the workstation is temporarily stored in a nearby e-mail server, and then the e-mail server holds a corresponding destination mailbox. It finds another mail server and sends it back. Then, the other mail server receiving the mail stores the mail, and in response to an inquiry from the workstation, the owner (user) of the mailbox.
Has been notified that the mail has arrived, and the owner of the mailbox has taken out the mail stored in the mail server in response to the notification.

[Problems to be solved by the invention]

However, in the above e-mail system, when an e-mail is transmitted to an individual, the transmission is unilateral to the sender, and it cannot be determined whether the recipient has received the e-mail. There was a problem.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION The present invention has been made in view of the above problems, and provides an e-mail system capable of notifying reception of an e-mail of a receiving party in response to a request from an e-mail sender, and enabling the sender to confirm receipt of the e-mail. The task is to provide

[Means for solving the problem]

According to the present invention, a plurality of workstations and a mail server that provides a mail service to the plurality of workstations are connected to a network, and a receiving workstation that has received an e-mail sends a message to a source workstation of the e-mail. An e-mail system for replying to a receipt confirmation mail, wherein the source workstation specifies whether or not to make a request for receipt confirmation of the e-mail when transmitting the e-mail to another workstation. The receiving workstation, when receiving an e-mail from the source workstation, determining means for determining whether the received e-mail accompanies the receipt confirmation request, and the determining means If it is determined that the request is accompanied by a receipt confirmation request, Characterized by comprising a returning means for returning the acknowledgment mail including at least the date and time of taking out the Lumpur from the mail server.

[Action]

According to the present invention, when a receiving workstation receives an e-mail from a source workstation, it determines whether or not the received e-mail is accompanied by a receipt confirmation request. A receipt confirmation mail including at least the date and time when the mail was extracted from the mail server is returned.

Therefore, the sender of the e-mail can easily confirm the reception status of the e-mail by the recipient.

〔Example〕

An embodiment of the present invention will be described with reference to the drawings of FIGS.

FIG. 1 is a configuration diagram of an electronic mail system according to the present invention. In the figure, workstations 13 to 16, mail servers 17 and 18, and communication servers 19 and 20 are connected to the Ethernets 11 and 12, respectively, to enable transmission and reception of mail between the workstations.

Each of the workstations 13 to 16 includes a keyboard 13a to 16a and a mouse for inputting various information such as characters and editing instructions, as well as information for sending an email and whether or not to confirm receipt.
13b to 16b, a display device 13c to 16c composed of a CRT or the like and displaying a list and contents of messages (messages, documents, folders, etc.), a mail classification device 13d to 16d for searching and classifying each mail, It is composed of processors 13e to 16e that perform operation control.

The mail servers 17 and 18 have their own mailboxes in the disk devices 17a and 18a, store the received mails in the mailboxes under the control of the processors 17b and 18b, and retrieve the mails from the workstation. Upon receiving the request, the corresponding mail is taken out of the mailbox and sent to the requesting workstation. It should be noted that only a part of the physical mail stored in the mailbox is present, thereby saving disk space. A box (not shown) representing the mail is placed in the box for receiving the same mail, and apparently there is a plurality of the same mail in each mailbox. In response to the request, provide a copy of the physical mail to each user, and after reading, only the above tag,
Has been deleted from each mailbox.

The communication servers 19 and 20 are connected to a transmission path 23 via modems 21 and 22.
And send and receive e-mails between each other's networks.

Next, the transmission / reception operation of the electronic mail system shown in FIG. 1 will be described with reference to the flowcharts of FIGS. In the above-mentioned transmission and reception of the mail, transmission and reception between the workstations are possible. However, for convenience of explanation, the workstation 13 and the workstation 15 are not described here.
The transmission and reception of an e-mail between and will be described.

FIG. 2 is a flowchart at the time of sending an e-mail,
An object (message) to be transmitted and its attachments (documents,
Folder or the like with the keyboard 13a, the mouse 13b or the like (step 101), and further selecting an outbox icon (not shown) as a place for movement / transcription (step 102).
The processor 13e controls the display device 13c to display a mail option sheet including a mail reception confirmation on the screen of the display device 13c as shown in FIG. 4 (step 103). Then, each parameter of the e-mail is created according to the user's instruction to complete the e-mail (step 104). In the parameters of the mail option sheet, enter the sender's field where the name of the e-mail sender is entered, the address field where the destination name is entered, and the name of the person who wants to send a copy of the e-mail. There are a copy field for inputting the title of the mail, a comment field for inputting the content of the message, and the like.

When the input of each parameter on the sheet is completed, it is determined whether the sender wants to confirm receipt of the mail (step 105). Here, when the user clicks the [Receive Confirmation] item in the sheet with the mouse 13b (step 106) and clicks [Send] in the sheet with the mouse 13b, the mail server 17 determines that the receipt has been confirmed. Judgment is made, and a mail of the receipt confirmation designation is transmitted (step 107). If the user clicks only [Send] without clicking the [Receipt Confirmation] item with the mouse 13b, the mail server 17 determines that there is no receipt confirmation, and the transmission of the mail for which the receipt confirmation is not specified is performed. (Step 107).

