System and Method for Providing Improved Time References in Documents

• US 20090055487A1
• Filed: 08/23/2007
• Published: 02/26/2009
• Est. Priority Date: 08/23/2007
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Original Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Inventors: Moraes, Francisco Inacio, Parvin, William Augustus III, West, Dean Merritt II
• Granted Patent: US 7,761,525 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: G06Q 10/109 Time management, e.g. calendars, reminders, meetings or time accounting

Abstract

A system, method, and program product is provided that receives, at a recipient'"'"'s computer system, an email message from a sender'"'"'s computer system with the email message including a time offset value in a metadata area of the email message. The time offset indicates an offset between the time zone that is used at the sender'"'"'s computer system and a base time zone. A total time offset value is computed based on the received time offset value and the time zone used that is used at the recipient'"'"'s computer system. Time notations that have been included in a body area of the email message are converted to the second time zone by applying the computed total time offset value to the time notations. The converted time notations are displayed, along with the body area of the email message, on a display device.

Claims

1. A computer-implemented method comprising:

receiving, at a recipient'"'"'s computer system, an email message from a sender'"'"'s computer system, the email message including a time offset value in a metadata area of the email message, the time offset value indicating a number of hours between a first time zone used at the sender'"'"'s computer system and a base time zone;

computing, based on the received time offset value and a second time zone that is used at the recipient'"'"'s computer system, a total time offset value;

converting one or more time notations included in a body area of the email message to the second time zone by applying the computed total time offset value to the one or more time notations, the converting resulting in one or more converted time notations; and

displaying the body area of the email message with the one or more converted time notations on a display device attached to the recipient'"'"'s computer system.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the time notations that were included in the body area of the email message include a uniform time zone indicator that indicates that the base time zone corresponds to each of the time notations that are converted to the converted time notations.

3. The method of claim 2 wherein the metadata area of the email message is a header included in the email message, wherein the base time zone is Universal Time (UT), and the method further comprises:

adding a time zone indicator that corresponds to the second time zone to each of the converted time notations; and

displaying the added time zone indicator along with the converted time notations on the display device.

4. The method of claim 1 wherein the converting further comprises:

calculating a recipient time offset value that is a second number of hours between the second time zone and the base time zone; and

computing the total time offset value as being the recipient time offset value.

5. The method of claim 1, wherein the time notations that were included in the body area of the email message include a first time zone indicator that indicates that the time notations correspond the first time zone.

6. The method of claim 5 wherein the metadata area of the email message is a header included in the email message, wherein the base time zone is Universal Time (UT), and the method further comprises:

adding a time zone indicator that indicates the second time zone to each of the converted time notations; and

displaying the added time zone indicator along with the converted time notations on the display device.

7. The method of claim 5 wherein the converting further comprises:

retrieving the time offset value from the metadata area of the email message;

retrieving one or more character offset values from the email message, wherein each of the character offset values corresponds to a character location of one of the time notations in the body area of the email message;

identifying each of the time notations based on the time notation'"'"'s character location included in the character offset values;

calculating a recipient time offset value that is a second number of hours between the second time zone and the base time zone;

computing the total time offset value by combining the recipient time offset value and the received time offset value.

8. A information handling system comprising:

one or more processors;

a memory accessible by at least one of the processors;

a nonvolatile storage area accessible by at least one of the processors;

a display device attached accessible by at least one of the processors;

a network interface that connects the information handling system to a computer network; and

a set of instructions stored in the memory and executed by at least one of the processors in order to perform actions of;

receiving, at the network interface, an email message from a sender'"'"'s computer system, the email message including a time offset value in a metadata area of the email message, the time offset value indicating a number of hours between a first time zone used at the sender'"'"'s computer system and a base time zone;

computing, based on the received time offset value and a second time zone that is used at the recipient'"'"'s computer system, a total time offset value;

converting one or more time notations included in a body area of the email message to the second time zone by applying the computed total time offset value to the one or more time notations, the converting resulting in one or more converted time notations; and

displaying the body area of the email message with the one or more converted time notations on the display device.

9. The information handling system of claim 8, wherein the time notations that were included in the body area of the email message include a uniform time zone indicator that indicates that the base time zone corresponds to each of the time notations that are converted to the converted time notations.

