JP3419075B2 - Email system - Google Patents

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, and more particularly to an electronic mail system which can always send an electronic mail to a recipient of the electronic mail in an appropriate form.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art In recent years, a LAN (local area network) has been established in an office, a plurality of terminal devices having a document processing function are connected to the LAN, and electronic mail can be used in the network system. For this reason, in an environment where such a communication infrastructure is in place, office work uses e-mail to distribute documents created by a word processor etc. to related parties, communicates the contents, and confirms the documents. It is becoming easier to perform daily information processing activities such as notification of revisions and corrections.

However, although the conventional electronic mail system is convenient for temporary information exchange, many complicated operations and processes are still involved in the information processing activity of office work in which work is continuously performed. is necessary. For example, when it is necessary to continuously update and transmit the contents of a document in the process of creating a document, e-mail must be repeatedly sent again and again.

As a method for dealing with such a problem, for example, in the "mail communication method" described in Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 3-206754, when the content of an electronic mail transmitted once is updated, the last of the electronic mail is We propose a communication method that can easily send the latest information by comparing the update date and time and the last transmission date and time. With such a communication method, it becomes possible to easily send the latest information to a relatively fixed receiver. However, when dealing with information that is updated frequently, many similar emails will be sent to the recipient.

[0005]

Further, in a network system in which an electronic mail system can be used, a plurality of terminal devices having a document processing function connected to the network system are provided by different document creators with electronic documents. When a document is created and, as a result, one electronic document is jointly created, and when the created electronic document is distributed to a third party after the completion of the document creation, at that time, the document creator is the other co-creator. , Or add a third party's address as the e-mail address and send it by broadcast communication,
Either it will be notified separately that it has been sent to a third party, or nothing will be reported.

However, in this case, in the first processing,
The known information will be duplicated and sent to the co-author. The second processing requires extra transmission processing, resulting in complicated processing. The third process has a problem that the co-creator does not know that the electronic mail has been sent.

The present invention has been made to solve the above-mentioned problems, and an object of the present invention is to provide a recipient of an electronic mail to an e-mail recipient by designating a transmission form in advance. It is to provide an e-mail system that can always send e-mail in an appropriate form.

[0008]

In order to achieve the above object, the electronic mail system according to the present invention has a transmission information having information necessary for transmission and reception, such as a sender, a destination, a title, a transmission date and time, and a message. In the e-mail system that sends a transmission content having an element of content information having a main content to be transmitted, such as a document to be sent, to a mail address specified as a destination, the transmission content represented by the combination of the above elements A transmission form registration means (2) for holding the form information, a transmission form designation means (3) for selecting and designating the form information of the e-mail to be transmitted for each destination mail address, and a designation for each mail address And a mail generation means (5) for generating a transmission mail of the transmission content from the form information.

Further, in the electronic mail system of the present invention, the mail address is further analyzed, and when the same recipient is described in duplicate, the transmission contents specified for each mail address are A form organizing means (45) for comparing the form information and determining appropriate form information is provided.

Further, in the electronic mail system of the present invention, when the outgoing mail is generated from the contents to be sent by the mail generating means, a sending form indicating a form in which the electronic mail is sent to each mail address is provided. A transmission form information adding means (46) for adding content information is provided.

[0011]

In the electronic mail system according to the present invention, the transmission content having the elements of the transmission information such as the sender, the destination, the title, the transmission date and time, and the content information of the message or the delivery document is designated as the destination. When sending to an address, the transmission form registration means (2) holds the form information of the transmission content represented by the combination of the elements, and the transmission form designation means (3) sends the destination mail here. Select and specify the e-mail form information to be sent for each address. When the form information of the electronic mail is designated, the mail generating means (5) generates a transmission mail of the transmission contents from the form information designated for each mail address.

In this way, the transmission form designating means (3)
By selecting and instructing appropriate form information to the recipient specified by the mail address, the mail generating unit (5) uses the form information stored in the transmission form registration unit (2) to An appropriate electronic mail is generated from the form information specified for each mail address according to the contents of the transmission, and the mail is transmitted. Therefore, the recipient of the e-mail can always receive the e-mail having the transmission content in an appropriate form, depending on the transmission content of the instructed form information.

Further, the electronic mail system of the present invention further comprises a form organizing means (45). The form organizing means (45) analyzes the mail addresses, and when the same recipient is described in duplicate, compares the form information of the transmission contents designated for the respective mail addresses to determine an appropriate form. Determine the information. Thereby, when the same recipient is described in the address in duplicate, appropriate morphological information is determined, and an electronic mail is generated and transmitted with the transmission content according to the morphological information. Therefore, even if the recipient's mail address is duplicated in the address, it is possible to prevent unnecessary information from being transmitted to the recipient.

Further, the electronic mail system of the present invention further comprises a transmission form information adding means (46). The transmission form information adding means (46) adds the contents information of the transmission form indicating the form in which the electronic mail is sent to each mail address when the outgoing mail is generated from the transmission contents. Therefore, the content information of the transmission form added to the transmission contents can inform the recipient of who and in what form the email was sent. As a result, the recipient can know what the other recipients know, and can smoothly perform later meetings.

[0015]

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS Embodiments of the present invention will be specifically described below with reference to the drawings. FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing a basic configuration of a main part of an electronic mail system according to a first embodiment of the present invention. In FIG. 1, 1 is a mail content recording unit, 2 is a transmission form registration unit, 3 is a transmission form designation unit, 4 is a designated form recording unit,
Reference numeral 5 is a mail generation unit, and 6 is a mail transmission unit.

As will be described later, the mail content recording unit 1 has a mail content which is an element constituting an electronic mail, that is, a transmission having information necessary for transmission and reception including a sender, an addressee, a title, a transmission date and time, and the like. The mail content (10: FIG. 2) that is the transmission content having the elements of the information and the content information having the main body content to be transmitted such as the message and the sending document is held, and the transmission form registration unit 2 stores the email content of the email. The form information (form data 14: FIG. 3) indicating the form of the transmission content represented by the combination of the elements of each information is held. Further, the transmission form designation unit 3 arbitrarily associates the form information held in the transmission form registration unit 2 with each of the destination mail addresses described in the mail contents according to a user's instruction. The designation information of the transmission form in which the mail address and the form information are associated with each other is recorded in the designated form recording unit 4. Based on the transmission form designation information recorded in the designated form recording unit 4, the mail generation unit 5 holds the mail content recording unit 1 from the form information of the transmission form designated for each recipient (mail address). The e-mail is generated by combining the elements of the mail contents that are being processed. The generated electronic mail is passed to the mail transmission unit 6, and the mail transmission unit 6 transmits the mail to the designated destination (recipient).

FIG. 2 is a diagram for explaining an example of the data structure of electronic mail. In FIG. 2, 10 is the content of the e-mail, 11 is transmission information, 12 is a transmission message,
Reference numeral 13 represents document information. E-mail content 10
As shown in FIG. 2, is mainly composed of a combination of the transmission control information of the transmission information 11 for mail communication and the content information of the transmission content such as the transmission message 12 and the document information 13. The transmission information 11 is, for example, a date (Dat
e), sender (From), address (sending destination: To,
Copy destination: Cc, and title (Subj)
ect) and other item information in a predetermined format. Following this transmission information 11, a transmission message 12 of the transmission content, document information 13 and the like are added to form the email content 10 of the electronic mail.