The mail sent from the workstation 13 is temporarily stored in a nearby mail server 17 by a network management (clearing house) service for managing users and resources on the network, and then the mail server 17 transmits the mail to the communication servers 19, 20 and Sought out via modem 21,22,
The message is sent to the mail server 18 having the mailbox of the corresponding destination, and the sending operation ends.

Next, the operation at the time of receiving an e-mail for which receipt confirmation has been designated will be described with reference to the flowchart of FIG. In the figure, when the mail server 18 receives a mail transmitted from the workstation 13 (step 201), the mail server 18 stores the mail in the user's mailbox described in the recipient column of the sheet (step 202). In addition, the mail server 18 receiving the mail responds to the inquiry from the workstation 15 that the mail has arrived at the owner of the mailbox. Next, when there is an instruction from the recipient user to retrieve the e-mail stored in his / her own mailbox (step 203), the e-mail in the above-mentioned mailbox is input to the workstation 15. At the workstation 15, when each e-mail of the user who is the recipient is input, under the control of the processor 15e, the e-mail classification device 15d searches for each e-mail, classifies the e-mails, for example, in order of receiving time, and receives the e-mail. The e-mail titles are listed, and a list (not shown) is displayed on the display device 15c (step 20).
Four).

Next, the processor 15e determines whether or not there is any mail that the user wants to read (step 205). Here, when the user clicks the title of the mail to be read by using the mouse 15b and selects the desired mail, the desired mail to be read is extracted and the content is displayed on the display device.
It is displayed on 15c (step 206). At this time, the processor 15e also detects the date and time when the mail was extracted. If no e-mail is selected, the e-mail retrieval operation is terminated.

When the above mail is selected and its contents are displayed, the processor 15e determines whether or not the mail has "receipt confirmation" specified (step 207).
If there is no such designation, the process returns to step 205 to determine the next e-mail to read, and
Is specified, the processor 15e adds the sender name (the person who received the mail), the address (the person who sent the mail),
The subject (reception confirmation mail) and the date and time when the mail was taken out as a comment are entered, and the reception confirmation mail is sent to the work station 13 via the mail server 18 (step 208). Then, the process returns to step 205 to determine the next mail to be read. If there is a mail selection, the above operation is repeated, and if there is no mail selection, the mail fetch operation ends.

Therefore, according to the present invention, the user who has transmitted the mail can know that the e-mail transmitted by himself has been transmitted to the other party without fail by returning the above-mentioned receipt confirmation mail, thereby preventing an important communication error from being transmitted. And the reliability of transmission of the e-mail function can be improved.

〔The invention's effect〕

As described above, according to the present invention, when a receiving workstation receives an e-mail from a source workstation, it determines whether or not the received e-mail accompanies an acknowledgment request. In such a case, since the reception confirmation mail including at least the date and time when the e-mail was extracted from the mail server is returned, the following effects can be obtained.

1) The sender can initiatively select whether or not to confirm receipt of an e-mail.

2) Useful information such as the date and time when the e-mail was taken out is received and added to the confirmation e-mail, so that the added value of the e-mail system can be improved.

3) The sender can easily confirm the e-mail reception status of the receiver.

[Brief description of the drawings]

FIG. 1 is a block diagram of an electronic mail system according to the present invention, FIG. 2 and FIG. 3 are flowcharts for explaining transmission and reception operations of the electronic mail system shown in FIG. 1, and FIG. FIG. 5 is a view showing an embodiment of an e-mail option sheet of an e-mail according to the present invention, and FIG. 5 is a view showing an embodiment of a return confirmation mail for return. 11,12 ... Ethernet, 13-16 ... Workstation, 13a-16a ... Keyboard, 13b-16b ... Mouse, 13
c to 16c display device, 13d to 16d mail sorting device, 13e to 16e processor, 17, 18 mail server, 17a, 18a disk device, 17b, 18b processor,
19,20… Communication server, 21,22… Modem.

──────────────────────────────────────────────────続 き Continued on the front page (58) Field surveyed (Int.Cl. ⁶ , DB name) H04L 12/54 G06F 13/00 351 H04L 12/58

Claims (1)

(57) [Claims] A plurality of workstations and a mail server that provides a mail service to the plurality of workstations are connected to a network, and a receiving workstation that has received an e-mail is set as a source workstation of the e-mail. In the e-mail system for returning an acknowledgment mail to the user, the source workstation may specify whether to make a request for acknowledgment of the e-mail when transmitting the e-mail to another workstation. Means for receiving, when receiving an e-mail from the source workstation, determining means for determining whether or not the received e-mail accompanies the receipt confirmation request; and If the means determines that a receipt confirmation request is involved, E-mail system, characterized by comprising a returning means for returning the acknowledgment mail including at least the date and time of taking out the e-mail from the mail server.