Threaded presentation of electronic mail

• US 20040260756A1
• Filed: 06/23/2003
• Published: 12/23/2004
• Est. Priority Date: 06/23/2003
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Apple Inc.
• Original Assignee: Apple Inc.
• Inventors: Christie, Greg, Lemay, Stephen O., Forstall, Scott
• Granted Patent: US 7,421,690 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 709/200
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/107 Computer-aided management of electronic mailing [e-mailing]
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 51/00 User-to-user messaging in packet-switching networks, transmitted according to store-and-forward or real-time protocols, e.g. e-mail
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 51/216 Handling conversation history, e.g. grouping of messages in sessions or threads

Abstract

A threaded list of e-mail messages is provided by checking each received message against previous messages to determine whether the new message is associated with previous messages. If so, then a new thread is created. The new thread has an associated thread header, which stores metadata bout the messages in the thread. If the received message is related to messages in an existing thread, then the received message is added to that thread, and the thread header for that thread is updated to reflect data from the received message. The thread header appears with messages in a message list view of the inbox, and provides data about the thread. Messages that are not part of a thread are shown in the same view as threaded messages, without a thread header. This allows a user to view both threaded and non-threaded messages in a single view.

Claims

1. A method for threading e-mail messages, the method comprising:

receiving an e-mail message;

determining that the e-mail message is related to an e-mail thread, the e-mail thread containing at least one existing e-mail message and including an associated thread header;

associating the received e-mail message with the e-mail thread; and

updating a persistent thread header associated with the e-mail thread to include information derived from the attributes of the received e-mail message.

4. The method of claim 1 wherein the persistent thread header includes a subject of the e-mail thread.

5. The method of claim 1 wherein the persistent thread header includes an originator of the e-mail thread.

6. The method of claim 1 wherein the persistent thread header includes indicia of the number of messages in the thread.

7. The method of claim 1 wherein the persistent thread header includes a time that the e-mail thread was most recently updated.

2. A system for reading e-mail messages, comprising:

a mailbox processor module for receiving e-mails;

a mailbox, communicatively coupled to the mailbox processor module, for electronically storing e-mail messages;

a threading engine, communicatively coupled to the mailbox processor module, for determining that a received e-mail is related to an existing thread of e-mail messages stored in the mailbox and associating the received e-mail with the existing thread.

8. The system of claim 2 wherein the threading engine additionally updates a thread header associated with the existing thread.

9. The system of claim 8 wherein the thread header includes a subject of the e-mail thread.

10. The system of claim 8 wherein the thread header includes an originator of the e-mail thread.

11. The system of claim 8 wherein the thread header includes indicia of the number of messages in the thread.

12. The system of claim 8 wherein the thread header includes a time that the e-mail thread was most recently updated.

3. A computer program product for threading e-mail messages, the program product stored on a computer readable medium and adapted to perform the operations of:

receiving an e-mail message;

determining that the e-mail message is related to an e-mail thread, the e-mail thread containing at least one exiting e-mail message and including an associated thread header;

associating the received e-mail message with the e-mail thread; and

updating a persistent thread header associated with the e-mail thread to include information derived from the attributes of the received e-mail message.

13. The computer program product of claim 3 wherein the persistent thread header includes a subject of the e-mail thread.

14. The computer program product of claim 3 wherein the persistent thread header includes an originator of the e-mail thread.

15. The computer program product of claim 3 wherein the persistent thread header includes indicia of the number of messages in the thread.

16. The computer program product of claim 3 wherein the persistent thread header includes a time that the e-mail thread was most recently updated.

17. A system for threading e-mail messages, comprising:

receiving means, for receiving an e-mail message;

determining means, communicatively coupled to the receiving means, for determining that the e-mail message is related to an e-mail thread, the e-mail thread containing at least one existing e-mail message and including an associated thread header;

associating means, communicatively coupled to the determining means, for associating the received e-mail message with the e-mail thread; and

updating means, communicatively coupled to the associating means, for updating a persistent thread header associated with the e-mail thread to include information derived from the attributes of the received e-mail message.