KR20010084365A - Method of expanding storage on internet and mail system using thereof - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE: A method for extending a storage domain on the Internet and a mail system are provided to enable a user to store lots of mails without a limitation by enabling the user to extend a storage domain on the Internet. CONSTITUTION: A user connects to a service providing site through a computer and receives a mail service in a storage domain of the service providing site(301). It is judged whether a storage domain which the user uses exceeds a fixed capacity(302). It is judged whether encoding is performed(303). Data to be provided to the user's domain are encoded(304). Recent mails are stored in the storage domain of the service providing site. In addition, the other mails are stored in a special storage media(305). The special storage media is provided to the user(306).

Description

Method of expanding storage on internet and mail system using

The present invention relates to a method of expanding storage on the Internet and a mail system using the same.

Recently, Internet users have exploded due to the simplicity of HTML-based web (WWW) and the development of multimedia technology, and many applications have been developed to provide various services in the cyber space. Doing. In particular, most portal sites, telecommunications sites and company sites operating on the Internet provide mailing services free of charge along with various search services.

However, most mailing services currently provided have a certain limit on the memory space allocated per subscriber since the storage space of the service provider (ie, the storage space of the mail system) is limited. For example, most portal sites allocate mail spaces limited to 20M, 50M, or 100M per subscriber, and recommend that you delete old messages because data beyond this capacity cannot be stored.

The present invention has been made to solve the above problems, and an object of the present invention is to provide a method for expanding the storage space so as not to be limited to the storage space on the Internet from the user's point of view and a mail system using the same.

1 is a schematic diagram showing an Internet configuration to which the present invention is applied;

2 is a conceptual diagram illustrating a storage space expansion concept on the Internet according to the present invention;

3 is a flowchart illustrating a procedure of expanding a storage space in a service providing site according to the present invention;

4 is a diagram illustrating a procedure of a user accessing a mail system and viewing mail according to the present invention.

* Explanation of symbols for main parts of the drawings

102,104: User PC 110: Internet

120: service providing site 122: server

124: Database 202: Mail List

204: service provider mail storage space

206: service user mail storage space

In order to achieve the above object, the method of the present invention provides a storage means required for providing a predetermined service in the Internet where a user can access a service providing site by a computer and receive a predetermined service. In addition to providing at the service providing site, the user may provide an extended storage means to expand the storage space arbitrarily on the Internet.

In addition, in order to achieve the above object, the mail system of the present invention is located on the service providing site side in the Internet where a user can access a service providing site by a computer and receive a predetermined service. Main storage means for storing mails; Expansion storage means located on the user side for storing the user's mail; And a list of all mails related to the user, and when the user selects a specific mail, determine the location of the mail, read the mail data from the main storage means or the expansion storage means, and display the mail data on the web. It characterized in that it comprises a mail server for transmitting and receiving mail over the Internet in accordance with a predetermined mail transmission and reception protocol.

Hereinafter, exemplary embodiments of the present invention will be described in detail with reference to the accompanying drawings.

1 is a schematic diagram showing an Internet configuration to which the present invention is applied. Referring to FIG. 1, a service providing site 120 is implemented on the Internet, and the service providing site 120 includes a web and mail server 122, a database 124, and the like. In general, the service providing site 120 provides various web contents or search services and provides a mailing service. The user may access the service providing site 120 through the Internet 110 through the user PCs 102 and 104 and receive various services. For example, when the mail service provided by the service providing site 120 is used, mails are stored in a user account of the mail server provided by the site 120. At this time, the limited capacity allocated by the mail server was conventionally available, but the mail server according to the present invention can provide an infinite storage space by applying a storage expansion concept. To this end, the embodiment of the present invention uses a CD-ROM drive installed in the storage device 124 of the site and the user PCs 102 and 104.

2 is a conceptual diagram illustrating a concept of expanding a mail storage space on the Internet according to the present invention. Referring to FIG. 2, the present invention divides a mail storage space into a provider area and a user area provided by a service providing site (ie, a provider). The mail list 202 in the service provider area records a list of all mails. The mail files recorded in the mail list 202 are stored in the service provider mail storage 204 or the service user mail storage 206. have. That is, in the related art, since only the storage space provided by the service provider (operator) is used, the storage space is limited on the Internet, but according to the present invention, the entire storage space is expanded by using the storage space at the service provider side and the storage space at the user side. . At this time, the storage space of the service provider side is allocated to the storage device in the service providing site 120, and the storage space of the user side is an auxiliary memory device connected to the user computers 102 and 104, for example, a CD-ROM drive, a home drive, a hard disk, and the like. This can be In this case, the files may be stored in the form of a general file or a compressed file. In the embodiment of the present invention, a CD-ROM drive is used as a user-side storage device. An example of a mail list is shown in Table 1 below.

