WO2008138251A1

WO2008138251A1 - A method for providing the states of emails and the device thereof

Info

Publication number: WO2008138251A1
Application number: PCT/CN2008/070887
Authority: WO
Inventors: Ziqun Huang
Original assignee: Tencent Technology (Shenzhen) Company Limited
Priority date: 2007-05-11
Filing date: 2008-05-06
Publication date: 2008-11-20
Also published as: CN101072200A

Abstract

A method for providing the states of emails includes: receiving a mail (S201), creating at least one state for the mail, and presetting at least one state as un-processed (S202); receiving an operation instruction for the mail (S204), and setting the state corresponding to the operation instruction as processed (S206); displaying at least one state of the mail on the operation interface (S208). Also a device for providing the states of emails is provided. The method of the invention makes use of a special state marker bit to record the state of a mail, and different icons are used on a display interface to indicate states of a mail, thus it makes the mail dealing process fast and accurate.

Description

Method and device for providing email status

The present invention relates to email technology, and more particularly to a method and apparatus for providing email status. Background of the invention

Today, with the rapid development of information technology, information communication has become an indispensable part of people's daily life, and e-mail (hereinafter referred to as mail) is playing an important role.

For mail users, the most common action after receiving a message is to reply to the message and forward the message. When a user faces a large number of pending mails, quickly identify the status of the mail, such as whether the mail has been replied, forwarded, etc., to speed up the process of processing the mail.

In the prior art, the process of processing the received mail by the mail server is as shown in FIG.

Step S101: The email server collects the mail delivered to the domain.

Step S102: The server performs attribute analysis on the mail.

Step S103, according to the result of the attribute analysis, identifying the attribute of the mail on the index item status flag corresponding to the mail, and saving the mail and its index item to the corresponding position in the corresponding mailbox.

Step S104: When the user browses the mail, the mail list in the mailbox is read from the mailbox of the server, and the mail index entries are displayed in a certain order.

As can be seen from the above steps, when the mail server receives the mail, a plurality of status flags are set for the mail, and the status flags are generated according to the attribute of the mail at the time of receiving the mail. After the user performs operations on the message, such as replying, forwarding, etc., in the message Cannot be displayed in the status flag. For the above reasons, in the prior art, if the user needs to process or has processed the received mail, the following two methods are needed.

In the first method, the user can directly open the mail, read the contents of the mail, and discern whether the mail needs to be processed or has been processed.

In the second method, when the sent message is saved in the outbox, the user can open the outbox to see if a message has been processed, such as whether a message has been replied to and/or forwarded.

A disadvantage of the first method described above is that it requires identification by means of memory, and a memory error may occur. Moreover, the longer the elapsed time after receiving the mail, the more likely the memory error will occur. Moreover, since it is generally necessary to open the mail to confirm whether the mail has been processed, the operation time is too long. In particular, when there are a large number of messages in the inbox, it is difficult for the user to make a quick judgment.

The second method described above generally ensures that the judgment is correct. However, under this method, the user cannot intuitively recognize whether or not an already received mail has been processed, and thus an additional operation is required. When there are a lot of mail, this operation takes a lot of time and may be missed. Summary of the invention

In view of the above drawbacks, the technical problem to be solved by the present invention is to provide a method for providing a mail status, which provides a user of a mail with information for whether or not the mail needs to be processed or has been processed in a manner suitable for identification. The present invention also provides an apparatus for providing a mail status.

A method of providing email status, including:

Receiving a mail, creating at least one state for the mail, and presetting the at least one state as unprocessed;

Receiving an operation instruction for the mail, setting a state corresponding to the operation instruction to deal with;

At least one state of the mail is displayed on the operation interface. .

A device for providing an email status, including:

An operation receiving unit, configured to receive an operation instruction of the user on the mail;

a determining unit, configured to determine whether the user operates the mail; if yes, output the information of the operation to a flag setting unit;

a flag setting unit, configured to set at least one state for the received mail, and set the state to be unprocessed; receive information of the operation sent by the determining unit, and send the mail according to the information The status corresponding to the operation is set to have been processed;

And a display unit, configured to display at least one state of the mail on the operation interface. Compared with the prior art, the technical solution provided by the present invention uses a special status flag to record various states of the mail, and displays the status of the mail on the display interface to identify different states of the status flag. Therefore, the mail user can quickly identify the processed mail through the prominent logo, so that the mail processing process is fast and accurate. BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

1 is a flow chart of mail processing in the prior art;

2 is a flow chart of a method for providing a mail status according to a first embodiment of the present invention; and FIG. 3 is a block diagram of a device for providing a mail status according to a second embodiment of the present invention. Mode for carrying out the invention

A first embodiment of the present invention provides a method of providing a mail status. Please refer to Fig. 2, which is a flow chart of the first embodiment.