FIG. 3 is a diagram showing an example of the form information stored in the transmission form registration unit. As described above, the content of the electronic mail is the content of the combination of the elements of the mail content 10, such as the transmission information 11, the transmission message 12, and the document information 13, so that the form information ( Hereinafter, referred to as morphological data) is data of format information that indicates the combination. As shown in FIG. 3, the form data 14 is composed of data in each of a label field 14a, a comment field 14b, a transmission information field 14c, a message field 14d, a document field 14e, a reference information field 14f, and a standard form field 14g. The format information is such that the transmission form is represented by an instruction of a combination of elements that are the contents of the mail, and information (label, comment) for identifying the form data itself is added thereto.

A plurality of types of transmission forms are set as the transmission form of the electronic mail, and form data of the types representing the transmission forms are registered. In order to distinguish individual form data, label information (A, B, C) unique to each form data is registered in the label field 14a, and
The comment field 14b describes an annotation that briefly describes the content of the morphological data. The standard form field 14g is a field for instructing to set the form data as a default when the transmission form is designated. More specifically, the form data 14 registered here indicates, for example, that the form data in the second line indicates that the combination of elements of the mail content is composed of transmission information and a transmission message. Is specified by the label information "B", and the comment information of the annotation "message only" is registered as the information of the annotation that describes the transmission form. Note that here, the date (Date), the sender (F
rom), address (destination To, copy destination Cc), title (Subject), and other control information for mail transmission are collectively treated as one transmission information 11, but in this form data, Each piece of information may be treated as a combination of individual elements so that the combination of each individual element can be designated separately.

FIG. 4 is a flow chart showing the processing flow of the transmission mode designation processing in the transmission mode designation unit 3.
The process of designating the transmission form here will be described with reference to FIG. When the process is started, first, in step S71, a process of creating the address list L is performed. In this process, all the mail addresses are fetched from the mail content recording unit 1 and put in the address list L. As a result, the address list L is created. Next, in step S72, it is determined whether the address list L is empty. If the address list L is empty as a result of the determination, the process ends. Otherwise, in step S73, the top element of the address list L and the form data are displayed. That is, since the user specifies the transmission mode, the first element (mail address) of the address list L
Then, the types of transmission modes that can be designated from the label information and the comment information data of the mode data held in the transmission mode registration unit 2 are displayed on the display screen. Then, next, in step S74, it is determined whether or not a correct label is input, and this determination processing is repeated. That is, in the determination processing of step S74, the input of the designation of the transmission form from the user is waited for, and the input of the designation of the form data by the input of the label information is waited for.

When the user inputs a label designating the transmission mode and confirms that the correct label information is input,
In the next step S75, the head element of the address list L and the input label are saved. As a result, the correspondence relationship between the mail address and the instruction data representing the designated transmission mode is stored. Then, in the next step S76, the first element of the address list L for which the designation of the transmission form has been completed is removed, and the transmission form designation process for the next mail address is performed.
Then, the process is repeated from the process of determining the contents of the address list L.

Through such processing, the processing of designating the transmission form is performed for the mail address. In this process, in the data input to specify the transmission mode, for example,
Since the mail address (recipient) of the destination to be specified is displayed on the display screen, the value of the label information of the form data designating the transmission form is input in correspondence with the display of the mail address. After that, the transmission mode is specified by inputting the line feed key. In such input processing, default data can be used to simplify the input operation. In this case, first, the form data marked in the standard form field (14g: FIG. 3) is displayed as the designated transmission form,
When specifying to use the form data, it is possible to specify only by entering the line feed key.

FIG. 5 is a diagram showing an example of a display screen at the time of an input operation for designating the transmission mode. As shown in FIG.
The transmission form designation input screen 15 is provided with an address input field 16 for designating a mail address and a transmission form input field 17 for designating a transmission form. Further, the label information of the form data (14: FIG. 3) previously registered and held and the comment information thereof are displayed on the transmission form designation input screen 15 as the transmission form that can be designated.

Transmission form designation input screen 1 as shown in FIG.
5, when the input operation of the transmission form designation is performed for each address, the inputted form designation data becomes
It is held in the designated form recording unit (4: FIG. 1) together with the destination mail address. FIG. 6 is a diagram showing an example of the data structure of the form designation data held in the designated form recording unit. As shown in FIG. 6, the form designation data 18 stored in the designated form recording portion here indicates the correspondence between the mail address and the form data of the designated transmission form. The data structure is associated with the field 18b. The address field 18a holds the address of each mail recipient, and the form field 18b holds the label information of the form data representing the designated transmission form. That is, in this example, the mail transmission form for the mail address "Sato" is designated as "A" in the label information, and the form for transmitting "message and body" is designated. Similarly, the email transmission form for the email address "Tanaka" is designated as "A" in the label information, and the email transmission form for the email address "B-Group" is designated as "C" in the label information. And reference information "are specified.

When the transmission form designation is input and the form designation data 18 is held in the designated form recording unit (4: FIG. 1), the mail generation unit (5:
1) performs the process of generating an electronic mail, and the mail sending unit (6: FIG. 1) sends the mail. Next, processing of mail generation and mail transmission will be described.

FIG. 7 is a flow chart for explaining a series of processes involved in the mail generation process performed by the mail generation unit. The mail generation process will be described with reference to FIG. 7. In this process, the process proceeds based on the form data (14: FIG. 3) held in the transmission form registration unit 2 in this order.
Therefore, when the process is started, first, in step S81, the transmission form list T is created. That is, all the form data 14 stored in the transmission form registration unit 2 is taken out and placed in the transmission form list T. Next, step S8
In 2, it is determined whether or not the transmission form list T is empty. If the transmission form list T is empty, it means that all the processes of mail generation and mail transmission have been completed, so the process here is ended.

If the transmission form list T is not empty in step S82, then an address list L is created in step S83. Address list L here
For the creation of the mail list, referring to the form designation data (18: FIG. 6), the mail addresses designated to send the e-mail according to the form stored at the head of the transmission form list T are collected to form an address list L. .

Next, in step S84, the contents of the address list L are determined. If the address list L is empty, the process proceeds to step S87 for the processing of the next transmission mode. If the address list L is not empty, step S85.
At, the form data 14 is read, the elements of the mail content forming the electronic mail of the designated transmission form are discriminated from the form data, and the corresponding elements are taken out from the mail content recording unit 1 and combined. Then, in the next step S86, the created electronic mail is sent to the mail addresses in the address list L. As a result, the process of sending the mail in the form of the first element of the transmission form list T is completed. After the mail is sent, the process proceeds to step S87, the first element of the transmission form list T is removed, and the next transmission form is removed. In order to perform the process of step S8, the process returns to step S82
The process from 2 is repeated.

In this way, various transmission forms of electronic mail are registered as form data, and further the address of the destination of the transmission destination and the correspondence with the transmission form data of the electronic mail are designated in correspondence with the destination. By doing so, the electronic mail can be transmitted in an appropriate form according to the designation. As a transmission content of such an electronic mail, when a document file or the like stored in a file is transmitted, a form (form data) of transmitting data from the file is provided as one type of transmission form. With this, by a simple operation similar to the case described above, it is possible to specify the transmission form (specify the label information of the form data) and send the e-mail in an appropriate form according to the specified form. . Next, a second embodiment which is an embodiment of such an electronic mail system will be described.

