Method of populating a collaborative workspace and a system for providing the same

• US 20090013043A1
• Filed: 07/27/2005
• Published: 01/08/2009
• Est. Priority Date: 07/30/2004
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Third Sight Pte Limited
• Original Assignee: Third Sight Pte Limited
• Inventors: Tan, Eng Siong
• Granted Patent: US 8,161,120 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 709/205
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/107 Computer-aided management of electronic mailing [e-mailing]
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 12/1822 Conducting the conference, e.g. admission, detection, selection or grouping of participants, correlating users to one or more conference sessions, prioritising transmission
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 51/08 Annexed information, e.g. attachments
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 51/234 for tracking messages

Abstract

A method of populating a collaborative workspace based on an electronic message is disclosed herein. An embodiment of the present invention is operative to post-process an outgoing email after being assigned to a workspace. Further, a message identifier is computed to uniquely identify the e-mail and then the method identifies and obtains core elements of workspace, namely, members, discussion, files, events and their relationships before populating these elements into the workspace data stores for subsequent contextual search and navigation. The outgoing e-mail is also annotated to encapsulate additional information. The described embodiment also suggests pre-processing incoming emails to exploit the annotation to append a Context-bar to allow quick and direct access to the contextual workspaces associated with the email. A system for providing a collaborative workspace is also suggested.

Claims

1. A method of populating a collaborative workspace with a plurality of user-specified elements of an electronic mail message, the method comprising the steps of:

(i) assigning the electronic mail message to a collaborative workspace based on the said mail message, the workspace including a plurality of data groups accessible by a sender and/or one or more recipients of the electronic mail message;

(ii) automatically identifying and obtaining each user-specified element of the plurality of user-specified elements from the electronic mail message;

(iii) automatically associating each user-specified element with a said data group to enable the sender and/or the one or more recipients to collaborate on the user-specified elements;

(iv) generating a message identifier based on the electronic message; and

(v) storing the identifier in association with each user-specified element after each element has been associated with the data group.

2. A method according to claim 1, wherein the workspace is an existing workspace.

3. A method according to claim 1, wherein step (i) further comprises the step of creating a new collaborative workspace, the electronic mail message being assigned to the new workspace.

4. A method according to claim 1, wherein the workspace is categorised as a shared workspace in which the user-defined elements within the workspace can be collaborated on by the sender and one or more recipients of the electronic mail message, and a private workspace in which the data groups within the work space can be collaborated on only by the sender of the electronic message, and the method further comprises the step of:

selecting whether to assign the electronic message to a shared workspace or to a private workspace.

5. A method according to claim 4, further comprising the step of selecting whether to categorise the electronic mail message as a shared message within a said shared workspace in which the user-defined elements can be collaborated on by the sender and the one or more recipients, or as a private message within a said shared workspace in which the user-defined elements can be collaborated on only by the sender of the electronic mail message.

6. A method according to claim 1, further comprising the step of associating the identifier with the workspace to which the electronic message is assigned.

7. A method according to claim 2, wherein the existing workspace or the newly created workspace is stored in a computer system local to the sender of the electronic message.

8. A method according to claim 7, wherein the assigning step is performed at the computer system local to the sender of the electronic message.

9. A method according to claim 8, further comprising the step of prompting the sender of the electronic message to select whether to assign the electronic message to a workspace, prior to the assigning step.

10. A method according to claim 1, further comprising the step of transmitting the electronic message over a communications network to the one or more recipients after step (iii).

11. A method according to claim 7, wherein the plurality of user-specified elements includes electronic mail addresses of the one or more recipients.

12. A method according to claim 8, wherein the plurality of data groups includes a people data group and step (iii) further comprises the step of associating the addresses of the one or more recipients with the people data group.

13. A method according to claim 1, wherein the plurality of user-specified elements includes a message body of the electronic mail message.

14. A method according to claim 13, wherein the plurality of data groups includes a discussion data group, and step (iii) further comprises the step of associating the message body of the electronic mail message with the discussion data group.

15. A method according to claim 13, wherein the message body includes new text yet to be associated with the discussion data group and old text already associated with the discussion data group, the method further comprising the steps of identifying and obtaining the new text, and associating the new text with the discussion data group.

16. A method according to claim 15, wherein the identifying step comprises checking the format of the message body to identify the new and old text in the message body.

