Method and system for implementing instant message and e-mail interworking

• US 8,706,825 B2
• Filed: 04/09/2010
• Issued: 04/22/2014
• Est. Priority Date: 09/11/2009
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: ZTE Corporation
• Original Assignee: ZTE Corporation
• Inventors: Li, Fengjun, Ali, Ghazanfar, Huang, Zheng
• Primary Examiner(s): JEAN, FRANTZ B
• Application Number:
  US13/258,308
• Publication Number:
  US 20120191787A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,474 Days
• Field of Search: 709/206, 709/204, 455/412.1, 455/414.4, 715/752, 715/758, 379/88.13, 379/88.14, 379/88.22
• US Class Current: 709/206
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 2101/37 E-mail addresses
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 2101/38 Telephone uniform resource identifier [URI]
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 2101/385 Uniform resource identifier for session initiation protocol [SIP URI]
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 51/04 Real-time or near real-time messaging, e.g. instant messaging [IM]
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 51/066 Format adaptation, e.g. format conversion or compression
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 61/301 Name conversion
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 69/08 Protocols for interworking; Protocol conversion

Abstract

The disclosure discloses a method for implementing instant message and E-mail interworking, comprising: corresponding an IM user applying a service of IM and E-mail interworking to at least one E-mail address, either being constructed from an IM address of the IM user or being a pre-allocated E-mail address; determining the E-mail address or IM address of a destination user from a received IM or a received E-mail from a user, converting the IM into a E-mail or the E-mail into an IM, and sending the E-mail or IM to the determined receiving address of the destination user. The disclosure also discloses a system for implementing IM and E-mail interworking. The disclosure realizes a free interworking between IM and E-mail.

Claims

1. A method for implementing instant message (IM) and E-mail interoperability, comprising corresponding an IM user applying a service of IM and E-mail interoperability to at least one E-mail address, either being constructed from an IM address of the IM user or being a pre-allocated E-mail address, and the method further comprising:

determining, from a received IM, the E-mail address of a destination user, converting the IM into an E-mail, and sending the E-mail to the E-mail address of the destination user;

or

determining, from an E-mail initiated by an E-mail receiver, the IM address of a destination user, converting the E-mail into an IM, and sending the IM to the IM address of the destination user,

wherein the method is performed by an interworking server, the IM user sends the IM to the interworking server and the E-mail user sends the E-mail to the interworking server, and

when the IM user uses the IM to communicate with the E-mail user, the E-mail user replies directly with the E-mail, and when the E-mail user uses the E-mail to communicate with the IM user, the IM user replies directly with the IM.

2. The method according to claim 1, wherein determining from the IM the E-mail address of the destination user comprises:

determining whether the receiving address of the destination user in the IM is an E-mail address or not, if so, then determining the E-mail address as the receiving address of the destination user, otherwise finding out the E-mail address of the destination user corresponding to the IM address of the destination user according to the IM address of the destination user in the IM;

determining, from the E-mail, the IM receiving address of the destination user comprises;

finding out the IM address corresponding to the E-mail address of the destination user, according to the E-mail address of the destination user in the E-mail.

3. The method according to claim 2, wherein converting the IM into the E-mail comprises:

determining and mapping an E-mail address corresponding to an origin user in the IM into a parameter “

from”

in the E-mail, setting a parameter “

date”

in the IM or the current time information to a parameter “

orig-date”

in the E-mail, setting a parameter “

to”

in the E-mail to the E-mail address of the destination user in the IM, setting “

imdn.Disposition-Notification”

in the IM to “

positive-delivery”

or “

negative-delivery”

, setting a parameter “

Disposition-Notification-To”

in the E-mail to “

required”

, setting “

disposition-type”

in the E-mail to “

displayed”

when the “

imdn.Disposition-Notification”

in the IM is set to “

display”

, and directly using the IM as the content of the E-mail when the type of the message content of the IM is text, or directly constructing an E-mail header and an E-mail body of a multipurpose Internet E-mail extensions (MIME) type when the type of the message content of the IM is MIME; and

converting the E-mail into the IM comprises;

using the parameter “

from”

in the E-mail header as the origin user address in the IM, using an IM address converted by a command parameter “

RCPT To”

as the destination user address of the IM, setting the parameter “

imdn.Disposition-Notification”

in the IM to “

positive-delivery”

or “

negative-delivery”

when the parameter “

Disposition-Notification-To”

in the E-mail header is “

required”

, setting the “

imdn.Disposition-Notification”

in the IM to “

display”

when the parameter “

disposition-type”

in the E-mail header is “

displayed”

, and using the content of the E-mail as the message body of the IM.

4. The method according to claim 2, wherein sending the converted E-mail to the determined receiving address of the destination user comprises:

initiating a domain name server (DNS) query according to the E-mail address of the destination user, acquiring the address of a Simple Mail Transfer Protocol (SMTP) server to which the destination user belongs, establishing a transmission channel, sending the command “

DATA”

to the SMTP server to which the destination user belongs, and sending the E-mail converted from the IM; and

sending the converted IM to the determined receiving address of the destination user comprises;

determining an IM system corresponding to the IM address of the destination user, sending the converted IM to the IM system, and sending, by the IM system, the converted IM to the receiving address of the destination user.

