JP3444188B2 - Communication terminal device and program recording medium - Google Patents

Description

Detailed Description of the Invention

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to a communication terminal device having an electronic mail function and a computer-readable program recording medium.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art Communication networks such as the Internet can be used by simply paying the communication cost (line usage fee and provider cost) from a computer or the like to the nearest contract provider (connection provider to the communication network). Communication with other computers has become possible at low cost, and the number of users is rapidly increasing.

Therefore, nowadays, in addition to computers,
As a communication terminal device, a facsimile device capable of connecting to a communication network has been developed. According to this, a scanned and scanned original image is transmitted by either facsimile transmission or electronic mail transmission to the other party's communication. It can be sent to the terminal device. That is, when facsimile transmission is selected when transmitting image data,
Send image data directly using the telephone network. On the other hand, when the electronic mail transmission is selected, the image data is converted into the electronic mail format and this data is stored in the mailbox on the network. Many receiving parties access the communication network via the telephone network at an appropriate time by dial-up connection, and if the electronic mail arrives, the image data is taken out from the mailbox.

FIG. 7 shows an example of a communication sequence when receiving an electronic mail. Here, POP, which is the upper protocol of TCP / IP, is used as the receiving protocol.
3 shows a sequence when 3 (Post Office Protocol Version3) is adopted. In the figure, a client refers to a communication terminal device (mail client) that is a receiving side of electronic mail, and a server refers to a mail server having a mailbox on a communication network.

After making a (1) TCP connection request, the client sends (2) a user name and (3) a password to obtain authentication on the server side. When the server is authenticated, (4) inquires about the reception status, receives the data such as the number of mails in the mailbox, and if the mail addressed to itself arrives, (5) the mail stored in the mailbox Inquire the list and receive the data such as the message number of each mail.

Then, (6) the message number is designated to request reading of the message, and (7) the message stored in the mailbox is read and received. If the message can be received, (8) the message number of the received message is designated to request deletion of the message. If there are multiple messages to read,
When the operations of (6) to (8) are repeated (see *) and the reading of all messages is completed, (9) a communication end request is made and then (10) a TCP disconnection request is made.

[0007]

As described above, in the conventional communication terminal device, when electronic mail data (message) is downloaded (received), the data is deleted from the mailbox on the communication network. (See FIG. 7 (8)), the downloaded data is still stored in the memory and if a power failure occurs, the email data disappears from the communication terminal device, and the email data is lost. There was a problem that no longer exist.

[0008] When the e-mail disappears in this way, the sender of the e-mail cannot be known either. Therefore, the sender cannot send the e-mail again, and the content of the e-mail remains unknown. Was becoming. The present invention has been made in view of such circumstances, and after recording the data of the received electronic mail in the recording medium, the data is deleted from the mailbox on the communication network so that the contents of the electronic mail are deleted. It is an object of the present invention to provide a communication terminal device that prevents the user from being confused and a program recording medium that stores a program that causes a computer to realize the functions of the device.

[0009]

A communication terminal device according to claim 1 proposed for achieving the above object is a communication network device.
Receive emails from mailboxes on network
Receiving means and the electronic mail received by this receiving means.
Recording means for recording the data of a recording medium on a recording paper, and a receiving means
The e-mail received by is already recorded on the recording paper
Print management table for managing whether or not
Process table to find unrecorded email data.
The recording means to record the fact that it has been recorded.
E-mail printing process and print management
Refer to the table and save the recorded email data.
Control to remove from mailbox on communication network
And means.

Here, the communication terminal device according to the present invention may be any device having a function of communicating electronic mail via a communication network, such as a facsimile device or
It can be applied to personal computers capable of data communication.

According to a second aspect of the present invention, in the first aspect, the control means records the electronic mail data by the recording means and then receives the electronic mail. Therefore, when the communication network is accessed, the control means records the data. It is characterized by deleting data of e-mail. That is,
When the data of the electronic mail is recorded, the data is not deleted from the mailbox, and the data is deleted from the mailbox when the communication network is logged in to receive the electronic mail.

[0012] Claim 3 proposes a computer-readable program recording medium, and this program recording medium allows a computer to realize the function of the communication terminal device according to claim 1 or 2. The program is recorded. That is, when the computer reads the program recording medium, the control means of the computer receives the electronic mail, records the data of the electronic mail in the recording medium, and then records the recorded electronic mail from the mailbox on the communication network. Delete the data.