(Second Embodiment) FIG. 8 is a block diagram showing the arrangement of the main parts of an electronic mail system according to the second embodiment of the present invention. The electronic mail system according to the second embodiment has a configuration in which a file access unit and a file storage device are provided in the electronic mail system of the first embodiment so that the content of a file can be designated as an element of mail content. ing. That is, as shown in FIG.
In the device configuration of the electronic mail system according to the embodiment, the file access unit 23 and the data storage device 24 are further added to the device configuration of the electronic mail system described in FIG. 1, and the transmission mode designation unit 21 and the mail generation unit 22 are added. A part of the processing contents in (1) has a modified structure so as to be able to support file specification. Other components are the same as the configuration of the electronic mail system described in FIG.

In the electronic mail system of the second embodiment, the data storage device 24 stores, as file data, document data which is a part of the elements of the transmission contents of the electronic mail. As the data storage device 24, a file device such as a database or a file server accessible by a plurality of users can be used as it is. The file access unit 23 accesses the data storage device 24 and acquires the stored data stored therein, access rights, reference information to the stored data, and the like.

Therefore, in the configuration of the electronic mail system of the second embodiment, among the elements of the mail content 10 stored in the mail content recording unit 1, the document information 1
Since the file data corresponding to No. 3 is stored in the data storage device 24, only the reference information to the file data of the data storage device 24 is recorded in the mail content recording unit 1. When handling the reference information to the file data, the mail generation unit 22 accesses the data storage device 24 via the file access unit 23 to perform processing. That is, in the mail generation unit 22, the form data (1
4: FIG. 3) is read to determine the elements that make up the email of the specified transmission form, the entity of the elements is taken out from the mail content recording section 1, and when the emails are combined, the file access section 23 stores the data. The device 24 is accessed to create an email.

FIG. 9 is a flow chart showing the processing flow of the transmission form designation processing by the transmission form designation unit in the second embodiment. With reference to FIG. 9, the transmission mode designation processing here will be described. When the process is started, first, in step S91, a process of creating the address list L is performed.
That is, all the mail addresses are taken out from the mail content recording unit 1 and put in the address list L. Next, in step S92, it is determined whether the address list L is empty. If the address list L is empty, it means that the designation for the mail address has been completed, and the process ends. If the address list L is not empty, step S
At 93, the address and the transmission mode that can be designated are displayed. That is, the top element of the address list L (email address of the destination), the label information and the comment information of the form data held in the transmission form registration unit 2 are displayed.
Then, next, in step S94, it is determined whether or not a correct label is input, and this determination processing is repeated. That is, in the determination processing of step S94, the user waits for the input of the designation of the transmission form and the input of the designation of the form data by the input of the label information.

When the user inputs the label designated by the transmission form and confirms the input of the correct label information, next, in step S95, the form data of the designated label information further includes reference information. Or not. If the morphological data does not include the reference information, it is the same as in the case of the first embodiment described above, and therefore the process proceeds to step S98. On the other hand, when it is determined in step S95 that the reference information is included, the recipient of the transmission destination (mail address) specified at the beginning of the address list L has the access right to the file specified by the reference information. Or not. In this judgment, if the recipient does not have the access right to the file, it is an error in the specification of the transmission mode, and in the next step S97, a warning message such as "This recipient does not have access to the data" is displayed. Then, the process returns to step S94 and the processing from step S94 is repeated.

If it is determined in step S96 that the recipient of the electronic mail designated by the destination address has the access right, the transmission form and the destination address designated by the input label information are specified. Since there is no contradiction in the relationship, the mail address and the label information are stored as a pair in step S98. That is, the top element (mail address) of the address list L and the designation data of the transmission form (label value of the transmission form) are stored. As a result, the correspondence relationship between the mail address and the instruction data representing the designated transmission mode is stored. Next, in step S99, the first element of the address list L for which the designation of the transmission form has been completed is removed, and the transmission form is designated for the next mail address. Returning to S92, this processing is repeated.

In this way, in the electronic mail system of the second embodiment, the contents of the electronic mail to be transmitted are as follows.
The data of the file stored in the file can be sent as the contents of the mail. In this case, the form data designated by the transmission form for transmitting the data from the file as one type of the transmission form is registered in the transmission form registration unit 2, and the designated transmission can be performed only by designating the form data. The email can be sent in any suitable form depending on the form.

Next, when registering the form data representing the type of the e-mail transmission form, the user can perform the operation of creating and registering the form data of the transmission form by the operation of a simple screen editor. A modified example of doing so will be described as a third embodiment. That is, an example in which a transmission mode management unit for managing the mode data here is provided will be described as a third example.

(Third Embodiment) FIG. 10 shows the third embodiment of the present invention.
3 is a block diagram showing a configuration of a main part of the electronic mail system according to the embodiment of FIG. The electronic mail system according to the third embodiment has a configuration in which, in the electronic mail system according to the second embodiment, a transmission form management unit for managing the form data in the transmission form registration unit is further provided. In other words, as shown in FIG. 10, the electronic mail system of the second embodiment has the device configuration (configuration of FIG. 8) to which the transmission mode management unit 25 is added.

The transmission form management unit 25 includes the transmission form registration unit 2
Manages morphological data registered and held in
Change the combination of each item in the form data,
Alternatively, morphological data of a new combination is added, and each item of morphological data is added.
FIG. 11 is a diagram showing an example of an edit screen when an operation of updating the transmission form data is performed by the transmission form management unit 25. As shown in FIG. 11, in the edit screen 26 here,
The above-mentioned form data (14: FIG. 3) is displayed in the table format as it is, and the same editing process as the normal editing process of the table format data by the screen editor can be performed. Thereby, the process of changing the content of the morphological data is performed. Next, the editing process of such morphological data will be described.

FIG. 12 is a flow chart showing an example of the processing flow of editing processing of form data in the transmission form management unit. The form data editing process will be described with reference to FIG. In the form data editing process in the transmission form management unit, a screen editor is activated to start the process. When the process is started, first, a command input from the user is accepted (step S101: hereinafter, the word step is omitted in parentheses), each accepted command is determined (S102 to S107), and according to the result of the determination, The processing specified by each command is executed sequentially.

That is, when the command is the end command (S102), the edited form data is stored in the transmission form registration unit 2 and the process is ended (S108). If the command is a change command (S103), the data corresponding to the specified form and item is rewritten with the changed contents (S109). For example, in the edit screen 26 shown in FIG. 11, the data in the transmission information column 26a and the message column 26b has a value of “◯” or “x”. In the editing process using this change command, the mouse cursor 26c is positioned in each display area,
Click the mouse button. As a result, if the designated value is “◯”, the designated value is changed to “×”, and if the designated value is “×”, the designated value is changed to “◯”. In particular, the input operation is not performed individually for changing.

