Message data management

• US 7,941,492 B2
• Filed: 02/15/2006
• Issued: 05/10/2011
• Est. Priority Date: 03/01/2004
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Corporation
• Inventors: Warman, Leon R., Pearson, Malcolm Erik
• Primary Examiner(s): Ismail; Shawki S
• Assistant Examiner(s): Ashraf; Waseem
• Application Number:
  US11/354,368
• Publication Number:
  US 20060212286A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,910 Days
• Field of Search: 709/206
• US Class Current: 709/206
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/107 Computer-aided management of electronic mailing [e-mailing]

Abstract

A workflow manager application transfers message data received from an originating device via a communication network to a target application for processing. A graphical user interface displays the received message data and allows the user to view and designate one or more target applications for processing the message data. The workflow manger application is responsive to user input to transfer message data to the designated one or more target applications for processing the message data. Alternatively, the workflow manager application analyzes received message data to identify one or more target applications, and transfers the message data to the identified one or more target applications for processing.

Claims

1. A computerized method for transferring message data to an application for processing, said computerized method comprising:

receiving, at a destination device, message data via a communication network;

determining an intent of the received message data;

defining a target application as a function of the determined intent;

transferring the received message data to the defined target application for processing;

identifying a message thread based on the received message data, said message thread including at least two electronic messages each having message data, said identifying includes identifying a thread number for each of the at least two electronic messages as a function of the message data, said thread number corresponding to a chronological sequence in which each of the at least two electronic messages were received at the destination device;

comparing message data included in a most recent electronic message in the chronological sequence to the message data included in a next most recent electronic message in the chronological sequence to determine if updated message data is associated with the most recent electronic message; and

transferring the updated message data to the defined target application for processing.

2. The method of claim 1 further comprising:

storing a list of applications and a corresponding threshold value for each application in of the list of applications in a memory, and wherein said determining an intent includes calculating a transfer probability for each application in the list of applications;

comparing the calculated transfer probability for each application to the corresponding threshold value for each application to determine whether to transfer the message data to one or more a target applications; and

defining a particular application in the list of applications as the target application when the calculated transfer probability for that particular application is greater than the corresponding threshold value for that particular application.