The control means deletes the recorded e-mail data from the mailbox when the communication network is accessed in order to receive the e-mail after recording the e-mail data.

[0014]

BEST MODE FOR CARRYING OUT THE INVENTION Embodiments of the present invention will be described below with reference to the drawings. FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing an example of the internal configuration of the communication terminal device of the present invention. here,
As one of the communication terminal devices of the present invention, a configuration example of a facsimile device F with an electronic mail function will be shown. This facsimile device F has a communication function via a communication network in addition to a facsimile communication function such as the conventional G3 method performed via a public line network. Below, as one of the communication networks, A case where the Internet is used and an electronic mail (e-mail) service is used on the Internet will be described.

The communication terminal device according to the present invention may be any device as long as it has a communication function of electronic mail via a communication network, and can be applied to, for example, a personal computer. In addition to the Internet, a personal computer communication service may be used for the communication network. The main control section 1 constitutes a control means with a CPU and the like, and not only controls each section of the facsimile apparatus F, but also performs encoding and decoding, image conversion, binary text conversion, mail editing, etc., which will be described later. Execute each process.

The NCU 2 closes and opens the communication line L (analog line). The modem 3 modulates and demodulates signals for facsimile communication. Here, the modem 3 is composed of a FAX modem having a data modem function for transmitting and receiving electronic mail. During G4 communication, not via the modem 3 or NCU2, but via DSU (not shown)
It is connected to an ISDN line (digital line) or the like.

The image memory 4 is composed of a DRAM or the like and stores image data. The RAM 5 stores in advance temporary data generated during execution of processing, a user name (user ID) and password for logging in to the Internet, an e-mail address of a partner, a facsimile number, and the like. The display unit 6 is composed of a liquid crystal display device or the like, and displays the operating state and operating procedure of the facsimile device F. The operation unit 7 is provided with a ten-key pad and various operation buttons, and makes various input settings for the facsimile apparatus F. If the display unit 6 is a touch panel type, the display unit 6 can be integrated with a part or all of the operation unit 7.

The reading unit 8 reads a document with a scanner using a CCD or the like and converts it into black and white binary image data. The recording unit 9 is composed of an electrophotographic printer or the like, and prints out image data received by facsimile from another facsimile device or image data received via the Internet on recording paper. The flash memory 10 reads the device control program required for the operation of the facsimile device F from the recording medium 12 (program recording medium) and stores it. Recording medium reading /
The writing unit 11 reads the control program of the facsimile apparatus F from the recording medium 12 such as a floppy disk or a CD-ROM. The read program is stored in the flash memory 10 by the main control unit 1, and thereafter, each unit is controlled according to the program. Also,
The recording medium reading / writing unit 11 can also write the data of the electronic mail downloaded in the image memory 4 into the recording medium 12 such as a floppy disk or a magneto-optical disk (MO).

The facsimile apparatus F has a function of transmitting and receiving mainly TIFF file image data as an electronic mail in addition to a facsimile communication function, and image data to be originally facsimile-communicated,
It can be sent and received via the Internet. Figure 2
3 schematically shows the flow of data in the facsimile apparatus F. Although not shown in FIG. 1, each unit in the figure is processed by the main control unit 1 on the basis of a software program stored in the flash memory 10 and also constitutes the receiving means of the present invention. is there.

The encoding / decoding unit 1a encodes the dot image data read by the reading unit 8 by an encoding method such as MH, MR, MMR, or conversely, decodes the received encoded data into image data. To do. Image converter 1
b is a general image format used in a computer for encoding encoded data when sending an electronic mail,
While converting to TIFF (Tagged Image File format) format, at the time of reception, it is converted from TIFF format to encoded data.

The TIFF specifications are based on Adobe Systems
It is released by the company and handles various data such as black and white binary, multi-valued black and white, full color, etc.
Classes corresponding to each are defined. One of them is Clas, which handles facsimile image data in G3 format.
s F is defined, and Cl is added at the beginning for encoded data.
It is possible to convert to the TIFF format by performing a relatively easy process such as adding TIFF header information of ass F.

The binary / text converter 1c converts TIFF format image data from binary data into text data when sending an electronic mail, and converts text data into binary data when receiving. This is because the Internet may be connected to a computer that cannot handle binary data emails. Therefore, in order to ensure that emails are delivered to the other party, the TIFF data Binary data such as must be converted to text data when sent.