Step S201: The mail server receives the mail, that is, the mail server receives the mail delivered to the domain. Step S202, setting at least one state for the mail, for example, an index entry of the mail may be created, and at least one status flag is established in the index entry for recording at least one state of the mail, such as a reply flag bit, a forwarding flag Bits, pending flag bits, important mail flag bits, etc., and preset the above flag bits to unprocessed, such as "not replied", "not forwarded", "unprocessed", "not important", and so on.

According to this step, the index entry of the mail can be first established before the mail is stored in the database corresponding to the location of its mailbox. In the mail index entry, at least one state is established for the mail.

The at least one state may each be represented by a field, each field having a different value representing a different state in a state. For example, for the reply status of the mail, "0x00" is used to identify the "not replied" status, and "OxFF" is used to identify the "returned" status. Similarly, for the forwarding status of the mail, "0x00" is used for the "not forwarded" status. "OxFF" stands for "Forwarded" status. The at least one state may also employ one or more fields in common, and the fields or fields simultaneously represent a plurality of states. For example, the first four characters of a field can be used to correspond to the reply status of the mail, and the last four characters correspond to the forwarding status of the mail. For example, "0x00" means not replied, not forwarded; "OxFO" means replies, not forwarded; "OxOF" means not replied, forwarded; "OxFF" means replies, forwarded, etc.

The above index entry containing the status of the mail is finally stored in the mail index database of the mail server, and can also be saved to the index file of the user client after the user views the mail.

Since the message has not been processed since it was received, it is immediately placed in an unprocessed state, such as "Not Responded", "Not Forwarded", etc., after the status is created.

Step S203: Store the mail and its index entry.

This step stores the message in the appropriate mailbox on the mail server. Also add the index entry for the message to the message index.

Step S204: Receive an operation instruction of the user on the mail. After the user logs in to the mail server through the client or receives the email notification sent by the mail server, the user logs in to the mail server and opens the mail through the mail index. Mail can be saved on the mail server or downloaded to the client. When downloading to the client, the index of the mail is also established on the client, and the index of the mail is saved in the form of an index file on the client.

When the user operates the mail, the received mail list is displayed on the operation interface, and the status of each mail is displayed, for example, an icon, a prompt text, a title color, and the like can be used. At this time, since the user has not performed any operation, the status is displayed as an unprocessed state such as "not replied", "not forwarded", "unprocessed", "not important", and the like. Here, the system can set the default display mode and which status to display, or it can be customized by the user. You can use an icon to display multiple states, or you can display different states with different icons; or display them in text mode, for example, when the user places the cursor on the message header, the status prompt text is displayed as a floating window, or The prompt text of the status information is displayed on the display interface when the user selects the mail; or the different mail status is indicated by different colors. The color corresponding to the different status may be specified by the system by default, or may be defined by the user, and the title of each mail is specified. Or the entire mail item displays the color corresponding to its status; the mail can be classified and displayed according to the status. According to the value of the status flag of the mail, the user can search, and all the mails in the status are displayed, for example, all Unreacted mail, all mail that has been forwarded, etc.

Step S205, determining whether the user performs some operation on the mail; if yes, proceeding to step S206; if not, proceeding to step S207.

The operation may be performed based on whether the user has triggered a button or shortcut of the operation and whether the operation is successfully executed or the like. For example, it is determined whether the user has triggered the reply of the mail or forwarded the shortcut key, or whether the mail reply or the mail forwarding is selected in the menu; and then, it is judged whether the new mail established after the above operation is actually Send. If both of the above conditions are met, the message has been replied or forwarded. Step S206, according to the result of the operation, setting the state, for example, a status flag bit in the mail index. Then, the process proceeds to step S208.

For example, if the user performs a reply operation, the reply flag is set to "reply"; if the user performs a forwarding operation, the forwarding flag is set to "forwarded"; if the user instructs to mark the message as "important" , the important mail flag is set to "important"; if the user instructs to mark the message as "pending", the pending flag is set to "pending unprocessed"; if the message has been marked as "pending unprocessed" ", when the user instructs to mark the message as "processed", the pending flag is set to "pending processed" and so on.