5. The method according to claim 4, wherein the method further comprises:

if the E-mail, when being converted into an IM, has a content of exceeding a size (i.e. 1300 bytes) of a pager mode IM, converting the content of the E-mail into two or more Message Session Relay Protocol (MSRP) messages.

6. The method according to claim 4, wherein the method further comprises:

when the message content of the IM is transferred as a MSRP message, caching the message contents of the received MSRP messages, constructing the cached message contents as a complete message after all MSRP message are received, and converting the complete message into the E-mail.

7. A system for implementing IM and E-mail interoperability, comprising a setting unit, a receiving unit, a first determining unit, a converting unit and a sending unit, wherein

the setting unit is configured to set an IM user applying a service of IM and E-mail interoperability to correspond to at least one E-mail address, either being constructed from an IM address of the IM user or being a pre-allocated E-mail address;

the receiving unit is configured to receive the IM or E-mail from the user;

the first determining unit is configured to determine from a received IM an E-mail address of a destination user, or to determine an IM address of a destination user from a received E-mail of a user;

the converting unit is configured to convert the received IM into a E-mail or to convert the received E-mail into an IM; and

the sending unit is configured to determine the E-mail address of the destination user from the received IM, convert the IM into a E-mail, and send the E-mail to the E-mail address of the destination user, or to determine the IM address of the destination user from a received E-mail initiated by the E-mail user, convert the E-mail into an IM, and send the IM to the IM address of the destination user,

wherein the setting unit, the receiving unit, the first determining unit, the converting unit and the sending unit are located in an interworking server, the IM user sends the IM to the interworking server and the E-mail user sends the E-mail to the interworking server, and

when the IM user uses the IM to communicate with the E-mail user, the E-mail user replies directly with the E-mail, and when the E-mail user uses the E-mail to communicate with the IM user, the IM user replies directly with the IM.

8. The system according to claim 7, wherein the first determining unit is further configured to determine whether the receiving address of the destination user in the IM is an E-mail address or not, if so, determine the E-mail address as the receiving address of the destination user, otherwise find out the E-mail address of the destination user corresponding to the IM address of the destination user, according to the IM address of the destination user in the IM;

and

the first determining unit is further configured to find out the IM address corresponding to the E-mail address of the destination user, according to the E-mail address of the destination user in the E-mail.

9. The system according to claim 8, wherein the system further comprises:

a second determining unit, configured to determine the E-mail address of an origin user in the IM; and

, wherein

the converting unit is further configured to map the E-mail address of the origin user in the IM determined by the second determining unit into a parameter “

from”

in a E-mail, to set a parameter “

date”

in the IM or the current time information to a parameter “

orig-date”

in the E-mail, to set a parameter “

to”

in the E-mail to the E-mail address of the destination user in the IM, to set “

imdn.Disposition-Notification”

in the IM to “

positive-delivery”

or “

negative-delivery”

, to set a parameter “

Disposition-Notification-To”

in the E-mail to “

required”

, to set “

disposition-type”

in the E-mail to “

displayed”

when the “

imdn.Disposition-Notification”

in the IM is set to “

display”

, and to directly use the IM as the content of the E-mail when the type of the message content of the IM is text, or directly constructs an E-mail header and an E-mail body of a multipurpose Internet E-mail extensions (MIME) type when the type of the message content of the IM is MIME; and

the converting unit is further configured to use the parameter “

from”

in the E-mail header as the origin user address in the IM, to use an IM address converted by a command parameter “

RCPT To”

as the destination user address of the IM, to set the parameter “

imdn.Disposition-Notification”

in the IM to “

positive-delivery”

or “

negative-delivery”

when the parameter “

Disposition-Notification-To”

in the E-mail header is “

required”

, to set the “

imdn.Disposition-Notification”

in the IM to “

display”

when the parameter “

disposition-type”

in the E-mail header is “

displayed”

, and to use the content of the E-mail as the message body of the IM.

10. The system according to claim 9, wherein the sending unit is further configured to initiate a domain name server (DNS) query according to the E-mail address of the destination user, to acquire the address of an SMTP server to which the destination user belongs, to establish a transmission channel, to send command “

DATA”

to the SMTP server to which the destination user belongs, and to send a E-mail converted from the IM; and

the sending unit is further configured to determine an IM system corresponding to the IM address of the destination user, to send the converted IM to the IM system, and to send the converted IM to the receiving address of the destination user through the IM system.

11. The system according to claim 10, wherein if the E-mail, when being converted into an IM by the converting unit, has a content of exceeding the size (i.e. 1300) of a pager mode IM, the content of the E-mail is converted into two or more MSRP messages.

12. The system according to claim 10, wherein the system further comprises:

a cache unit and a third determining unit, wherein

the cache unit is configured to cache the message contents of the received MSRP messages when the message content of the IM is transferred as a MSRP message; and

the third unit is configured to determine whether all MSRP messages are received or not, and to trigger the converting unit to construct the cached message contents as a complete message and convert the complete message into a E-mail, upon reception.