EMAIL MESSAGES

• US 20100057864A1
• Filed: 09/04/2008
• Published: 03/04/2010
• Est. Priority Date: 09/04/2008
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Corporation
• Inventors: Laird-McConnell, Tom
• Granted Patent: US 8,028,032 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 709/206
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/9577 Optimising the visualization of content, e.g. distillation of HTML documents
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/107 Computer-aided management of electronic mailing [e-mailing]

Abstract

The described implementations relate to email messages. One technique detects a link to a web-site in an email message. The technique causes content from the web-site to be visualized on a common display area with the email message for a recipient of the email message.

Claims

1. A system, comprising:

an email application configured to display an email message on a first portion of a graphical window; and

,

a browser module associated with the email application and configured to automatically retrieve and display web-site content on a second portion of the graphical window.

2. The system of claim 1, wherein the browser module is configured to retrieve the web-site content by detecting one of:

a single link to a web-site in the email message that contains the web-site content and multiple links to web-sites in the email message that contain the web-site content.

3. The system of claim 1, wherein the browser module is embedded in the email application.

4. The system of claim 1, wherein the browser module is configured to assess a security risk associated with the web-site content and to only automatically display web-site content when the security risk is below a threshold.

5. The system of claim 1, wherein the browser module is configured to assess a security risk associated with the web-site content and to query a user for permission to display the web-site content when the security risk is above a threshold.

6. The system of claim 1, wherein the browser module is configured to automatically retrieve and display the web-site content from multiple web-sites in a prioritized order.

7. The system of claim 1, wherein the email module and the browser module reside on one of:

a computing device upon which the graphical window is displayed and a server computer that is communicably coupled to the computing device upon which the graphical window is displayed.

8. A method, comprising:

displaying an email message on a graphical window, wherein the email message is bound to web-content; and

,

enabling a recipient of the email message to have the web-content displayed with the email message on the graphical window.

9. The method of claim 8, wherein the displaying comprises displaying an email message that relates to a collaborative web-site to which a sender of the email message is a collaborator.

10. The method of claim 8, wherein the displaying comprises displaying the email message for a sender of the email message, and wherein the enabling comprises enabling the sender to embed a link to the web-content in the email message effective that the recipient of the email can cause the web-content to be displayed on the graphical window with the email message.

11. The method of claim 8, wherein the enabling comprises automatically displaying the web-content with the email on the graphical window.

12. The method of claim 8, wherein the enabling comprises assessing a security risk of a web-site that contains the web-content and presenting the security risk in a dialog box from which the recipient can select to have the web-content displayed in the graphical window or select not to have the web-content displayed in the graphical window.

13. The method of claim 8, wherein the enabling comprises identifying links to the web-content that are bound to the email message.

14. The method of claim 8, wherein the displaying comprises adjusting the email message so that the web-content is displayed in context with the email message in the graphical window.

15. A computer-readable storage media having instructions stored thereon that when executed by a computing device cause the computing device to perform acts, comprising:

detecting a link to a web-site in an email message; and

,

causing content from the web-site to be visualized on a common display area with the email message for a recipient of the email message.

16. The computer-readable storage media of claim 15, wherein the detecting further comprises utilizing the link to obtain the content from the web-site.

17. The computer-readable storage media of claim 15, wherein the causing comprises defining pixels of the common display area and communicating the defined pixels for display on a computer associated with the recipient.

18. The computer-readable storage media of claim 15, wherein the causing comprises defining pixels of the common display area and displaying the defined pixels.

19. The computer-readable storage media of claim 15, wherein the causing comprises causing the web-content to be displayed in context with portions of the email message that relate to the web-content.

20. The computer-readable storage media of claim 15, wherein the detecting comprises detecting links to multiple web-sites and further comprising determining an order in which the content from the multiple links should appear on the display area.