ENHANCEMENT OF E-MAIL CLIENT USER INTERFACES AND E-MAIL MESSAGE FORMATS

• US 20120023416A1
• Filed: 10/02/2011
• Published: 01/26/2012
• Est. Priority Date: 09/18/2002
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Slack Technologies, Inc. (Salesforce.com, Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Justin Khoo
• Inventors: Khoo, Justin
• Granted Patent: US 8,543,656 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 715/752
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/0482 Interaction with lists of selectable items, e.g. menus
• 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

Abstract

An enhancement to e-mail user interfaces and message formats includes a dynamic preview window to view and retrieve attachments and summaries of e-mail messages directly in the e-mail list view or inbox view without opening an e-mail message. The efficient viewing mechanism further allows previews without cluttering the listing of the e-mails in the inbox by allowing the client to detect special preview instructions within an e-mail and run executables within the preview window. The enhancement is applicable to standalone e-mail clients (POP or IMAP based) and to web-based e-mail systems.

Claims

1-36. -36. (canceled)

37. A method of enhancing an e-mail user interface by an e-mail application, comprising:

identifying by the receiving e-mail application an e-mail having one or more attachments having content that can be visually rendered;

rendering a window at a location proximate to said e-mail on an inbox view list of e-mails to provide to a user a visual connection to said e-mail;

providing within said window user controls to enable selection and display of one or a sequence of said attachments without opening said e-mail; and

rendering an image of the content of an attachment of said e-mail within said window such that a majority of said content is visible within said image, said image being sized to fit within the temporary window without scrolling.

38. The method of claim 37, wherein a first vertical location at which said window is rendered is determined by a second vertical location of said e-mail on said inbox view list of emails, and wherein said window is unique to and rendered solely for said e-mail.

39. The method of claim 37, wherein said window is initially not rendered when said inbox view is rendered, and wherein said rendering said window comprises associating a trigger in said list of e-mails with said e-mail;

and upon activation by a user of the trigger, displaying said window temporarily.

40. The method of claim 39, wherein said window on said inbox view is automatically closed upon one of deactivation of the trigger associated with said e-mail, after a predetermined time has elapsed, or upon the user activating another trigger associated with another e-mail.

41. The method of claim 37, wherein said rendering an image of said content comprises automatically rendering said content upon opening of the window.

42. The method of claim 37, wherein each attachment comprises a link to said content, and said method further comprises obtaining said content for display within the window using said link without opening the e-mail.

43. The method of claim 42, wherein said link communicates with said e-mail application to extract said content from the attachment and to launch an appropriate viewer to render the content.

44. The method of claim 42, wherein said link is a URL to an e-mail server that upon being accessed downloads and renders said content in a web browser of the user from a web-based e-mail client application.

45. The method of claim 37, wherein said-attachments comprise a plurality of images, and said user controls within said window enable rendering successive ones of a sequence of said images, where at least one of said images is not visible within said window with other ones of said images.

46. The method of claim 45, wherein said user controls enable the user to navigate forward and backward in said sequence of images.

47. The method of claim 45, wherein said rendering an image comprises displaying identifiers of said images in the window, and said user controls enable a user to select a specific image using said identifiers for display in said window.

48. The method of claim 45, wherein said rendering successive ones of said sequence of images comprises displaying said sequence of images as a slide show automatically without user involvement.

49. The method of claim 37, wherein said content comprises multi-media content, and said user controls enable the user to control said rendering of said multi-media content such that an image comprises a majority of a frame of said multi-media content.

50. The method of claim 49 further comprising downloading said multi-media content to the window from a remote server.

51. The method of claim 37 further comprising automatically retrieving from a network server and installing using said application a plug-in for rendering said content.

52. The method of claim 39, wherein said trigger comprises an icon adjacent to said e-mail, and said method comprises activating said trigger upon positioning a cursor relative to said icon.

54. The method of claim 37, wherein said method comprises converting an attachment into an image using a format converter to enable the attachment to be displayed within said window.

55. The method of claim 37, wherein at least one of said attachments is not an image, and the method comprises loading a plug-in into said window that visually renders the at least one attachment within said window.

51-1. The method of claim 37, wherein there are a plurality of attachments, each attachment having an identifier, and said user controls enable a user to download selected attachments using said identifiers.

56. Computer program non-transitory storage media storing executable instructions for controlling the computer to provide an enhanced e-mail user interface for an e-mail client application, the instructions controlling the computer to:

detect of one or more attachments to an e-mail having content that can be visually rendered;

associate a trigger with said e-mail on an inbox view listing of e-mails displayed on said computer;

create a temporary window solely for said e-mail on said inbox view listing upon activation of the associated trigger by a user, said temporary window being positioned to appear on said inbox view at a location proximate to said trigger to provide to the user a visual connection to said e-mail;

provide user controls within the temporary window to enable selection and display of an image of one or a sequence of said attachments; and

render a visual image of the content of a selected attachment within the temporary window such that a majority of said content is visible within said image, said image being sized to fit within the temporary window without scrolling.

57. A method of enhancing an e-mail user interface, comprising:

Identifying an e-mail having one or more instructions relating to said email;

associating a trigger with the e-mail on an inbox view listing of e-mails;

upon activation by a user of the trigger associated with said e-mail, opening a temporary window on said inbox view, said temporary window being opened over said inbox view at a location proximate to said trigger to provide to a user a visual connection to said e-mail;

rendering the content within said temporary window in accordance with said instructions, said content being different from body content of said email, said content being rendered so as to fit within said temporary window without scrolling, said rendered content taking up the majority of the space of said temporary window; and

providing user controls within the temporary window to enable interaction of said content.

58. The method of claim 57, wherein said instructions comprise one or more email headers.

59. The method of claim 57, wherein said instructions comprise one or more attachment to said email.

60. The method of claim 57, wherein said instructions comprise identifiers referring to remote content located on a remote server.

61. The method of claim 60, wherein the said remote content comprises one or more images, and said user controls enable selection and display of one or a sequence of said images within said temporary window.

62. The method of claim 60, wherein said remote content is retrieved and rendered within said temporary window, and said user controls enable modification of content within said temporary window.

63. The method of claim 62, wherein a visual identifier is rendered adjacent to said email within said list of emails, and said method further comprises changing the appearance of said visual identifier in response to changes made to said remote content by an entity other than the user of the email application after said email has been delivered to the inbox of said user.

64. The method of claim 57, wherein said instructions direct the email application to load another application into the temporary window to render content referenced by said instructions.

65. The method of claim 57, wherein said instructions comprise user controls enable scheduling of information through said window in response to said instructions.