Step S207, maintaining the state, for example, keeping the value of the status flag unchanged. Step S208: Displaying each status of each mail item on the mailing list displayed on the operation interface. Then, according to the above flag, an icon reflecting the status of the mail is displayed on the corresponding icon position of the mail item on the operation interface, or the mail item is displayed in the corresponding color on the operation interface, or the user moves the cursor to the mail. When the item is on, the status information prompt text of the mail is displayed in the floating window, or when the user moves the cursor to the mail item or selects the mail item, a text is displayed in the status bar of the operation interface to indicate the mail. Status information, etc.

Here, the use of several fields to record various states is not related to the use of several icons or colors to display the status of the mail. For example, when two fields are used to respectively identify the reply status and the forwarding status, correspondingly, icons indicating the reply status and the forwarding status may be respectively displayed on two different identification positions; when a field is used to identify the reply status and the forwarding status, Four different icons can be used at one location to display different states of the reply status and the forwarding status. When two fields are used to record the reply status and the forwarding status, The reply and forward status are identified by four different icons on one of the identified positions. When one field is used as the reply status and the forwarding status, icons indicating the reply status and the forwarding status respectively may be used in the two identified positions.

Step S209, returning to step S204, continuing to receive the operation instruction of the user.

Through the above steps, when the user sees the mailing list, one or more states of the mail can be seen at the same time, so that the user can conveniently judge whether the mail has been processed, for example, whether the mail has been replied and forwarded, etc. Need to check the sent email address or judge by memory.

In the above method, according to each state in the index entry of the mail, the search service may also be provided to the user, that is, the user may select to list all the messages in a certain state or a certain state, for example, all the important messages that have been replied to have been forwarded. , all pending and unprocessed messages that have not been forwarded, etc. If you combine other information about the message, you can further list the messages sent by an address within a certain period of time, which are in a certain state or a combination of several states. The status of the email may be a state or a combination of multiple states, for example, no reply has been forwarded, an important reply has been forwarded, an important pending unprocessed, and the like, and details are not described herein again.

A second embodiment of the present invention provides an apparatus for providing a mail status. Figure 3 shows a block diagram of the device. The device includes:

The mail receiving unit 301 is configured to receive the mail sent to the server where it is located; before the unit stores the mail in the database corresponding to the location of the mailbox, the unit first performs attribute analysis on the received mail, and establishes according to the analysis result. Corresponds to the index entry for this message.

The flag setting unit 302 is configured to set at least one state for the received mail, for example, in the index entry thereof, and for the mail just received, the unit sets the above state to an unprocessed state, for example, “not replied”, "Not forwarded", "Not processed", "Not important", etc.

The at least one state may each adopt a field, and each field has two different values, respectively representing different kinds of states. For example, for the reply status of the mail, "0x00" identifies the "not replied" status, and "OxFF" identifies the "returned"status; likewise, for the forwarding status of the message, "0x00" for the "not forwarded" status and "OxFF" for the "forwarded" status. . The at least one state may also collectively employ a field while identifying multiple states of the mail. For example, the first four characters of a field correspond to the reply status, and the last four characters correspond to the forwarding status. For example, "0x00, for non-response, not forwarded; "OxFO" for replies, not forwarded; "OxOF" for non-reply, forwarded; "OxFF" for replies, forwarded. The index of the message is ultimately saved in The mail index database of the mail server can also be saved to the index file of the user client after the user views the mail.

Since the message has not been processed since it was just received, it is immediately pre-set as unprocessed after the status is created.

The storage unit 303 is configured to store the mail and its index.

The operation receiving unit 304 is configured to receive an operation instruction of the user on the mail.

Users can perform various operations on the mail through the index information provided by the server. This includes opening emails and further email replying and forwarding.

The determining unit 305 is configured to determine whether the user performs some operation on the mail; if yes, output the corresponding information to the flag setting unit 302. The flag bit setting unit 302 resets the state corresponding to the operation according to this, for example, changing the value of the state flag bit corresponding to the operation.

The determining unit 305 determines whether the user performs some operation on the mail according to whether the user triggers the button or shortcut of the operation and whether the operation is successfully executed, for example, when the user opens a mail and selects Replying or forwarding to create a new mail, and the new mail is sent, it is judged that the user has replied or forwarded the mail.

The display unit 306 is configured to display, according to the mail stored in the storage unit and the index thereof, a list of mails on the operation interface, and display at least one state of the mail, for example, in the column A position of the table displays an icon corresponding to the status of a mail, or displays an item or title of the mail in a color corresponding to a certain status.

