ELECTRONIC MAIL SYSTEM AND
TERMINAL DEVICE
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
1. Field of the Invention 5 The present invention relates to an electronic mail system
and more specifically to an electronic mail system which enables a client side to check whether or not a mail has been read.
2. Description of the Prior Art 10 With the spread of a personal computer, the field of
information communication is more increasingly occupied by an electronic mail system in which character, audio, picture or other information is transmitted/received in the form of a mail between client terminal devices through a computer network. In the electronic mail system constructed through a wide area network, that is, in a distributed electronic mail system, the computer for providing a service to the client-side computer, a so-called server is generally 2Q installed on the network. The transmission/receipt of information between the client terminal devices is accomplished through the server.
Unlike a telephone communication, such an electronic mail system does not allow the clients to communicate the 25 information directly to each other. Thus, a particular executive system is needed in order to check whether or not a transmitted electronic mail has been really read by a receiving side (transmit opponent), that is, to check whether the electronic mail has been unread or read. Heretofore, such an electronic mail nonread-read execution has been generally performed by the server in the electronic mail system.
Depending on the function of the electronic mail system which the client terminal device using the electronic mail belongs to, the service available to the client terminal device 35 is limited. Therefore, in order that the executive function is used by the client terminal device requiring the abovedescribed electronic mail nonread-read execution, there is a need for adding this type of function to the server in the electronic mail system which the client terminal device 40 belongs to. Consequently, it is impossible to add the nonread-read executive function by the intention of the client.
In addition, the electronic mail nonread-read execution has been heretofore performed on the server side in this 45 manner, and thus all the receiving sides (transmit opponents) are to be executed for checking whether or not the mail has been read. As a result, the receiving side to be executed cannot be specified on a client-by-client basis. More disadvantageously, the conventional executive system can- 50 not comply with an alias expansion function for collectively executing a plurality of receiving sides (transmit opponents) as a single receiving side (transmit opponent).
BRIEF SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
It is an object of the present invention to provide an electronic mail system capable of introducing an electronic mail nonread-read executive function by the intention of a client without considerably changing an existing electronic mail system, and a terminal device for use in the system. 60
It is another object of the present invention to provide an electronic mail system capable of optionally selecting a receiving side to be executed for checking whether or not an electronic mail has been read, and a terminal device for use in the system. 65
It is a still another object of the present invention to provide an electronic mail system capable of performing an
electronic mail nonread-read execution in response to an alias expansion function, and a terminal device for use in the system.
In the electronic mail system of the present invention for transmitting/receiving the electronic mail between the terminal devices connected to each other via a server on a network, the terminal device comprises executive means for performing the electronic mail nonread-read execution for checking whether or not the receiving side has read the electronic mail. This executive means performs the electronic mail nonread-read execution in response to header information of the transmitted/received electronic mail.
This executive means has library means in which the receiving side to be executed for checking whether or not the electronic mail has been read is recorded, whereby the electronic mail having the recorded receiving side is executed for checking whether or not it has been read by the receiving side.
This executive means comprises storage means for storing electronic mail nonread-read information; library means having a library table in which the receiving side to be executed for checking whether or not the electronic mail has been read is recorded; executive control means for determining whether or not the electronic mail to be transmitted is to be executed for checking whether or not it is read and for writing the contents stored in the storage means; request addition means for adding request information for read notice to the electronic mail to be executed for checking whether or not it is read; request judgement means for judging whether or not the request information is added to the received electronic mail; and read information send means for sending read information when the electronic mail with the request information added is received.
This executive means further comprises means for performing an alias expansion, whereby a single electronic mail is executed for checking whether or not it has been read by a plurality of receiving sides in accordance with the result of the alias expansion.
According to the present invention, the client terminal device side is provided with the nonread-read executive function for checking whether or not the receiving side has read the electronic mail. The out-going side client terminal device adds the request information for read information notice to the electronic mail and transmits the electronic mail to the in-coming side client terminal device. After the in-coming side (receiving side) client terminal device reads the electronic mail, it then sends the read information to the out-going side client terminal device.
Therefore, the nonread-read execution can be achieved by adding the function to the client terminal device side alone without considerably changing the existing electronic mail system. In addition, the client terminal device side can optionally set the receiving side to be executed for checking whether or not the electronic mail is read, and thus the present invention has higher convenience.
The above and further objects and features of the invention will more fully be apparent from the following detailed description with accompanying drawings.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE SEVERAL
VIEWS OF THE DRAWINGS
FIG. 1 is an illustrative diagram for describing a principle of the present invention;
FIG. 2 shows a whole configuration of an electronic mail system according to the present invention;
FIG. 3 is a block diagram showing an internal structure of a client terminal device;
FIG. 4 is a flow chart showing the processing procedure of the present invention (the procedure of the processing performed by the out-going side client terminal device 5 during the transmission of an electronic mail);
FIG. 5 is a flow chart showing the processing procedure of the present invention (the procedure of the processing performed by the in-coming side client terminal device during the receipt of the electronic mail); and 10
FIG. 6 is a flow chart showing the processing procedure of the present invention (the procedure of the processing performed by the out-going side client terminal device during the receipt of read information).
DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE 15
INVENTION
FIG. 1 is an illustrative diagram for describing a principle of the present invention. Means for performing an out-going side client function comprises a transmit-receive unit 1 for 2Q transmitting/receiving an electronic mail and a nonread-read executive unit 2 for performing a nonread-read execution for the electronic mail on the out-going side. The nonread-read executive unit 2 has a library table 7 in which a receiving side to be executed for checking whether the electronic mail 2J has been read is recorded. Also, means for performing an in-coming side client function comprises a transmit-receive unit 5 for transmitting/receiving the electronic mail and a nonread-read executive unit 6 for performing the nonreadread execution for the electronic mail on the in-coming side. 3Q Moreover, means for carrying out a server function on the out-going and in-coming sides comprise server systems 3 and 4, respectively.
Next, the processing of the electronic mail nonread-read execution in such a constitution will be described below. In 35 the first place, when the electronic mail is transmitted from the transmit-receive unit 1 of an out-going side client terminal device to the server system 3 through the nonreadread executive unit 2, whether or not the receiving side (transmit opponent) is recorded in the library table 7 is 40 checked. If the receiving side is recorded in the library table 7, the electronic mail is the one requiring the check so as to see whether or not it is read. Thus, after information on the receiving side associated with the electronic mail is internally stored as nonread executive information, request infor- 45 mation for read information notice is added to the electronic mail, and then the electronic mail is transmitted to the server system 3.
The electronic mail is transmitted from the server system to the server system 4, and then it is input to the in-coming 50 side client terminal device by the operation of the transmitreceive unit 5. The nonread-read executive unit 6 determines whether or not the request information for read information notice is added to the transmitted electronic mail. If so, the read information is transmitted to the server system 4. The 55 read information is transferred from the server system 4 to the nonread-read executive unit 2 of the out-going side client terminal device through the server system 3.
The nonread-read executive unit 2 checks the received read information with the stored nonread executive infor- 60 mation. If the read information is coincident with the nonread executive information, the read information is added to the nonread executive information. Then, the fact that the in-coming side client terminal device has read the electronic mail is verified by the out-going side client terminal device. 65
In a manner as described above, according to the present invention, the nonread-read executive unit 2 of the out-going
side client terminal device can correctly check whether or not the in-coming side client terminal device has read the electronic mail, and thus the electronic mail nonread-read execution can be easily accomplished. In addition, since an existing protocol alone for the electronic mail is used for this execution, a great change is not required for an electronic mail system.
Furthermore, the present invention is adapted to be capable of performing the electronic mail nonread-read execution on the side of the client terminal device. This permits setting freely whether or not the nonread-read execution is performed on a client-by-client basis by the client terminal devices, which thus enables the client requiring the execution to introduce the execution of its own free will. Additionally, it is also possible to freely select the receiving side to be executed for checking whether or not the electronic mail has been read. Moreover, the present invention is constituted so that alias information possessed by the server may be also used, whereby it can comply with an alias expansion.
FIG. 2 shows a whole configuration of the electronic mail system according to the present invention. In the drawing, numeral 11 denotes a client terminal device assigned to each client. The client terminal devices 11 are connected to each other through a LAN 13 and a server device 12, via which the electronic mail can be transmitted/received between the client terminal devices 11. The server device 12 controls the alias information.
FIG. 3 is a block diagram showing an internal structure of each client terminal device 11. The client terminal device 11 comprises a transmit-receive unit 21 for transmitting/ receiving the electronic mail and a nonread-read executive unit 22 for performing the nonread-read execution for the electronic mail. The nonread-read executive unit 22 has a nonread-read information storage unit 31 for storing electronic mail nonread-read information; an alias expansion unit 32 for performing the alias expansion; a library unit 33 having the library table in which the receiving side to be executed for checking whether or not the electronic mail has been read is recorded; an executive control unit 34 for determining whether or not the electronic mail to be transmitted is to be executed for checking whether or not it is read, for writing the contents stored in the nonread-read information storage unit 31 and so on; a request addition unit 35 for adding the request information for read information notice to the electronic mail to be executed for checking whether or not it is read; a request judgement unit 36 for judging whether or not the request information for read information notice is added to the electronic mail; and a read information send unit 37 for sending electronic mail read information.
Of these units constituting the nonread-read executive unit 22, the nonread-read information storage unit 31, the alias expansion unit 32, the library unit 33, the executive control unit 34 and the request addition unit 35 are operated when the client terminal device 11 functions as the electronic mail transmitting side (out-going side). On the other hand, the request judgement unit 36 and the read information send unit 37 are operated when the client terminal device 11 functions as the electronic mail receiving side (in-coming side).
The contents recorded in the library table can be freely changed by the client terminal devices 11, and thus it is possible to optionally set the receiving side that needs the check in order to see whether or not the electronic mail has been read.
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