System and method for providing configuration data such as for configuring electronic mail access

• US 20050033830A1
• Filed: 02/11/2004
• Published: 02/10/2005
• Est. Priority Date: 08/08/2003
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Malikie Innovations Limited (Key Patent Innovations Limited)
• Original Assignee: Teamon Systems Incorporated State of Incorporation Delaware
• Inventors: Gorty, Suryanarayana Murthy
• Granted Patent: US 7,739,336 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 709/220
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/107 Computer-aided management of electronic mailing [e-mailing]

Abstract

A system, method and computer-readable medium provides configuration data, such as for electronic mail access. A configuration module retrieves the configuration data from a source of configuration data, such as a user system. The configuration in one aspect could be for accessing different electronic mailboxes of a user. Data object are generated. Each data object is submitted as a distributed object module to a web service. The web service in one aspect of the invention could be for a pass-through access for configuring electronic mailboxes.

Claims

1. A system that provides configuration data for a web service comprising:

a source of configuration data; and

a configuration module that retrieves the configuration data at the request of a web service and is operative for generating data objects related to the configuration data and submitting each data object as a distributed object module to the web service.

2. A system according to claim 1, wherein said configuration data comprises configuration data used for accessing an electronic mailbox.

3. A system according to claim 2, wherein a web service comprises an internet service provider (ISP) that uses configuration data for accessing electronic mail from another internet service provider.

4. A system according to claim 2, wherein the mailbox comprises a gateway window into an electronic mailbox.

5. A system according to claim 4, wherein the gateway window uses configuration data on-the-fly for accessing an electronic mailbox.

6. A system according to claim 1, and further comprising a web service interface module that formats data objects as distributed object modules for submission to a web service.

7. A system according to claim 1, wherein said source of configuration data comprises a user system.

8. A system according to claim 7, wherein said user system further comprises a web browser or email client.

9. A system for providing configuration data for electronic mail access comprising:

a user system having configuration data for accessing respective electronic mailboxes that are different from each other; and

a configuration module that retrieves configuration data required for accessing the different electronic mailboxes of a user, wherein said configuration module is operative for generating data objects for each electronic mailbox relating to the configuration data, and submitting each data object as a distributed object module to a web service for configuring access to the respective electronic mailboxes associated with each data object from either the web service or a targeted electronic mailbox without requiring a user to provide manually any configuration data for each electronic mailbox.

10. A system according to claim 9, and further comprising a web service interface module that formats the data objects as distributed object modules for submission to a web service.

11. A system according to claim 9, wherein said user system further comprises a web browser or email client for accessing the web service or a targeted electronic mailbox.

12. A system according to claim 9, wherein the user system comprises a personal computer or mobile communications device.

13. A system according to claim 9, wherein the configuration module is implemented as a component object module.

14. A system according to claim 13, wherein the component object module is implemented as an ActiveX control.

15. A system according to claim 9, wherein the data objects are formatted within the configuration module using an extensible markup language (XML) for transmission to an XML-compliant web service.

16. A system according to claim 9, wherein said user system comprises a plurality of user computing sources.

17. A system according to claim 9, wherein said electronic mailboxes to be accessed reside on an intranet or internet server.

18. A method of providing configuration data comprising the steps of:

retrieving configuration data at the request of a web service;

generating data objects related to the configuration data; and

submitting each data object as a distributed object module to the web service.

19. A method according to claim 18, and further comprising the step of retrieving the configuration data from a user system.

20. A method according to claim 19, wherein the user system comprises a web browser or email client.

21. A method according to claim 18, wherein the configuration data comprises configuration data used for accessing an electronic mailbox.

22. A method according to claim 21, wherein the web service comprises an internet service provider (ISP) and receiving configuration data for accessing an electronic mailbox of another ISP.

23. A method according to claim 21, and further comprising the step of using configuration data on-the-fly for accessing an electronic mailbox.

24. A method for providing configuration data for electronic mail access comprising the steps of:

retrieving configuration data required for accessing different electronic mailboxes of a user from respective email clients of the user;

generating data objects within a configuration module for each electronic mailbox relating to the configuration data for accessing a respective electronic mailbox; and

submitting the data objects as a distributed object module from the configuration module to a web service for configuring the web service to access the respective electronic mailbox associated with each data object from either the web service or a targeted electronic mailbox without requiring a user to provide manually any configuration data for each electronic mailbox.

25. A method according to claim 24, and further comprising the step of formatting the data object as a distributed object module for submission to the web service within a web service interface of the configuration module.

26. A method according to claim 24, and further comprising the step of accessing the web service or one or more targeted electronic mailboxes through either a web browser or email client.

27. A method according to claim 26, wherein the web browser or email client is resident on a personal computer or mobile communications device.

28. A method according to claim 24, wherein the electronic mailboxes to be accessed reside on an intranet or internet server.

29. A method according to claim 24, and further comprising the step of automatically retrieving the configuration data by the configuration module implemented as a component object model.

30. A method according to claim 29, wherein the component object model is implemented as an ActiveX control.

31. A method according to claim 24, and further comprising the step of formatting the data objects within the configuration module using an extensible markup language (XML) for transmission to an XML-compliant web service.

32. A method according to claim 31, wherein the web service comprises a Simple Object Access Protocol (SOAP) compliant service.

33. A method according to claim 24, and further comprising the step of retrieving configuration data from a plurality of user computing sources.

34. A computer-readable medium for providing configuration data comprising:

an import module having a plurality of import agents each programmed to retrieve configuration data from a source of configuration data;

data objects related to the configuration data; and

a web service interface module that formats data objects for submission to a web interface that configures a web service following the configuration data.

35. A computer-readable medium according to claim 34, wherein said import agents are operative to retrieve from a selected email client of a user the configuration data required for accessing an electronic mailbox.

36. A computer-readable medium according to claim 34, wherein data objects relate to configuration data for accessing an electronic mailbox.

37. A computer-readable medium for providing configuration data for electronic mail access comprising:

an import module having a plurality of import agents each programmed to retrieve from a selected email client of a user the configuration data required for accessing the respective selected electronic mailbox;

data objects for each electronic mailbox to be accessed relating to configuration data for accessing a respective electronic mailbox; and

a web service interface module that formats data objects for each electronic mailbox to be accessed for submission to a web interface that configures the web service to access the respective electronic mailbox associated with each data object from either the web service or a targeted electronic mailbox without requiring a user to provide manually any configuration data for each electronic mailbox.

38. A computer-readable medium according to claim 37, wherein said data objects are formatted as distributed object modules for submission to the web service interface module.

39. A computer-readable medium according to claim 37, wherein the import agents are implemented as component object models.

40. A computer-readable medium according to claim 39, wherein the component object model is implemented as an ActiveX control.

41. A computer-readable medium according to claim 37, wherein the data objects are formatted using an extensible markup language (XML) for transmission to an XML-compliant web service.