If the command is a form addition command (S104), new form data is added and the value of each item of the form data is determined (S110). For example, in FIG.
In the edit screen 26 shown in FIG. 1, new form data is added next to the last form data. Specifically, a new row is generated next to the row of the form data whose label of the form type column 26d is "D", and the label of that form is "E". Then, the value of each field of the row of the new form data is filled in by the user's designation. As a result, new form data is added. Also in this case,
In addition of new form data, data of each field may be automatically set by setting with an implicit value. That is, the label of the form type column 26d is incremented in descending order to "E", and the transmission information column 26a
Is set to "○", the value of each item in the message column 26b, the document column, and the reference information column is set to "x", and an implicit value is set as it is, and the set value is displayed in each column. .

If the command is a form deletion command (S105), the specified form data is deleted (S111). For example, in the operation example on the edit screen 26 shown in FIG. 11, when the form data whose label of the form type column 26d is “C” is specified as the form data to be deleted here, the form of the corresponding third line is specified. The data is deleted.

If the command is an item addition command (S106), a new item designated in each form data is added, and the value of the added item is determined (S112). For example, in the edit screen 26 shown in FIG. 11, a column for adding a new item column is generated next to the reference information column 26e, and the user fills the value of the generated column item, An item of morphological data is added. Also in this case, in the initial state, the value of the column added to all the form data (row data) is displayed by setting the value "x" as an implicit value.

If the command is the standard form change command (S107), the standard form designation is changed to the designated form data (S113). That is, a mark is added to the position of the column of the standard form of the specified form data (row), and the mark of the position of the column of the standard form in the form data (row) previously specified is erased. This allows
The designation of the standard form of the form data is changed.

As described above, in the electronic mail system of the third embodiment, the transmission form management unit 25 for managing the form data is provided, the form data is managed by the transmission form management unit 25, and the form data editing process is performed. Is done. As a result, in the form data editing process, a simple tabular edit operation can be performed by the screen editor to update the form data as desired by the user and re-register in the transmission form registration unit 2. As a result, by making a designation using the registered form data, the electronic mail can be transmitted in an appropriate form according to the specified form data.
Further, in this case, as described above, the designation of the transmission form using the designated form data is performed by the transmission form designation unit (21: FIG.
0), but in order to more easily perform the input work when the user specifies the transmission form, the transmission form determination unit can be modified. Next, a modified example for easily performing the operation of designating the transmission form in the electronic mail system will be described as a fourth embodiment.

(Fourth Embodiment) FIG. 13 shows a fourth embodiment of the present invention.
3 is a block diagram showing a configuration of a main part of the electronic mail system according to the embodiment of FIG. As shown in FIG. 13, the electronic mail system of the fourth embodiment here has a configuration in which a transmission form determining unit 27 is further provided in addition to the configuration of the electronic mail system of the third embodiment described above. There is.

The transmission form determining unit 27 includes the transmission form specifying unit 2
The mail address is taken out from the mail content recording unit 1 via 1, and an appropriate transmission form is set in accordance with the specified condition of the form data set in advance corresponding to the condition of the mail address, such as an individual address or a group address. Perform processing to determine. For example, as shown in FIG. 3, the transmission mode registration unit 2 may label information “A”, “B”, or “C”.
When the three types of form data 14 specified by are recorded, the form of sending to each mail address is based on the form specifying condition table (28: FIG. 14) in which the conditions for appropriately determining the form of sending are set. Is specified.

FIG. 14 is a diagram showing an example of the form designation condition table referred to by the transmission form determining unit 27. As shown in FIG. 14, the form designation condition table 28 includes a condition field 28 representing a condition for designating a transmission form.
a and a form field 28b that describes a form to be specified when the condition is satisfied. With reference to such a form designation condition table 28, the transmission form determination unit 27 appropriately determines the transmission form by matching the information of the mail address with the condition of the condition field 28a according to the content of the mail address. To do. For example, when the destination mail address is the copy destination Cc and the address attribute is personal, the label information “B” for which only the message is transmitted from the form designation condition table 28 is transmitted. The form data is specified.

FIG. 15 is a flowchart showing the processing flow of the transmission mode determination processing in the transmission mode determination unit 27. A process of appropriately determining the form data (label information) of the transmission form corresponding to the mail address designated by the user will be described with reference to FIG. Transmission form determination unit 2
When the process is started, 7 retrieves all the mail addresses from the mail content recording unit 1 via the transmission form designating unit 21 and puts them in the address list L (S121). Next, the contents of the address list L are checked, and if the address list L is empty (S122), the process ends. Otherwise, the first element (mail address) of address list L
The form specification condition table 28 is searched for form data (label information) having a matching condition (S123).

If no form having a matching condition is found, the transmission form is set to the standard form, and therefore, step S12.
Go to 6. If a form having the matching condition is found, the process proceeds to step S124, and it is determined whether the form having the matching condition is a form including the reference information (S124). If the morphological data does not include the reference information, that is all right, so step S
Proceed to 127. If the form data includes the reference information, in order to check the access right to the mail recipient, it is checked whether or not the recipient at the first address of the address list L has the access right (S125), and the access right exists. If so, the process proceeds to S127. On the other hand, in this determination, if the user does not have the access right, confirmation by the user is necessary. Therefore, also in this case, the process proceeds to step S126 as in the case where the condition is not matched, and the standard form is set as the specified form. The process in this case may be a process specified by the user through a manual operation, as shown in FIG.

In this way, the form designation condition table 2
When the form data (label information) of an appropriate transmission form is specified for the first element (mail address) of the address list L, including the case of specifying the standard form, when automatically discriminated according to the condition 8 Next, in step S127, the designated address and the label of the designated form are stored. Then, in order to perform processing for the next address,
In step S128, the top element of the address list L is removed, the process returns to step S122, and step S122
The processing from 122 is repeated.

As described above, in the fourth embodiment, the transmission form determination unit 27 is further provided, and the transmission form determination unit 27 determines the recipient (in accordance with the mail address designated as the destination). You can specify an appropriate transmission form by the condition of (e-mail address). Therefore, it is possible to reduce the time and effort required for the mail sender to specify the transmission mode. Further, such a mail sender can further easily and appropriately perform the operation of designating the transmission form for the mail receiver by using the template. That is, it is possible to simplify the designation of the form by designating the form close to the intention of the mail sender as the standard value by designating the template. Next, a modified example will be described as a fifth embodiment.

(Fifth Embodiment) FIG. 16 shows the fifth embodiment of the present invention.
3 is a block diagram showing a configuration of a main part of the electronic mail system according to the embodiment of FIG. As shown in FIG. 16, the electronic mail system of the fifth embodiment has a template recording unit 31 and a template management unit 32 in addition to the configuration (FIG. 13) of the electronic mail system of the fourth embodiment described above. And has been added. Template recording unit 31
Stores a plurality of templates each representing a set of mail addresses and a form used in a mail sent to each address. Then, when the mail sender designates the transmission form and performs the mail transmission, the template recording unit 31 provides the selection information by the designated template to the transmission form designation unit 21. The template management unit 32 performs processing for managing template information such as template creation processing and update processing.

