DYNAMIC SET OPERATIONS WHEN SPECIFYING EMAIL RECIPIENTS

• US 20070255789A1
• Filed: 05/01/2006
• Published: 11/01/2007
• Est. Priority Date: 05/01/2006
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Brian Buchheit
• Original Assignee: Brian Buchheit
• Inventors: BUCHHEIT, BRIAN
• Granted Patent: US 7,886,011 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 709/206
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/107 Computer-aided management of electronic mailing [e-mailing]
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 51/046 Interoperability with other network applications or services
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 61/4547 for personal communications, i.e. using a personal identifier
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 61/4555 Directories for electronic mail or instant messaging
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 61/4594 Address books, i.e. directories containing contact information about correspondents telephone directories in user terminals H04M1/27453

Abstract

A method for specifying email recipients that includes specifying a first set of email recipients, a second set of email recipients, and a set operation. A third set of email recipients can be automatically is generated by performing the set operation upon the first set and the second set. Email can then be sent to this automatically generated third set of email recipients.

Claims

1. A method for specifying recipients comprising:

specifying a first set of email recipients;

specifying a second set of email recipients;

designating a set operation; and

automatically generating a third set of email recipients by performing the set operation upon the first set and the second set.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein at least one of the first set and the second set comprise a previously established email distribution list.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein the first set and the second set comprise a previously established email distribution list.

4. The method of claim 1, wherein the set operation, the first set, and the second set are specified by a user of an email application.

5. The method of claim 4, further comprising:

sending an email to each email recipient within the third set.

6. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

presenting a graphical user interface that includes an ability for a user to specify a plurality of set operations, said set operations comprising an inclusion and an exclusion operation, wherein the set operation is a user selected one of the plurality of set operations.

7. The method of claim 6, further comprising:

within the graphical user interface, presenting a recipient pop-up window, wherein the recipient pop-up window visually displays each email recipient in the automatically generated third set.

8. The method of claim 6, wherein the graphical user interface comprises a user selectable programmatic action selected from a group of actions comprising an action for storing a new email distribution list consisting of the third set of email recipients and an action for storing an expression from which the third set was generated for future reuse.

9. The method of claim 1, wherein the set operation comprises one user selected operation of a collection of graphically presented mathematical set operations, wherein each mathematical set operation of the collection is available for user selection within a graphical user interface associated with an email application.

10. The method of claim 1, wherein the set operation comprises one user selected operation of a collection of Boolean operations including union and complementation operations.

11. The method of claim 10, wherein the collection of Boolean operations further includes an intersection operation, and wherein the method evaluates a Boolean expression including at least two Boolean operations to generate the third set, where an order of operations for the Boolean expression is determined by user specified parenthesis placed within the Boolean expression.

12. The method of claim 1, wherein said steps of claim 1, are steps performed by at least one machine in accordance with at least one computer program having a plurality of code sections that are executable by the at least one machine.

13. A software method for specifying email recipients comprising:

providing a graphical user interface associated with an email application;

identifying within the graphical user interface a user specified distribution list, a user specified set operations, and a user specified at least one email recipient; and

automatically generating a set of intended email recipients by performing the set operation upon the distribution list and the at least one email recipient.

14. The method of claim 13, wherein the at least one email recipient is contained within a second user specified distribution list, and wherein the automatically generated set is generated by performing the set operation upon the first distribution list and the second distribution list.

15. The graphical user interface for sending email comprising:

a recipient designation section; and

a set operation designation section, wherein a set of intended email recipients is automatically generated by a software program that performs a set operation specified in the set operation designation section using at least two sets of recipients designated within the recipient designation section.

16. The graphical user interface of claim 15, wherein at least one previously established email distribution list is able to be designated within the recipient designation section, and wherein the at least two sets of recipients includes at least one email distribution list.

17. The graphical user interface of claim 15, further comprising:

a resultant recipient section within which the set of intended email recipients is displayed.

18. The graphical user interface of claim 17, further comprising:

an ability for a user of the graphical user interface to modify the set of intended email recipients displayed within the resultant recipient section.

19. The graphical user interface of claim 15, wherein the set operation designation section comprises a collection of user selectable set operations.

20. The graphical user interface of claim 19, wherein the collection is visually displayed within the graphical user interface.