Method for automatically implementing special forms in an e-mail system
First Claim
1. In an electronic mail system for transmitting an item, said item including a plurality of properties, a computer-implemented method for transmitting custom form data as part of said item, comprising:
- obtaining said custom form data, said custom form data including at least one field for displaying field data stored in at least one of said plurality of properties and control data values for controlling the layout of the at least one field upon application of said control data values to a general form generation procedure of a recipient computer without requiring a custom form stored on said recipient computer prior to said application of said control data values; and
storing said custom form data in one of said plurality of properties in response to obtaining said custom form data.
1 Assignment
0 Petitions
Accused Products
Abstract
In an electronic mail system environment, a system and method for providing message flags, providing custom forms, and providing an autoresponse feature. The e-mail system notifies a recipient when a due date is approaching or when a follow-up action is past due. A custom forms feature allows a user to create and share custom forms without requiring the form to be published or installed by other users. The custom form'"'"'s attributes are transmitted to the recipient as an element of the e-mail message. An autoresponse feature allows a sender to create a message that includes voting buttons corresponding to the possible responses to a query. A recipient replies by selecting one of the voting buttons. The recipient'"'"'s vote is automatically tallied in the sender'"'"'s copy of the message, thus allowing the sender to view a vote tally, a list of recipients, and their response.
97 Citations
13 Claims
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1. In an electronic mail system for transmitting an item, said item including a plurality of properties, a computer-implemented method for transmitting custom form data as part of said item, comprising:
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obtaining said custom form data, said custom form data including at least one field for displaying field data stored in at least one of said plurality of properties and control data values for controlling the layout of the at least one field upon application of said control data values to a general form generation procedure of a recipient computer without requiring a custom form stored on said recipient computer prior to said application of said control data values; and
storing said custom form data in one of said plurality of properties in response to obtaining said custom form data. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3)
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4. In an electronic mail system for receiving an item, a method for displaying an item comprising:
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receiving said item, said item including a plurality of properties;
determining whether said item includes a form property;
in response to a determination that said message item includes said form property, retrieving form data stored in said form property; and
otherwise, retrieving form data from a form registry. - View Dependent Claims (5, 6)
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7. A computer-readable medium on which is stored a computer program for transmitting custom form data as part of an item, said computer program comprising instructions which, when executed by a computer, perform:
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adding a form property to said item;
obtaining said custom form data, said custom form data including at least one field for displaying field data stored in at least one of a plurality of properties and control data values for controlling the layout of the at least one field upon application of said control data values to a general form generation procedure of a recipient computer without requiring a custom form stored on said recipient computer prior to said application of said control data values;
storing said custom form data in said form property in response to obtaining said custom form data;
receiving said field data from said at least one field as input; and
storing said field data in said at least one of said plurality of properties. - View Dependent Claims (8)
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9. A computer-readable medium on which is stored a computer program for displaying an item in the context of a form, said computer program comprising instruction which, when executed by a computer, perform:
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receiving said item, said item including a plurality of properties;
determining whether said item includes a form property that includes custom form data;
in response to a determination that said item includes said form property, retrieving said custom form data stored in said form property; and
otherwise, retrieving form data from a form registry. - View Dependent Claims (10, 11, 12, 13)
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Specification