title Send / Receive Date and Time Sender URL Storage location ....... .... ... .... P P .. U U

Referring to Table 1, the mail list records the basic matters of all mails, and is provided with a "storage location" field for classifying storage spaces according to the present invention. If the storage location field is "P", this indicates that the mail is stored in the service provider area. In this case, mail stored in the operator area can be read more easily and quickly than mail stored in the user area. Therefore, frequently viewed mail, important mail, or recently arrived mail are stored in the operator area. In this way, priority can be given to each mail in order to distinguish the storage space.

In addition, the mail stored in the user area can be displayed directly on the user's computer without reading the mail to the service providing site, thereby eliminating the time required for data transmission and quickly displaying the mail in the user area.

3 is a flowchart illustrating a procedure of expanding a storage space at a service providing site according to the present invention. The user accesses the service providing site 120 and receives a mail service. The mail service provided at this time usually receives mail from the outside and stores it in the inbox, or sends the mail and stores the sent mail in the sender. In this way, while performing the mail service using the storage space of the service providing site 120, it is determined whether the storage space used by the user exceeds the standard capacity (301, 302).

If the used space where the user's mail is stored is out of the standard capacity, the following procedure is performed to move the mail to the user storage area. In this case, if encryption is required by determining whether to encrypt, mail files to be stored in the user area are encrypted according to a predetermined encryption algorithm (303 and 304).

Next, recent incoming mails or frequently viewed mails are stored in the storage space of the service providing site 120 (operator storage space) as it is, and the remaining mails are stored in the CD-ROM, and the CD-ROM is delivered to the user (305,306). ). At this time, the location information of the corresponding mail is recorded in the storage location field of the mail list. For example, for the mails moved to the user space using the storage location field value as the default "P", the storage location field is changed to "U".

4 is a diagram illustrating a procedure of a user accessing a mail system and viewing mail according to the present invention. Referring to FIG. 4, a user accesses a service providing site 120 to perform a mail service (401). For example, entering the inbox shows a list of all received mails (402). At this time, you can also display the mail storage location. In order to view a specific mail in detail, the user selects the mail by clicking a title of the list (403).

Then, the mail server of the service providing site determines whether the mail is stored at the service providing site (operator area), and reads the mail from the database if the mail is stored at the service providing site (405). If the mail is stored in the user area, search the user area's CD-ROM drive and if the CD-ROM is not found, display the message "Please enter the CD-ROM where the mail is stored." If input, mail is read from user storage (407).

Subsequently, if the read mail is encrypted data, the mail is decrypted according to a predetermined algorithm and then the requested mail is provided. If the mail is not encrypted data, the requested mail is provided as it is (408, 409, 406).

In the above embodiment, for the sake of understanding, the storage space on the Internet is an example, but the present invention is not limited to this embodiment, but is applied to all applications requiring personal storage space such as a diary, an address book, a homepage, and the like. Can be applied.

As described above, according to the present invention, the storage space on the Internet can be infinitely extended from the user's point of view so that a large number of mails can be stored without limitation.

Claims (5)

In the Internet where a user can access a service providing site with a computer and receive a predetermined service, In addition to providing the storage means required for providing a predetermined service at the service providing site, the user may also provide the expansion storage means. Storage space expansion method on the Internet, characterized in that the storage space can be arbitrarily expanded on the Internet. The method of claim 1, wherein the extended storage means provided by the user is any one of a CD-ROM, a zip-drive, and a hard disk, and the extended storage means stores user data at the service providing site. How to expand storage on the Internet. In the Internet where a user can access a service providing site with a computer and receive a predetermined service, Main storage means for storing the user's mail at the service providing site; Expansion storage means located on the user side for storing the user's mail; And And a list of all mails related to the user, and when the user selects a specific mail, determine the location of the mail, read the mail data from the main storage means or the expansion storage means, and display the mail data on the web. Mail system, characterized in that it comprises a mail server for sending and receiving mail over the Internet in accordance with the mail transmission and reception protocol. The method of claim 3, wherein the extended storage means, Mail system characterized in that the CD-ROM for storing the user data of the service providing site, zip-drive, hard disk. The method of claim 3, wherein the mail system, And a data stored in the extended storage means can be directly displayed on a user's computer without being read to the service providing site through the Internet.