17. A method according to claim 1, wherein the plurality of user-specified elements includes files attached to the electronic message.

18. A method according to claim 13, wherein the plurality of user-specified elements includes hyperlinks contained in the message body of the electronic message.

19. A method according to claim 17, wherein the plurality of data groups includes a file data group, and step (iii) further comprises the step of associating the files with the file data group.

20. A method according to claim 18, wherein the plurality of data groups includes a file data group, and step (ii) further comprises the step of associating the hyperlinks with the file data group.

21. A method according to claim 13, wherein the plurality of user-specified elements includes time and/or date information in the message body of the electronic message.

22. A method according to claim 21, wherein the plurality of data groups includes an event data group, and step (ii) further comprises the step of associating the time and/or date information with the event data group.

23. A method according to claim 10, wherein the assigning step is performed at a recipient computer system local to the one or more recipients of the electronic message after the electronic message is received by the recipient computer system.

24. A method according to claim 23, further comprising the step of, prior to the transmission at the sender'"'"'s computer system, annotating the electronic mail message with a first annotation field which allows the recipient computer system to automatically assign the received electronic mail message to a collaborative workspace local to the recipient computer system upon receipt of the electronic mail message at the recipient computer system, the said workspace having a plurality of data groups with each user-specified element of the electronic message being automatically associated with a said data group.

25. A method according to claim 24, wherein the local collaborative workspace is an existing workspace.

26. A method according to claim 24, further comprising the step of creating a new collaborative workspace based on the first annotation field and wherein the electronic mail message is assigned to the newly created collaborative workspace.

27. A method according to claim 24, further comprising, prior to the assigning of the electronic message to the collaborative workspace at the recipient computer system, checking automatically whether the electronic message is annotated with the first annotation field.

28. A method according to claim 24, further comprising the step of replacing the first annotation field of the electronic message with a context bar for directing the one or more recipients of the electronic message to the local collaborative workspace containing the user-specified elements, the context bar being viewable together with the electronic message by the one or more recipients.

29. A method according to claim 28, wherein the context bar includes a hyperlink pointing directly to the collaborative workspace.

30. A method according to claim 27, further comprising the step of applying a set of heuristic rules to the received electronic message to automatically determine whether the message is to be assigned to a workspace, if the electronic message is not annotated with the additional information.

31. A method according to claim 30, further comprising the steps of automatically identifying and obtaining selective user-defined elements of the electronic mail message, and checking whether the selected user-defined elements has been previously assigned to an existing workspace, and assigning the electronic mail message to the existing workspace if the heuristic rules determines that the selected user-defined has already been previously assigned

32. A method according to claim 30, wherein the heuristic rules are defined by the one or more recipients of the electronic mail message.

33. A method according to claim 28, further comprising the step of prompting the one or more recipients to select whether to assign the electronic message to a selected workspace or to create a new workspace for assigning the electronic message, if the heuristic rules cannot automatically determine that the message is to be assigned to a collaborative workspace.

34. A method according to claim 24, further comprising the steps of, prior to the transmission, annotating the electronic mail message with a second annotation field at the sender'"'"'s computer system which allows recipients unable to create the local collaborative workspace based on the first annotation field to still collaborate the user-specified elements based on the second annotation field.

35. A method according to claim 34, wherein the second annotation field includes a hyperlink to direct the one or more recipients to a website remote from the recipient computer system and which hosts the collaborative workspace to enable the one or more recipients to still collaborate on the user-specified elements.

36. A method according to claim 23, further comprising the step of generating a filtering identifier based on the assigned workspace of the electronic message, and annotating the filtering identifier to a selected user-specified element of the electronic message.

37. A method according to claim 36, further comprising the step of filtering the electronic message to appropriate electronic mail client folders based on the filtering identifier for retrieval and viewing by the one or more recipient.

38. A method according to claim 36, wherein the selected user-specified element is a subject field of the electronic mail message, and the filtering identifier is annotated to the subject field.

39. A method according to claim 10, wherein the communications network is the Internet.

40. A method according to claim 10, wherein the communications network is the Intranet.

41. A method according to claim 1, further comprising a plurality of electronic mail messages, and wherein the method further comprises the step of assigning each electronic mail message to respective collaborative workspaces according to subject matter of the electronic messages.