FIG. 17 is a diagram showing an example of the template selection screen of the electronic mail system of the fifth embodiment.
FIG. 8 is a diagram showing an example of a display screen of one piece of template information. The template selection screen 34 shown in FIG. 17 is a screen under the control of a graphical user interface control unit of a computer system including a coordinate input device such as a mouse and a display. On this screen, an instruction of the mouse cursor 33 is given. By the button function on the screen by the operation, it is possible to operate each selection setting. The template selection screen 34 is provided with a plurality of template selection buttons (35, 36) for selecting a template in which the template name is displayed. The template selection buttons 35 and 36 display a list of templates included in the template recording unit 31, and also display details of the template corresponding to the template selection button instructed to be selected. For example, when one of the template selection buttons 35 is selected by the selection operation of the mouse cursor 33, a template window 39 for displaying the specified template information is opened as shown in FIG.

In the template selection screen 34 shown in FIG. 17, the "new" button 37 at the upper right is a button having the function of creating a new template, and the "delete" button 38 is the template selection button ( 35, 36) is a button having a function of deleting the template selected and instructed.

When the operation of selecting the template selection button is performed, a template window 39 for displaying the specified template information is opened as shown in FIG. Information set in the template is displayed in the template window 39. That is, with the name of the template selected on the upper side, the addresses (“Sato”, “Tanaka”, “Yamad” registered here) are registered.
“A”, “A-Group”, “B-Group”) 42 and the selection status of the transmission mode to be used for the recipient of the address are displayed in a tabular form.
Indicates the transmission mode currently selected by the address. For example, for the address “Sato”, the form selection button 41 is in the selected state, and the form selection button 40 and the like are in the non-selected state. That is, with respect to the address "Sato", the transmission form used in the mail transmission is designated by the selection instruction of the form selection button 41 to transmit the "message and body". For example, if the form selection button 40 is selected here to change the transmission form for the address "Sato", the transmission form used in the e-mail is changed to a form in which "message only" is transmitted. The display state of the selection button 41 is switched. Such changes are temporarily stored in the template recording unit 31.

By instructing the "correct" button 44 provided in the upper right portion of the template window 39, the content of the template recording section 31 is updated to the content displayed in the template window 39 by the function of this button. To be done. Similarly, the "confirm" button 43 provided in the upper right portion sends the state of the selection instruction currently displayed in the template window 39 to the transmission form designating section 21 by the function of this button. As a result, the transmission form designation section 21 designates the form data corresponding to each address.

FIG. 19 is a diagram showing an example of a transmission mode designation processing flow based on template information. This will be described with reference to FIG. When the process of designating the transmission form is started, the transmission form designating unit 21 first reads the template information sent from the template recording unit 31 (S1).
31). Next, all addresses are taken out from the mail content recording unit 1 and an address list L is created (S13).
2). Next, in order to determine whether or not the transmission form has been specified for all addresses, the address list L
Is determined to be empty (S133). If the address list L is empty, the process ends.

If the address list L is not empty, in step S134, the top address of the address list L is searched from the template information to determine whether or not there is a corresponding address. In this determination, if the corresponding address is not found, the process proceeds to step S137. If the corresponding address is found, step S13.
5, it is checked whether or not the form data of the transmission form designated by the template information includes the reference information. If the reference information is not included, there is no problem with the access right, so the process proceeds to step S138 for registering the designation of the form.
If the reference information is included, in step S136,
It is checked whether or not the recipient of the first address in the address list L has the access right. If there is the access right, there is no problem with the access right of the e-mail, so the process proceeds to step S138 for registering the designation of the form. If there is no access right in this determination, or if the address to be processed does not exist in the template information here and the corresponding address is not found in step S134, step S
Proceeding to 137, the designated form is set as the standard form. In addition,
The designation process of this form may be performed by the user directly by the process shown in FIG.

In this way, it is possible to specify the transmission form for the first element (mail address) of the address list L by using the template information (including the case of specifying as the standard form when it cannot be specified). Then, in the next step S138, the designated address and the label of the designated form are stored. Then, in order to perform the form designation process for the next address, step S139.
In, the first element of the processed address list L is removed, the process returns to S133, and the processes from step S133 are repeated. By this iterative process, the processed addresses are sequentially removed, so step S
When it can be determined in 133 that the address list L is empty, the processing is ended.

As described above, in the fifth embodiment, the template recording unit 31 and the template management unit 32 are provided, and a plurality of sets of templates having the mail address and the information of the selection relation of the transmission form are recorded. Managed. By using this template information when designating the transmission form for the mail address, an appropriate template can be selected and used as a standard value. Therefore, by pre-selecting the transmission form of the content intended by the sender by the template information, the form close to the intention of the sender can be set as the standard value, and the operation of the form designation can be further performed. It can be done easily.

In such a transmission mode designation process, for example, a transmission mode is designated for an address addressed to an individual and a transmission mode is designated for an address addressed to a group. Therefore, an individual and a group to which the individual belongs are the same. There may be duplicate emails sent to the recipient. In addition, the same recipient may be designated in different transmission modes in duplicate. In such a case, it is possible to organize the designated situation of the designated transmission form and finally designate the transmission form for each recipient (email address). Next, such a modification will be described as a sixth embodiment.

(Sixth Embodiment) FIG. 20 shows the sixth embodiment of the present invention.
21 is a block diagram showing a configuration of a main part of the electronic mail system according to the embodiment of the present invention, and FIG. 21 is a diagram showing an example of a transmission mode designation input screen in the electronic mail system of the sixth embodiment. FIG. 22 is a diagram showing an example of the priority order specification table referred to by the electronic mail system of the sixth embodiment. Here, in the electronic mail system of the sixth embodiment, as shown in FIG. 20, in addition to the configuration of the electronic mail system of the fifth embodiment described above (FIG. 16), a form organizing unit 45 and an address expanding unit 55 are further added. Has been added.

The form organizing section 45 performs a process of changing to a proper form designation when a plurality of forms are designated for the same recipient (address). For example, as shown in FIG. 21, the form organizing unit 45 uses the transmission form designation input screen 54.
At, the overlapping address and the form (setting of form data) designated for the address are displayed, and the form designation input field 54a prompts the user to reselect an appropriate one. As a result, the duplicated state is removed from the duplicated address, and the designation of the transmission form for the address is corrected to an appropriate one.

Further, such a transmission mode designation input screen 5
2 is changed to a configuration in which a correction input is made to an overlapping address by the user's operation in FIG.
As shown in FIG. 2, a priority order specification table 56 is provided, and the priority order of the transmission mode specification is set in advance in the priority order specification table 56, so that overlapping addresses are overlapped according to the priority order. You can also remove the specified state of. In this case, in the electronic mail system of the sixth embodiment, the address expanding unit 55 performs processing for expanding an address including a plurality of recipients into an actual address, as realized by a conventional electronic mail system. , Check for duplicate addresses. Further, in this example, the priority designation table 56 is provided to store the priority information that gives the selection criterion for the type of morphological data.
4: priority information may be held as one field of FIG. 3). Further, as the information in the form designation condition table (28: FIG. 14), information on the priority order may be described.

