GRAPHICALLY INDICATING RELEVANCY OF ELECTRONIC MESSAGES

• US 20120066615A1
• Filed: 09/09/2010
• Published: 03/15/2012
• Est. Priority Date: 09/09/2010
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Original Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Inventors: Conzola, Vincent C., Craig, Randall A., Eischeid, Todd M., Molander, Mark E., Brugler, Thomas S.
• Granted Patent: US 8,930,825 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 715/752
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/107 Computer-aided management of electronic mailing [e-mailing]
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 51/00 User-to-user messaging in packet-switching networks, transmitted according to store-and-forward or real-time protocols, e.g. e-mail
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 51/212 using filtering or selective blocking

Abstract

Methods and systems for determining a relevancy of an electronic message, and for graphically indicating the relevancy to a user are disclosed. A method may include receiving an electronic message, such as an email, at an electronic messaging system. The method may also include determining a relevance level of the electronic message to a user based on one or both of a number of primary addressees and a number of secondary addressees identified in the electronic message. Further, the method may include displaying graphical indicia based on the relevance level.

Claims

1. A method comprising:

receiving an electronic message at an electronic messaging system;

determining a relevance level of the electronic message to a user based on one of a number of primary addressees and a number of secondary addressees identified in the electronic message; and

displaying graphical indicia based on the relevance level.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein determining a relevance level of the electronic message comprises determining whether the user is identified in the electronic message as one of a primary addressee and secondary addressee, and

wherein displaying graphical indicia comprises displaying graphical indicia based on whether the user is identified in the electronic message as one of the primary addressee and the secondary addressee.

3. The method of claim 2, wherein displaying graphical indicia comprises displaying the graphical indicia at a predetermined position on a display screen based on whether the user is identified in the electronic message as one of the primary addressee and the secondary addressee.

4. The method of claim 1, comprising:

receiving a plurality of electronic messages at the electronic messaging system;

receiving user input identifying one of a message sender and an addressee of the electronic messages;

determining whether each electronic message identifies the one of the message sender and the addressee; and

wherein displaying graphical indicia comprises displaying graphical indicia based on whether each electronic message identifies one of the message sender and the addressee.

5. The method according to claim 1, wherein determining a relevance level of the electronic message comprises determining the relevance level of the electronic message based on one of a number of primary addressees and a number of carbon copy (Cc) secondary addressees identified in the electronic message, and

wherein displaying graphical indicia comprises displaying the graphical indicia in a portion of a display screen in one of a respective primary header field and a Cc secondary addressee header field of the electronic message based on the number of primary addressees and Cc secondary addressees.

6. The method according to claim 1, comprising:

receiving user input to interact with the graphical indicia; and

in response to receiving the user input to interact with the graphical indicia, displaying one of the numbers of primary addressees and the numbers of secondary addressees.

7. The method according to claim 1, wherein determining a relevance level of the electronic message comprises determining whether the user is a blind carbon copy (Bcc) addressee, and

wherein displaying graphical indicia comprises displaying graphical indicia based on the determination that the user is Bcc addressee.

8. The method according to claim 7, wherein displaying graphical indicia comprises displaying the graphical indicia at a predetermined position on a display screen based on the determination that the user is a Bcc addressee.

9. The method of claim 1, wherein the electronic message is one of an email, a short message service (SMS) message, and a multimedia messaging service (MMS) message.

10. A system comprising:

an input/output (I/O) module configured to receiving an electronic message; and

an electronic messaging manager configured to;

determine a relevance level of the electronic message to a user based on one of a number of primary addressees and a number of secondary addressees identified in the electronic message; and

control a display to display graphical indicia based on the relevance level.

11. The system of claim 10, wherein the electronic messaging manager is configured to:

determine whether the user is identified in the electronic message as one of a primary addressee and a secondary addressee; and

control the display to display graphical indicia based on whether the user is identified in the electronic message as one of a primary addressee and a secondary addressee.

12. The system of claim 11, wherein the electronic messaging manager is configured to control the display to display graphical indicia at a predetermined position on a display screen based on whether the user is identified in the electronic message as one of a primary addressee and a secondary addressee.

13. The system of claim 10, wherein the I/O module is configured to receive a plurality of electronic messages, and

wherein the electronic messaging manager is configured to:

receive user input identifying one of a message sender and an addressee of the electronic messages;

determine whether each electronic message identifies the one of the message sender and the addressee; and

control the display to display graphical indicia based on whether each electronic message identifies the one of the message sender and the addressee.

14. The system of claim 10, wherein the I/O module is configured to receive user input to interact with the graphical indicia, and

wherein the electronic messaging manager is configured to display one of the numbers of primary addressees and the numbers of secondary addressees in response to receiving user input interacting with the graphical indicia.

15. The system of claim 10, wherein the electronic messaging manager is configured to:

determine whether the user is a blind carbon copy (Bcc) addressee; and

control the display to display graphical indicia based on whether the user is a Bcc addressee.

16. The system of claim 15, wherein the electronic messaging manager is configured to control the display to display graphical indicia at a predetermined position on a display screen based on whether the user is identified in the electronic message as a Bcc addressee.

17. The system of claim 10, wherein the electronic message is one of an email, a short message service (SMS) message, and a multimedia messaging service (MMS) message.

18. A computer program product for determining a relevance level of an electronic message to a user, said computer program product comprising:

a computer readable storage medium having computer readable program code embodied therewith, the computer readable program code comprising;

computer readable program code configured to determine the relevance level of the electronic message received at an electronic messaging system based on one of a number of primary addressees and a number of secondary addressees identified in the electronic message; and

computer readable program code configured to control a display to display graphical indicia based on the relevance level.

19. The computer program product of claim 18, comprising:

computer readable program code configured to determine whether the user is identified in the electronic message as one of a primary addressee and a secondary addressee; and

computer readable program code configured to control a display to display graphical indicia based on whether the user is identified in the electronic message as one of the primary addressee and the secondary addressee.

20. The computer program product of claim 19, comprising computer readable program code configured to control a display to display graphical indicia at a predetermined position thereon based on whether the user is identified in the electronic message as one of the primary addressee and the secondary addressee.