10. The information handling system of claim 9 wherein the metadata area of the email message is a header included in the email message, wherein the base time zone is Universal Time (UT), and the set of instructions, when executed, cause at least one of the processors to perform further actions comprising:

adding a time zone indicator that corresponds to the second time zone to each of the converted time notations; and

displaying the added time zone indicator along with the converted time notations on the display device.

11. The information handling system of claim 8 wherein the set of instructions that perform the converting perform further actions comprising:

calculating a recipient time offset value that is a second number of hours between the second time zone and the base time zone; and

computing the total time offset value as being the recipient time offset value.

12. The information handling system of claim 8, wherein the time notations that were included in the body area of the email message include a first time zone indicator that indicates that the time notations correspond the first time zone.

13. The information handling system of claim 12 wherein the metadata area of the email message is a header included in the email message, wherein the base time zone is Universal Time (UT), and the set of instructions, when executed, cause at least one of the processors to perform further actions comprising:

retrieving the time offset value from the metadata area of the email message;

retrieving one or more character offset values from the email message, wherein each of the character offset values corresponds to a character location of one of the time notations in the body area of the email message;

identifying each of the time notations based on the time notation'"'"'s character location included in the character offset values;

calculating a recipient time offset value that is a second number of hours between the second time zone and the base time zone;

computing the total time offset value by combining the recipient time offset value and the received time offset value;

adding a time zone indicator that indicates the second time zone to each of the converted time notations; and

displaying the added time zone indicator along with the converted time notations on the display device.

14. A computer program product stored in a computer readable medium, comprising functional descriptive material that, when executed by an information handling system, causes the information handling system to perform actions that include:

receiving, at a recipient'"'"'s computer system, an email message from a sender'"'"'s computer system, the email message including a time offset value in a metadata area of the email message, the time offset value indicating a number of hours between a first time zone used at the sender'"'"'s computer system and a base time zone;

computing, based on the received time offset value and a second time zone that is used at the recipient'"'"'s computer system, a total time offset value;

converting one or more time notations included in a body area of the email message to the second time zone by applying the computed total time offset value to the one or more time notations, the converting resulting in one or more converted time notations; and

displaying the body area of the email message with the one or more converted time notations on a display device attached to the recipient'"'"'s computer system.

15. The computer program product of claim 14, wherein the time notations that were included in the body area of the email message include a uniform time zone indicator that indicates that the base time zone corresponds to each of the time notations that are converted to the converted time notations.

16. The computer program product of claim 15 wherein the metadata area of the email message is a header included in the email message, wherein the base time zone is Universal Time (UT), and the functional descriptive material causes the data processing system to perform additional actions comprising:

adding a time zone indicator that corresponds to the second time zone to each of the converted time notations; and

displaying the added time zone indicator along with the converted time notations on the display device.

17. The computer program product of claim 14 further comprising functional descriptive material that causes the data processing system to perform additional actions that include:

calculating a recipient time offset value that is a second number of hours between the second time zone and the base time zone; and

computing the total time offset value as being the recipient time offset value.

18. The computer program product of claim 14, wherein the time notations that were included in the body area of the email message include a first time zone indicator that indicates that the time notations correspond the first time zone.

19. The computer program product of claim 18 wherein the metadata area of the email message is a header included in the email message, wherein the base time zone is Universal Time (UT), and the functional descriptive material causes the data processing system to perform additional actions comprising:

adding a time zone indicator that indicates the second time zone to each of the converted time notations; and

displaying the added time zone indicator along with the converted time notations on the display device.

20. The computer program product of claim 18 wherein the converting further includes functional descriptive material causes the data processing system to perform additional actions comprising:

retrieving the time offset value from the metadata area of the email message;

retrieving one or more character offset values from the email message, wherein each of the character offset values corresponds to a character location of one of the time notations in the body area of the email message;

identifying each of the time notations based on the time notation'"'"'s character location included in the character offset values;

calculating a recipient time offset value that is a second number of hours between the second time zone and the base time zone; and

computing the total time offset value by combining the recipient time offset value and the received time offset value.