FIG. 23 is a flow chart showing an example of the arrangement processing of the transmission form by the form arrangement unit. The arrangement processing of this transmission form will be described with reference to FIG. When the processing is started, first, in step S141, the form designation data including the pair information of the address and the form (label information) is taken out from the designated form recording unit 4, and the form designation list T is created. Next, in step S142,
It is determined whether the form designation list T is empty. If the form designation list T is empty, the process proceeds to step S147. If the form designation list T is not empty, the next step S143.
At, it is checked whether the address of the first element of the form designation list T represents a group. If it represents a group, it is expanded to addresses addressed to each individual belonging to the group and the duplication of the address is checked. Therefore, in step S144, the address is expanded and the expanded address and its designated form are combined. Add to address list L. Then, the process proceeds to step S146.

On the other hand, in step S143, if the address does not represent a group, then in step S145, the head element of the form designation list T is added to the address list L. This completes the processing for the top element of the form designation list T, so in the next step S146, the top element of the form designation list T is removed, and the process returns to step S142. This process is repeated, and even if the addresses of the group are included in the addresses of the form designation list T, the address list L is created by expanding all the addresses to the individual, and the creation of the address list L is completed. , And proceeds to step S147.

In step S147, the address list L
Determines whether is empty. If the address list L is empty, the duplication check for all addresses has been completed, and the process ends. If not, the process proceeds to step S148, and it is determined whether or not there is an address of an element that overlaps with the address of the head element of the address list L. If there is an overlapping element address in this determination, in the next step S149, the method by the user designation (FIG. 21) as described above or the method using the priority designation table 56 (FIG. 22) is performed. The designation is changed to eliminate the overlapping address, a new form is determined, and the process proceeds to step S150. If there is no overlapping element address, the process proceeds to step S1 as it is.
Go to 50. Then, in step S150, the processed address and the label of the determined form are stored as the form designation data (18: FIG. 6). Next, the element having the corresponding address for which processing has been completed is added to the address list L
Is removed, and the process returns to step S147. Then, the processing from step S147 is repeated. As a result, the addresses for which processing has been completed are sequentially removed, and step S14
If it can be determined in 7 that the address list L is empty,
The process ends.

As described above, in the electronic mail system of the sixth embodiment, the form organizing unit 45 and the address expanding unit 55 are added. With such a configuration, the mail address is analyzed and the same mail is received. When a person is described in duplicate, the transmission form designated for each is corrected and an appropriate transmission form is determined. As a result, even if the address is duplicately described as the address, the duplicate address is removed, so that it is possible to prevent unnecessary information from being transmitted to the recipient.

By the way, when a mail sender sends a plurality of e-mails to a plurality of different recipients, the e-mail recipients may send e-mails in any form on the recipient side. There is no way to know the situation. Therefore, the mail sender can send the mail to the mail recipient in the form of sending the email (message only email, message and document email, or send to other email recipients). If you want to convey the situation), you must convey the situation in the document content or the sent message. Therefore, it is very troublesome for the mail sender. On the other hand, in the e-mail system here, when sending an e-mail, the information of the form designation data indicating the form of sending the e-mail to each recipient (email address) has already been created. Therefore, as one mode of the transmission mode here, it is possible to easily cope with it by adding the content information of the transmission mode to the transmission mail so that the transmission mode in which the mail is transmitted can be designated. Next, an electronic mail system of such an embodiment will be described as a seventh embodiment.

(Seventh Embodiment) FIG. 24 shows a sixth embodiment of the present invention.
25 is a block diagram showing a configuration of a main part of the electronic mail system according to the embodiment of the present invention. FIG. 25 is data of an electronic mail to which content information of a transmission form created by the electronic mail system of the sixth embodiment is added. It is a figure which shows an example of a structure. As shown in FIG. 24, the electronic mail system of the sixth embodiment has a device configuration in which a transmission form information addition unit 46 is further added to the configuration of the electronic mail system of the fifth embodiment (FIG. 20). Has become. Transmission form information addition unit 46
Specifies that the content is added as the content information of the transmission form according to the form designation data (18: FIG. 6) designated by the transmission form designation unit 21. As a result, when the mail generation unit 22 generates a mail from the mail content of the mail content recording unit 1 based on the form data specified in correspondence with the address and sends the mail, the content information of the transmission form is added. Send an e-mail in the specified format.

As shown in FIG. 25, the mail contents 47 of the electronic mail in the format to which the contents information of the transmission form is added are the transmission information 48, the transmission message 49, and the contents information 5 of the transmission form.
1 and document information 50. Transmission information 4
8, the transmission message 49, and the document information 50 are shown in FIG.
The content information 51 of the transmission form is the same as the contents described in the above, and is added by the transmission form information addition unit 46. In the case of this example, as the content information 51 of the transmission form, a mail of “main body and message” is transmitted from the form designation data (18: FIG. 6) to the addresses “Sato”, “Tanaka”, “A-Group”. And the address “Yamada”, “BG
"Reference information and message" email is sent to "roup", and "message only" is sent to address "Suzuki"
The content information indicating that the e-mail has been sent is added.

As described above, in the electronic mail system according to the seventh embodiment of the present invention, the transmission form information adding section 46 is added, and this transmission form information adding section 46 Content information of the transmission form for the electronic mail is added as a part of the mail content.
For this reason, it is possible to inform the mail recipient of who has sent what form. This allows the recipient to
You can figure out what other recipients know,
You can proceed smoothly with subsequent meetings.

The content information of the transmission form added by the electronic mail system of the seventh embodiment is essentially additional additional information, and is intended for a recipient who does not need such information. , It is desirable to prevent unnecessary information from being transmitted. Therefore, in such a case, it is possible to modify so that the mail recipient who adds the content information of the transmission form to the electronic mail is designated in advance. An example of such a modification of the electronic mail system will be described as an eighth example.

(Eighth Embodiment) FIG. 26 shows an eighth embodiment of the present invention.
3 is a block diagram showing a configuration of a main part of the electronic mail system according to the embodiment of FIG. As shown in FIG. 26, the electronic mail system of the eighth embodiment has a device configuration in which a form information destination designating section 52 is further added to the configuration of the electronic mail system of the seventh embodiment (FIG. 24). Has become. The morphological information transmission destination designating unit 52 here sets the morphological designation data (18:
Whether to send the content information of the transmission form according to Fig. 6) together with the content of the mail, each recipient (mail address)
Decide against. As a result, the recipient designated to send the content information in the transmission form is sent the email in the format shown in FIG. 25, and the recipients not designated are sent the email in the format shown in FIG. Will be done.

FIG. 27 is a flow chart for explaining the mail generation process when the destination of the form information is designated. The mail generation process in this case will be described with reference to FIG. When the processing is started, in step S161, all the types of form data held in the transmission form registration unit 2 are extracted and placed in the transmission form list T to create the transmission form list T. Then, here, the process proceeds for each type of the form data included in the transmission form list T.
Therefore, next, in step S162, it is determined whether or not the transmission form list T is empty. If the transmission form list T is empty, it means that all the processes here have been completed, so the process is completed. Otherwise, in step S163, the form designation data (18: FIG. 6) is referred to, and the addresses designated to send the mail in the type of the form data (label information) at the head of the transmission form list T are collected, Create an address list L. Next, in step S164, it is determined whether the address list L is empty. If the address list L is empty, there is no mail to be transmitted in the type of the morphological data, or since the mail generation and transmission in the type of the morphological data have been completed, the process proceeds to step S165 and the next Since the processing is performed according to the type of form data, the first element of the transmission form list T is removed, and the process returns to step S162. Then, the processing from step S162 is repeated.