42. A method according to claim 41, wherein a said message identifier of an electronic message is associated with the plurality of data groups of a said workspace to which the electronic message is assigned.

43. A method according to claim 1, wherein each data group in the workspace are viewable simultaneously by the sender and/or the one or more recipient of the electronic mail message.

44. A method according to claim 1, wherein the plurality of data groups is associated with a data storage arranged to store the plurality of user-defined elements associated with respective ones of the plurality of data groups.

45. A method according to claim 1, wherein the assigning step is performed automatically.

60. A computer-readable medium on which is stored a program module comprising instructions which, when executed by a computer, perform the method according to claim 1.

46. A method of managing a collaborative workspace assigned with a plurality of electronic mail messages, each mail message having a plurality of user-specified elements, the workspace having a plurality of data groups with each user-specified element being associated with a said data group, the method comprising the steps of:

(i) generating an unique message identifier for each electronic message, and

(ii) storing the identifier in association with each user-specified element of the said electronic message.

47. A method according to claim 46, further comprising the steps of selecting a said user-specified element, and automatically obtaining the message identifier stored in association with the selected user-specified element and identifying the rest of the user-specified elements which has the same message identifier.

48. A method according to claim 46, further comprising the steps of selecting first said user-specified element within a workspace,

automatically obtaining corresponding message identifiers stored in association with the first said user-specified element, and

identifying a first list of mail messages within the workspace which are associated with each of the corresponding message identifiers.

49. A method according to claim 47, further comprising the steps of:

identifying a second said user-specified element,

determining the presence of the second user-specified element in the first list of mail messages;

identifying a second list of mail messages based on the presence of the second user-specified element in the first list of mail messages; and

obtaining a number of different message identifiers in the second list of mail messages.

50. A method according to claim 46, wherein the plurality of user-specified elements includes electronic mail addresses of a sender and/or of one or more recipients of the electronic mail message, a message body of the electronic mail message, files attached to the electronic message, and time and/or date information in the message body of the electronic message.

51. A method of processing an electronic mail message to be sent from a sender to a recipient, the method comprising the steps of:

(i) prompting the sender to select or create a filtering identifier to associate with the electronic mail message, and

(ii) transmitting the identifier in association with the electronic mail message.

52. A method according to claim 51, further comprising the step of assigning the electronic message to a collaborative workspace having a plurality of data groups prior to the transmitting step (ii), the plurality of data groups being accessible by the sender and/or the recipient, and wherein the identifier is in the form of the workspace'"'"'s name.

53. A method according to claim 52, wherein the electronic mail message includes a plurality of user-specified elements, each element being associated with a said data group to enable the sender and/or the recipient to collaborate on the user-specified elements.

54. A method according to claim 51, wherein the identifier is tagged to a subject field of the electronic mail message.

55. A method of processing a received electronic mail message having a plurality of user-specified elements and a filtering identifier, the method comprising the steps of:

(i) identifying and obtaining the filtering identifier, and

(ii) appending the identifier to a selected user-specified element of the received electronic mail message.

56. A method according to claim 55, further comprising the step of filtering the mail message based on the appended identifier.

57. A method according to claim 55, wherein the selected user-specified element is the subject field of the received electronic message.

58. A method according to claim 55, further comprising the step of assigning the electronic message to a collaborative workspace having a plurality of data groups prior to the transmitting step (i), the plurality of data groups being accessible by the sender and/or the recipient, and wherein the identifier is in the form of the workspace'"'"'s name.

59. A method according to claim 58, wherein the electronic mail message includes a plurality of user-specified elements, each element being associated with a said data group to enable the sender and/or the recipient to collaborate on the user-specified elements.

61. A system for providing a collaborative workspace based on an electronic mail message having a plurality of user-specified elements, the system comprising:

means for assigning the electronic mail message to a collaborative workspace having a plurality of data groups accessible by a sender and/or one or more recipients of the electronic mail message;

an identification module arranged to automatically identify and obtain each user-specified element of the plurality of user-specified elements,

means for automatically associating each user-specified element to a said data group;

means for enabling the sender and/or the one or more recipients to collaborate on the user-specified elements;

an identification generator for generating a message identifier based on the electronic message; and

means for storing the identifier in association with each user-specified element after each element has been associated with the data group.