The text data handled on the Internet is RFC (Request For Comm) which is a document issued by IETF (Internet Engineering Task Fore).
ents) 822, 1341 is defined as a 7-bit code. For example, MIME (Multipurpose
Binary data can be converted into text data by using base64, which is one of the encoding types of Internet Mail Extensions). Where ba
se64 considers 8 bits x 3 bytes of binary data as 6 bits x 4 bytes, and 6 bytes for each byte.
This is an encoding method for converting binary data into text data by assigning four types of character codes. In addition to the base64, the RFC includes 7 bit and 8 bit as the MIME encoding type.
t, binary, etc. are defined.

The mail editing unit 1d adds mail header information to the TIFF data with the MIME header converted into text data at the time of sending an e-mail and edits it in the e-mail format, while at the time of receiving the e-mail. The mail header information is removed from the data of (1) to be TIFF data of text data. Here, the mail header information is predetermined header information of an electronic mail on the Internet, and specifically, "Date:" (sending date), "From:" ( Source), "T
o: "(destination)," Subject: "(title)," cc: "(sub-destination)
Each item such as is added.

With such a configuration, the facsimile device F receives an electronic mail from a mailbox on the communication network (Internet) and stores the data in the image memory 4 (download). Then, the electronic mail data is read from the image memory 4 and recorded in a recording medium by a predetermined operation of the operation unit 7. Here, the recording medium is a recording medium 1 such as a floppy disc.
In addition to 2, the recording medium is included, and therefore the recording medium reading / writing unit 11 for writing the e-mail data on the floppy disk or the like, and the recording unit 9 for printing out the e-mail data on the recording paper are This constitutes the recording means of the present invention.

After recording the electronic mail data by the recording means, the main control unit 1 deletes the recorded electronic mail data from the mailbox on the communication network. By doing so, even if the data of the electronic mail stored in the image memory 4 disappears or is destroyed due to a power failure or a failure, it is already recorded on the recording medium 12 or the recording paper. Since the contents of the e-mail are recorded, the contents are never lost. In addition, even if the electronic mail data stored in the image memory 4 disappears before the electronic mail data is recorded,
Since the mail is still stored in the mailbox on the communication network, when a power failure etc. is restored,
You can download it again.

Further, when deleting the electronic mail data from the mailbox on the communication network, the main control section 1 sends a deletion command to the mail server installed in the provider through the communication line L. (See FIG. 7 (8)) In the present invention, this command is not sent immediately when the data of the electronic mail is recorded,
It then receives the email so that it can be sent when the user logs into the communications network.

That is, the main control unit 1 reads the recording medium /
After the electronic mail data is recorded by the writing unit 11 and the recording unit 9, the electronic mail is received. Therefore, when the communication network is accessed, the recorded electronic mail data is deleted from the mailbox. If you do this,
You can send a delete command when you receive another e-mail without accessing the communication network just to delete the e-mail data, so you do not incur unnecessary communication charges. I'm done.

Next, the operation of the facsimile apparatus F is shown in the flow chart of FIG. Here, the facsimile apparatus F permits deletion of the data on the network when the electronic mail data is printed out by the recording unit 9. FIG. 3A shows the operation of the mail reception process (steps 100 to 107) and FIG. 3B shows the operation of the mail print process (steps 110 to 115), both of which operate in parallel.

In the mail reception process of FIG. 3A, after the login to the mail server (100), first, the print management table T provided in the RAM 5 (described later with FIG. 4).
Check whether there is an e-mail for which printing is completed on the server by referring to, and if there is such an e-mail, delete the e-mail (101, 102). Further, if there is an incoming mail, the incoming mail is downloaded, and the recording unit 9
The unprinted mail flag indicating that the printing has not been performed yet is set (103 to 105).

When these processes are completed, the mail server is logged out (106), but the facsimile apparatus F waits for a certain period of time (107) and then logs in to the mail server again (100) to send an e-mail message. The receiving process is repeated. On the other hand, in the mail print process of FIG. 3B, the unprinted mail flag (10
5) is set (Y in 110), the unprinted mail on the image memory 4 is printed by the recording unit 9 (111), and if printing is completed (112).
Y), clear the unprinted mail flag (11
3) Then, the print completed mail is stored again as a print completed document (114). After that, in the facsimile apparatus F, after waiting for a certain period of time (115), it is checked again whether the unprinted mail flag is set (110), and the process of printing the unprinted mail is repeated.