If the address list L is not empty in the determination processing of step S164, the processing is performed in the transmission form of the specified form data type.
In 6, the element of the designated transmission form is read from the form data, the mail content part of the entity of the corresponding element is taken out from the mail content recording part 1, and combined to generate the mail. Then, in step S167, it is determined whether or not addition of the form designation data (content information of the transmission form) is designated at the head address of the address list L, and the addition of the form designation data is designated. Only in this case, in the next step S168, form designation data (content information of transmission form) is further added to the mail contents. Next, in step S169, a process of transmitting the mail generated to the head address of the address list L is performed. As a result, the processing for the first address of the address list L is completed, and the processing for the next address is performed. Therefore, in the next step S170, the address list L
The first element of is removed, the process returns to step S164, and the processing from step S164 is repeated.

As described above, in the electronic mail system of the eighth embodiment, the form information transmission destination designating unit 5 is further added.
2 has been added. When the content information of the transmission form for the mail is added to the recipient as a part of the mail content, the form information destination designating unit 52 can individually specify the recipients to which the content information of the transmission form is transmitted. . Therefore, it is possible to prevent unnecessary information from being transmitted to an unnecessary receiver of the content information in the transmission form. Further, in this embodiment, the form information transmission destination designating unit 52 designates the case of transmitting the content information (form designating data) of the form of transmission, but the form designating data (18:
6) may be treated as one element of the mail content, and addition (or not) of the form designation data may be designated in one field of the form data (14: FIG. 3).

In the electronic mail system of each of the embodiments, the reference information may be sent as one element of the mail contents. In this case, the mail recipient receives the reference information. If the reference information is used to directly access the document, the mail recipient can immediately read the document specified by the reference information when reading the mail content. next,
An electronic mail system of such a modified example will be described as a ninth embodiment.

(Ninth Embodiment) FIG. 28 shows a ninth embodiment of the present invention.
3 is a block diagram showing a configuration of a main part of the electronic mail system according to the embodiment of FIG. In FIG. 28, 57 is a mail receiving unit, 58 is a mail analyzing unit, 59 is a file access unit, and 60 is a document acquisition designating unit. The blocks of the elements that make up these systems represent the configuration of the system on the mail recipient side. When the mail receiving unit 57 receives the electronic mail sent from the mail sending unit 6, the mail analysis unit 58 determines whether the received mail contains the reference information, and the reference information is included. If the reference information has been sent, the file access unit 59
The data storage device 24 is accessed via to obtain the document information. As a result, the mail recipient can immediately read the document specified by the reference information when reading the mail content.

The document acquisition designating section 60 holds information for instructing whether or not to immediately access the document information based on the reference information sent as such an electronic mail. Therefore, in the system on the mail recipient side, when the mail analysis unit 58 performs the above-described access operation based on the reference information after receiving the mail, when the document acquisition designation unit 60 has designated the document acquisition. Only. That is, the document acquisition designating unit 60 can specify whether or not to acquire the document information immediately, and further, it is possible to selectively acquire only the necessary document information.
Therefore, the mail recipient who wants to read the document information can read the document information without performing the document acquisition operation each time the electronic mail is received.

Further, in the electronic mail system of each of the embodiments here, as one of the types of transmission modes, a transmission mode in which only reference information is transmitted instead of transmitting a document by mail content can be used. . By using this type of sending, the amount of data sent as the body of the e-mail will be small, and if individual e-mails need to be sent to multiple e-mail recipients, the individual e-mail sending process can be completed quickly. Therefore, the mail can be sent early even to the mail recipient of the finally designated address. If you do not use this type of transmission,
For the mail recipient of the last specified address,
As long as the processing of the previously specified mail recipient is not completed,
No email is sent to the recipient.

However, in the case of using such a transmission form, as the mail content, only the reference information is sent instead of sending the document. Therefore, the mail sender side
There remains a problem that the mail recipient cannot confirm whether or not the document information has been acquired. Therefore, in such a case, it is desirable to notify the email sender of whether or not the email recipient has obtained the document information from the email that was sent. An electronic mail system of such a modified example will be described as a tenth embodiment.

(Tenth Embodiment) FIG. 29 is a block diagram showing the arrangement of the main parts of an electronic mail system according to the tenth embodiment of the present invention. FIG. 30 is a diagram showing an example of the document acquisition notification mail information generated in the electronic mail system according to the tenth embodiment. As shown in FIG. 29, the electronic mail system of the tenth embodiment further includes a notification mail generation unit 62 and a mail transmission unit 63 in addition to the configuration of the electronic mail system of the ninth embodiment (FIG. 28). It has a different device configuration. The notification mail generation unit 62
The mail analysis unit 58 transmits the file via the file access unit 59.
When the document information is acquired from the data storage device 24 based on the reference information, the mail information of the document acquisition notification is generated. Then, the mail transmitting unit 63 replies to the mail sender. As a result, the mail sender is notified of the reply mail indicating that the mail recipient has acquired the document.

As shown in FIG. 30, in the mail information of the document acquisition notification, the mail content 64 is composed of transmission information 65 and a transmission message 66. The transmission information 65 is created by exchanging the sender (From) and the address (To) from the transmission information 8 of the transmitted electronic mail, and the transmission message 66 is automatically generated as a message indicating that the document is acquired. It

FIG. 31 is a flow chart showing an example of the document acquisition / notification processing in the electronic mail system of the tenth embodiment. The document acquisition notification process transmitted from the mail recipient will be described with reference to FIG. When the processing is started, first, in step S171, the mail list L containing the mails received by the mail receiving unit 57.
Is created and processing is performed according to the contents of the mail list L. Therefore, in the next step S172, it is determined whether or not the mail list L is empty. Mail list L
If is empty, the process ends. If the mail list L is not empty, it is determined in step S173 whether the top mail of the mail list L includes reference information. If the reference information is not included, the document is not acquired, so the process immediately proceeds to step S177 and the process for the next mail is performed.

If the reference information is included, then step S1
At 74, it is determined whether the document acquisition designation unit 60 has designated the document acquisition. If the document acquisition is not designated, the document acquisition is not performed in this case either, and therefore the process immediately proceeds to step S177 and the process for the next mail is performed. If it is determined in step S174 that the document acquisition is designated, the mail includes the reference information and the document acquisition is designated. Therefore, in step S175, the document designated by the reference information is acquired. I do. That is, the document information is acquired from the data storage device 24 via the file access unit 59. When the document information is acquired, the acquired document is displayed, and in the next step S176, the notification mail generation unit 62 generates and transmits the notification information indicating that the document has been acquired. After the transmission of the notification mail is completed, in order to process the next mail, the head element of the mail list L is removed in step S177, and the process returns to step S172.
Then, the processing from step S172 is repeated.

In the electronic mail system of the tenth embodiment, whether or not to acquire a document is specified in common for all electronic mails, and the document acquisition processing is performed in step S175 based on the specified document acquisition information. However, this document acquisition process is performed only when the e-mail is sent from a specific sender, or when the self-address is written in either the To field or the CC field of the transmission information. It is also possible to select whether or not to acquire the document for each mail, based on the specified information only when the mail is included. When the mail sender receives such a document acquisition notification mail, the mail sender can know what information the mail receiver needs, and can send the mail more appropriately at a later time. You can specify the form.

