Method and system for email synchronization for an electronic device
First Claim
1. A method usable for an electronic device having an email application, the method comprising:
- while the email application is operating in conjunction with email content stored in a memory of the electronic device, tracking changes to the email content, wherein the tracking is performed by an email service independent of the email application;
comparing, by the email service, the tracked changes with email content stored in a server;
based on at least some of the tracked changes, updating, by the email service, the email content stored in the memory to be consistent with the email content stored in the server; and
determining if a high-speed data connection to the server is present, wherein the high-speed data connection is a connection having a bandwidth of at least x bits per second, where x is user defined,if a high-speed data connection is present, updating the email content stored in the memory including downloading to the memory via the high-speed data connection an attachment associated with at least a portion of an email that was previously downloaded, wherein the updating is performed by the email service while the email application is in a mode wherein its default synchronization process is substantially precluded from being invoked,deferring download of the attachment, by the email service, if either one or both of the high-speed data connection is unavailable and an available data connection is under a certain speed, anddetermining whether the available data connection is under certain speed based on settings information.
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Accused Products
Abstract
An electronic device, such as a hand-held portable computer, is provided with client-side email capability that allows emails to be independently downloaded from a server, regardless of an operating mode of an email application and without using the standard email retrieval mechanism of the email application. The emails are periodically downloaded without attachments in response to a poll of the server and if a sufficient high-speed connection to the server is available, and then the downloaded email is locally stored in a local cache of the portable computer. Attachments associated with downloaded emails stored in the local cache can be selectively downloaded, via a background process, from the server independently of the operating mode of the email application and during any suitable power state of the electronic device. Synchronization of attachments to emails in the local cache is also independently performed, thereby bypassing synchronization that is normally performed by the email application while in the online mode.
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Citations
16 Claims
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1. A method usable for an electronic device having an email application, the method comprising:
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while the email application is operating in conjunction with email content stored in a memory of the electronic device, tracking changes to the email content, wherein the tracking is performed by an email service independent of the email application; comparing, by the email service, the tracked changes with email content stored in a server; based on at least some of the tracked changes, updating, by the email service, the email content stored in the memory to be consistent with the email content stored in the server; and determining if a high-speed data connection to the server is present, wherein the high-speed data connection is a connection having a bandwidth of at least x bits per second, where x is user defined, if a high-speed data connection is present, updating the email content stored in the memory including downloading to the memory via the high-speed data connection an attachment associated with at least a portion of an email that was previously downloaded, wherein the updating is performed by the email service while the email application is in a mode wherein its default synchronization process is substantially precluded from being invoked, deferring download of the attachment, by the email service, if either one or both of the high-speed data connection is unavailable and an available data connection is under a certain speed, and determining whether the available data connection is under certain speed based on settings information. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5)
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6. A machine-readable storage medium comprising instruction that, when executed by a processor, cause the processor to:
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track emails partially downloaded into a memory, including emails that were downloaded absent their attachments; determine if a high-speed data connection to a server is available, wherein the high-speed data connection is a connection having a bandwidth of at least x bits per second, where x is user defined; synchronize the emails partially downloaded into the memory with copies of the emails at the server, independent of a synchronization process of the email application, if a high-speed data connection is available, including downloading an attachment associated with a previously downloaded email into memory and via use of the available high-speed data connection to the serve; and defer the synchronization of the partially downloaded emails if the high-speed data connection is unavailable. - View Dependent Claims (7, 8, 9, 10)
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11. An apparatus having an email application, the apparatus comprising:
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a storage unit to store downloaded emails; a first component to download at least a portion of an email to the storage unit while the email application is in a memory-access mode wherein at least some content associated with the email is excluded from the download, wherein the excluded content includes an attachment to the email; a second component to track which emails stored in the storage unit have been downloaded and have excluded associated content; a third component to determine if a high-speed connection to the server is available, wherein the high-speed data connection is a connection having a bandwidth of at least x bits per second, where x is user defined; and a synchronization engine to synchronize, based on tracking information from the second unit-component and during the memory-access mode, the emails stored in the storage unit with emails stored at a server, the synchronization unit being capable to cooperate with the first component to download, excluded content associated with a previously downloaded portion of an email if, during synchronization while the email application is in the memory-access mode, a high-speed connection to the server is available, wherein the synchronization engine can download the content via the available high-speed connection to the server during the memory-access mode, and wherein the synchronization engine can defer download of the content if either or both the high-speed connection to the server is unavailable and is under a certain speed. - View Dependent Claims (12, 13, 14, 15, 16)
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Specification