FIG. 4 shows a configuration example of the print management table T provided in the RAM 5. In this table T, each time an e-mail is downloaded, as information for identifying each e-mail, for example, "From:" (sender) and "Date:" set in the header part of the e-mail.
(Sent date), "Subject:" (title) and message size (byte count) are stored, and the unprinted mail flag is also set (not printed).

Immediately after downloading an e-mail, the unprinted e-mail flag is set. Therefore, when logging in to download another e-mail, the e-mail in the mailbox is not deleted.
Delete the email from your mailbox when you log in to download another email after the downloaded email is printed and the unprinted flag is cleared.

FIG. 5 shows an example of a communication sequence for electronic mail reception using the print management table T. Here, POP3 (Post Office Protocol), which is a higher-level protocol of TCP / IP, is used as a reception protocol.
The sequence when Version3) is adopted is shown. Facsimile device F dials the provider, (1) requests TCP connection, and then (2) user name (USER command) and (3) password (PAS).
S command) to send the server side authentication. When the server authentication is obtained, the facsimile device F sends (4)
Queries the reception status (STAT command) and receives the number of mails in the mailbox and its size. As a result,
If the mail has arrived, (5) the mail list stored in the mailbox is inquired (LIST command), and the message number and size of each mail in the mailbox are received.

Then, according to the order of the list, (6) a header part request (TOP command) specifying the message number is performed, and (7) the header part of the message is received. Based on this header part, the print management table T is referred to search for a downloaded mail having the same header part data, and if the unprinted mail flag for that mail is cleared (printed), (8) A message deletion request (DELE command) specifying the message number is performed, and if the deletion is possible, the corresponding data is deleted from the table T.

If the unprinted mail flag is set, it means that the mail has already been downloaded, so no processing is performed. If there is no corresponding mail data in the print management table T, it means that the mail has not been downloaded.
(9) A message number is designated, a message read request (RETR command), and (10) a message stored in the mailbox is read and received (download).

This operation is repeated for the number of mails notified as a list (see * 1). That is, the header portion of each mail and the print management table T are compared in order to determine whether to delete, read, or do nothing. When the processing for all the mails is completed, (11) a communication end request (QUIT command) is performed, and then (12) a TCP disconnection request is performed.

Next, a computer that functions as the facsimile device F will be described. FIG. 6 is a block diagram showing an example of the internal configuration of a computer PC having an electronic mail communication function. The main control section 51 comprises a control means such as a CPU, and not only controls each section of the computer PC, but also constitutes a reception means in the same manner as the above-mentioned facsimile apparatus F to perform encoding and decoding. , Image conversion, binary text conversion, mail editing, etc. are executed (see FIG. 2).

The modem 52 is connected to the communication line L, modulates and demodulates signals for sending and receiving electronic mail, and also enables facsimile communication. Memory 53 is SR
The print management table T (see FIG. 4) and the like are stored by the AM and the like. The hard disk 54 reads the device control program and the like necessary for the operation of the computer PC from the recording medium 59 (program recording medium) and stores it.

The display unit 55 is composed of a CRT or the like. Although the keyboard 56 constitutes an operating means, this operating means may be a pointing device such as a mouse. The printer 57 displays data of electronic mail, image data received by facsimile, and the computer P.
The data created in C is printed out. Recording medium reading /
The writing unit 58 reads program data from a recording medium 59 such as a floppy disk or a CD-ROM. The main control unit 51 stores the read program in the hard disk 54.
After that, the operation of the computer PC is controlled according to the instructions of this program. Also, read recording media
The writing unit 58 can also write the electronic mail data downloaded to the hard disk 54 into a recording medium 59 such as a floppy disk or a magneto-optical disk.

In the present invention, the recording medium 59 stores a program for realizing the functions of the above-described facsimile apparatus F, and the main control section 51 records this program in the recording medium 59.
Is read by the recording medium reading / writing unit 58, the electronic mail is received, the data of the electronic mail is recorded on the recording medium 59, or is printed out from the printer 57, and then, from the mailbox on the communication network. Delete the recorded email data.

By operating in this way, even if a failure occurs and the data of the electronic mail stored in the hard disk 54 is erased or destroyed, the electronic mail is already written on the recording medium 59 or the recording paper. Since the contents are recorded, the contents will not be lost. Also, before recording the e-mail data, the hard disk 54
Even if the data of the electronic mail stored in is deleted, the mail is still stored in the mailbox on the communication network, so the mail can be downloaded again.