[0090]

As described above, according to the electronic mail system of the present invention, the recipient of the electronic mail can always send the contents of the appropriate form according to the contents of the specified form information (form data). It will be possible to receive e-mail. Therefore, the recipient of the email will not be confused by receiving too much information. Also, to the form information that specifies the transmission form, even if the address is duplicated in the address, extra information is prevented from being sent to the recipient, and the content information of the transmission form (form designation data) is added. Therefore, the electronic mail system can be effectively used in various transmission modes by a simple operation.

[Brief description of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing a basic configuration of essential parts of an electronic mail system according to a first embodiment of the present invention,

FIG. 2 is a diagram explaining an example of a data structure of an electronic mail,

FIG. 3 is a diagram showing an example of form information stored in a transmission form registration unit;

FIG. 4 is a flowchart showing a processing flow of a transmission form designation process in a transmission form designation unit;

FIG. 5 is a diagram showing an example of a display screen at the time of an input operation for designating a transmission form,

FIG. 6 is a diagram showing an example of a data structure of form designation data held in a designated form recording unit,

FIG. 7 is a flowchart illustrating a series of processes related to a mail generation process performed by a mail generation unit,

FIG. 8 is a block diagram showing a configuration of a main part of an electronic mail system according to a second embodiment of the present invention,

FIG. 9 is a flowchart showing a processing flow of a transmission form designation process by a transmission form designation unit in the second embodiment;

FIG. 10 is a block diagram showing a configuration of a main part of an electronic mail system according to a third embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 11 is a diagram showing an example of an edit screen when an operation of updating transmission form data is performed by the transmission form management unit 25;

FIG. 12 is a flowchart showing an example of a processing flow of editing processing of form data in the transmission form management unit;

FIG. 13 is a block diagram showing a configuration of a main part of an electronic mail system according to a fourth embodiment of the present invention,

FIG. 14 is a diagram showing an example of a form designation condition table;

FIG. 15 is a flowchart showing a processing flow of transmission form determination processing in the transmission form determination unit;

FIG. 16 is a block diagram showing a configuration of a main part of an electronic mail system according to a fifth embodiment of the present invention,

FIG. 17 is a diagram showing an example of a template selection screen of the electronic mail system of the fifth embodiment,

FIG. 18 is a diagram showing an example of a display screen of one template information,

FIG. 19 is a diagram showing an example of a transmission mode designation processing flow based on template information;

FIG. 20 is a block diagram showing a configuration of a main part of an electronic mail system according to a sixth embodiment of the present invention,

FIG. 21 is a diagram showing an example of an input screen for designating a transmission mode in the electronic mail system according to the sixth embodiment;

FIG. 22 is a diagram showing an example of a priority order specification table referred to by the electronic mail system of the sixth embodiment;

FIG. 23 is a flowchart showing an example of a transmission form arrangement process by the form arrangement unit;

FIG. 24 is a block diagram showing a configuration of a main part of an electronic mail system according to a sixth embodiment of the present invention,

FIG. 25 is a diagram showing an example of the data structure of an electronic mail to which the content information of the transmission form created by the electronic mail system of the sixth embodiment is added,

FIG. 26 is a block diagram showing a configuration of a main part of an electronic mail system according to an eighth embodiment of the present invention,

FIG. 27 is a flowchart illustrating a mail generation process when a destination of form information is designated;

FIG. 28 is a block diagram showing a configuration of a main part of an electronic mail system according to a ninth embodiment of the present invention,

FIG. 29 is a block diagram showing a configuration of a main part of an electronic mail system according to a tenth embodiment of the present invention,

FIG. 30 is a diagram showing an example of document acquisition notification mail information generated in the electronic mail system of the tenth embodiment,

FIG. 31 is a flowchart showing an example of a document acquisition / notification process in the electronic mail system of the 10th embodiment.

[Explanation of symbols]

1 ... E-mail content recording unit, 2 ... Transmission form registration unit, 3 ... Transmission form designation unit, 4 ... Designated form recording unit, 5 ... Mail generation unit,
6 ... E-mail sending part, 10 ... E-mail content, 11 ... Sent information, 12 ... Sent message, 13 ... Document information, 14 ... Form data, 14a ... Label field, 14b ... Comment field, 14c ... Sent information field, 14d ...
Message field, 14e ... Document field, 14
f ... Reference information field, 14g ... Standard form field, 15 ... Transmission form designation input screen, 16 ... Address input field, 17 ... Transmission form input field, 18 ... Form designation data, 18a ... Address field, 18b ...
Form field, 21 ... Transmission form designation unit, 22 ... Mail generation unit, 23 ... File access unit, 24 ... Data storage device, 25 ... Transmission form management unit, 26 ... Edit screen, 26a
... transmission information column, 26b ... message column, 26c ... mouse-carnor, 26d ... form type column, 26e ... reference information column, 27 ... transmission form determination unit, 28 ... form designation condition table, 28a ... condition field, 28b ... Form field, 31 ... Template recording section, 32 ... Template management section, 33 ... Mouse cursor, 34 ... Template selection screen, 35 ... Template selection button, 36 ... Template selection button, 37 ... "New" button, 38 ... "Delete" Button, 39 ... template window, 40 ... form selection button, 41 ... form selection button, 42 ... registered address, 43 ... "confirm" button, 44 ... "correction" button,
45 ... Form organizing unit, 46 ... Form information adding unit, 47 ... Mail contents, 48 ... Send information, 49 ... Send message, 50
... Document information, 51 ... Transmission form content information, 52 ... Transmission information destination designation unit, 54 ... Transmission form designation input screen, 54a
... Type designation input field, 55 ... Address expansion section, 5
6 ... Priority designation table, 57 ... Mail transmission unit, 58
Mail analysis unit, 59 file access unit, 60 document acquisition designation unit, 62 notification mail generation unit, 63 mail transmission unit, 64 mail content, 65 transmission information, 66 transmission message.

─────────────────────────────────────────────────── ─── Continuation of the front page (58) Fields surveyed (Int.Cl. ⁷ , DB name) H04L 12/54 G06F 13/00 H04L 12/58

Claims (3)

(57) [Claims] 1. An electronic mail system for sending a transmission content having elements of transmission information and content information having main contents to be transmitted to a mail address designated as a destination, which is represented by a combination of the elements. Transmission form registration means for holding the form information of the transmission contents, transmission form designation means for selecting and designating the form information of the electronic mail to be transmitted for each destination mail address, and the form designated for each mail address An electronic mail system comprising: a mail generation unit that generates a transmission mail of the transmission content from information. 2. The electronic mail system according to claim 1, further analyzing the mail address, and when the same recipient is described in duplicate, the transmission designated for each mail address. An electronic mail system comprising a form organizing unit that compares form information of contents and determines appropriate form information. 3. The electronic mail system according to claim 1, further comprising in what form the electronic mail is sent to each mail address when the outgoing mail is generated from the contents transmitted by the mail generating means. An electronic mail system comprising: transmission form information adding means for adding content information of the transmission form shown.