The method for displaying the status of the mail on the operation interface is to display an icon reflecting the status of the mail corresponding to the corresponding icon position of the mail item on the operation interface, or display the mail item in the color corresponding to the status of the mail on the operation interface or The title of the message, or when the user moves the cursor over the mail item, displays the status information prompt text of the mail in the floating window, or when the user moves the cursor to the mail item or selects the mail item. In the status bar of the operation interface, the status information prompt of the mail is displayed by text. Using several fields to record various states and displaying the status of a message using several icons or colors can be irrelevant. For example, when two fields are used to respectively identify the reply status and the forwarding status, correspondingly, icons for identifying the reply status and the forwarding status may be respectively set on two different identification positions, and the corresponding mails are simultaneously displayed. When a field is used to identify the reply status and the forwarding status, four different icons can be used in one identification position to display different states of reply and forwarding on the same identification position.

The apparatus provided in the second embodiment can set at least one state for the mail and display at least one state of the mail, so that the user can quickly recognize the status of the mail.

The above description is only a preferred embodiment of the present invention, and it should be noted that those skilled in the art can also make several improvements and retouchings without departing from the principles of the present invention. It should be considered as the scope of protection of the present invention.

Claims

Claim

A method for providing an email status, comprising:

Receiving an operation instruction for the mail, setting a state corresponding to the operation instruction to be processed;

At least one state of the mail is displayed on the operation interface.

The method according to claim 1, wherein the receiving an operation instruction for the mail, setting a state corresponding to the operation instruction to at least one processed including: following a status of the mail In case of not replying, receiving a reply instruction to the mail, setting the status to have been replied;

When the status of the mail is not forwarded, receiving a forwarding instruction for the mail, setting the status to be forwarded;

When the status of the mail is non-important, receiving an instruction to set the mail as an important mail, setting the status as important;

When the status of the mail is no need to be processed, receiving an instruction to set the mail as a pending, setting the status to be processed and not processed;

When the status of the mail is pending and unprocessed, an instruction to set the mail as processed has been received, and the status is set to be processed and processed.

3. A method according to claim 1 or 2, characterized in that

Creating a first state and a second state for the mail, and preset the first state to be unreturned Repeating, the second state is preset to be not forwarded;

When the reply command to the mail is received, setting the first state to have been replied; when receiving the forwarding instruction for the mail, setting the second state to be forwarded; on the operation interface The first state and the second state of the mail are displayed.

The method according to any one of claims 1 to 3, further comprising: determining whether the operation instruction is successfully executed, and if the operation instruction is successfully executed, The status corresponding to the operation instruction is set to processed.

The method according to any one of claims 1 to 4, wherein the at least one state is stored by at least one field, and different values of each of the fields respectively represent different types of the mail The state or combination of states.

The method according to any one of claims 1 to 5, wherein the displaying at least one state of the mail on the operation interface comprises at least one of the following: using different icons, in Displaying at least one state of the mail at the same icon location;

Using at least one icon, representing at least one state of the mail at a different icon location;

Using text to describe at least one state of the mail;

An entry or title of the mail is displayed in a different color to indicate at least one state of the mail.

The method according to any one of claims 1 to 6, wherein the at least one state is stored in an index of the mail corresponding to the mail in the client mail index file. In the entry, or in the server's mail index database, in the index entry corresponding to the message.

8. A device for providing an email status, comprising:

And a display unit, configured to display at least one state of the mail on the operation interface.

The apparatus according to claim 8, wherein the flag setting unit is configured to perform at least one of the following:

When the status of the mail is not replied and the determining unit sends a reply command, the status is set to have been replied;

When the status of the mail is not forwarded, and the determining unit sends a forwarding instruction, the status is set to be forwarded;

When the status of the mail is not important, and the determining unit sends an instruction to set the mail as an important mail, the status is set to be important;

When the status of the mail is no processing, and the determining unit sends an instruction to set the mail to be processed, the status is set to be processed and not processed;

When the status of the mail is pending and unprocessed, and the judging unit sends an instruction to set the mail as processed, the status is set to be processed and processed.

10. Apparatus according to claim 8 or claim 9 wherein: The flag setting unit is configured to create a first state and a second state for the mail, preset the first state as not replying, preset the second state as not forwarding; when receiving the opposite When the reply instruction of the mail is described, the first state is set to have been replied; when the forwarding instruction for the mail is received, the second state is set to be forwarded.

The apparatus according to any one of claims 8 to 10, wherein the flag bit setting unit is configured to store the at least one state using at least one field, and each of the different values of the field is respectively Represents a combination of different states or states of the message.

The device according to any one of claims 8 to 11, wherein the display unit is configured to:

Displaying at least one state of the mail at the same icon position using a different icon; or

Using at least one icon, representing at least one state of the mail at a different icon location; or

Using text to indicate at least one state of the message; or