The main control unit 51 receives the e-mail after recording the data of the e-mail by the recording medium reading / writing unit 58 and the printer 57. Therefore, when the communication network is accessed, the main control unit 51 reads from the mailbox. , The recorded e-mail data can be deleted. This way, you won't have access to the communication network just to delete the email data,
It is possible to delete the recorded e-mail from the mailbox by sending a delete command when receiving another e-mail without incurring unnecessary communication charges.

Therefore, the computer PC performs a simple process of reading the program from the recording medium 59,
It is possible to change the timing of deleting the electronic mail from the mailbox to provide a function of preventing the contents of the arrived electronic mail from being lost.

[0045]

As can be understood from the above description, the communication terminal device according to claim 1 of the present invention records the electronic mail data received from the mailbox on the communication network on the recording paper. Since the recorded e-mail data is deleted from the mailbox, even if the e-mail data stored in this device is lost or destroyed due to a power failure or failure, the e-mail data will already be deleted. Since the contents of the email are recorded, the contents are never lost. Even if the electronic mail data stored in the device disappears before the electronic mail data is recorded, the mail is still stored in the mailbox on the communication network. can do.

In claim 2, since the electronic mail is received after the electronic mail data is recorded, the recorded electronic mail data is deleted from the mailbox when the communication network is accessed. No communication charges are incurred because the communication network is not accessed just to delete data. In claim 3, an electronic mail is received on the program recording medium,
A program that deletes the recorded e-mail data from the mailbox on the communication network after recording the e-mail data on the recording paper , and when the communication network is accessed to receive another e-mail. In addition, since the program that deletes the recorded e-mail data from the mailbox is recorded, just by making the computer read this recording medium, the timing of deleting the e-mail from the mailbox can be changed on the computer. It is possible to provide a function of preventing the contents of the arrived email from being lost.

[Brief description of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing an example of an internal configuration of a communication terminal device according to the present invention.

FIG. 2 is a schematic diagram showing a data flow in the communication terminal device of FIG.

FIG. 3 is a flowchart showing an example of a basic operation of the communication terminal device of FIG.

FIG. 4 is a diagram showing an example of a configuration of a print management table.

5 is a diagram showing an example of a communication sequence for receiving an electronic mail by the communication terminal device of FIG.

FIG. 6 is a block diagram showing an example of an internal configuration of a computer.

FIG. 7 is a diagram showing an example of a conventional communication sequence for receiving electronic mail.

[Explanation of symbols]

F: Facsimile machine with e-mail function 1 ... Main control unit 4 ... Image memory 5 ... RAM 9 ... Recording section 10: Flash memory 11 ... Recording medium reading / writing unit 12 ... Recording medium T: Print management table PC: Computer equipped with e-mail communication function 51 ... Main control unit 53 ... Memory 54: Hard disk 57 ... Printer 58: Recording medium reading / writing unit 59 ... Recording medium

─────────────────────────────────────────────────── ─── Continuation of the front page (56) Reference JP 58-207132 (JP, A) JP 5-95369 (JP, A) JP 10-42115 (JP, A) Utility model registration 2522817 ( JP, Y2) Edited by Hidematsu Kasano, edited by Multimedia Communication Research Group, Encyclopedia of Communication Protocols, ASCII Corporation, April 25, 1997, 1st edition, pp. 199-204 (58) Fields surveyed (Int.Cl. ⁷ , DB name) H04L 12/58 G06F 13/00

Claims (3)

(57) [Claims] 1. From a mailbox on a communication network
Receiving means for receiving electronic mail, the electronic mail data received by the receiving means,
Regarding the recording means for recording on the recording paper and the electronic mail received by the receiving means,
Print management table that manages whether or not it has been recorded on recording paper
And the print management table above, refer to the
The data of the
If you perform an e-mail printing process that records that it has been recorded
In addition, referring to the print management table above,
Data on the communication network
A communication terminal device comprising: 2. The control means records the electronic mail data by the recording means and then receives the electronic mail. Therefore, when the communication network is accessed, the control means records the recorded electronic mail data from the mailbox. The communication terminal device according to claim 1, wherein the communication terminal device is deleted. 3. A computer-readable program recording medium in which a program for causing a computer to realize the function of the communication terminal device according to claim 1 or 2 is stored.