SYSTEM AND METHOD FOR BLENDED PRESENTATION OF LOCALLY AND REMOTELY STORED ELECTRONIC MESSAGES

• US 20130185649A1
• Filed: 01/18/2012
• Published: 07/18/2013
• Est. Priority Date: 01/18/2012
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Corporation
• Inventors: Novitskey, Robert R., Wiedemann, Bruce D., Kumar, Saurabh, Mahood, Justin B., Alagesan, Shri Vidhya, Gregg, Ryan E., Krishnaswamy, Somanath, Meisels, Joshua A.
• Granted Patent: US 10,255,587 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 51/234 for tracking messages
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/1095 Replication or mirroring of data, e.g. scheduling or transport for data synchronisation between network nodes

Abstract

An electronic messaging client caches copies of a subset of electronic messages available in a remote store in a local store of a user device. When the user device is in an online state, the client provides for the blended presentation of electronic messages such that a user can concurrently view information about the electronic messages that have been cached in the local store as well as information about electronic messages that are stored only in the remote store. The client also presents a blended state associated with a container of electronic messages to a user of a user device and enables a user to execute a search of cached electronic messages stored in a local store as well as of electronic messages stored in the remote store.

Claims

1. A method performed by an electronic messaging client installed on a user device, comprising:

(a) displaying information concerning one or more first electronic messages in a graphical user interface (GUI) rendered to a display of the user device, the contents of the one or more first electronic messages being stored in a local store of the user device;

(b) determining if the user device is connected to an electronic messaging server; and

(c) in response to at least determining that the user device is connected to the electronic messaging server, displaying information concerning one or more second electronic messages in the GUI concurrently with the information concerning the one or more first electronic messages, the contents of the one or more second electronic messages being stored in a remote store accessible to the electronic messaging server but not in the local store.

2. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

providing a component within the GUI that the user may interact with to cause the information concerning the one or more second electronic messages to be displayed in the GUI concurrently with the information concerning the one or more first electronic messages;

wherein step (c) is performed in response to at least determining that the user device is connected to the electronic messaging server and that the user has interacted with the component.

3. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

providing a component within the GUI that the user may interact with to cause the contents of a selected one of the one or more first electronic messages to be displayed in the GUI; and

in response to determining that the user has interacted with the component, obtaining the contents of the selected one of the one or more first electronic messages from the local store for display in the GUI.

4. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

providing a component within the GUI that the user may interact with to cause the contents of a selected one of the one or more second electronic messages to be displayed in the GUI; and

in response to determining that the user has interacted with the component, obtaining the contents of the selected one of the one or more second electronic messages from the remote store for display in the GUI without saving a copy of the contents of the selected one of the one or more second electronic messages in the local store.

5. The method of claim 1, wherein the number of electronic messages stored in the local store is determined in accordance with a synchronization window.

6. The method of claim 1, further comprising providing the user with a means for changing the size of the synchronization window.

7. The method of claim 1, wherein the electronic messages comprise e-mail messages.

8. A method performed by an electronic messaging client executing on a user device for presenting a blended state associated with a container of electronic messages to a display of the user device, comprising:

determining a local item count, wherein the local item count represents a number of electronic messages stored in a local store of the user device that are included in the container and have a particular state;

determining if the user device is connected to an electronic messaging server;

in response to determining that the user device is not connected to the electronic messaging server;

loading from the local store an amount that represents a last known difference between a remote item count and the local item count, wherein the remote item count represents a number of electronic messages stored in a remote store accessible to the electronic messaging server that are included in the container and have the particular state; and

presenting a blended item count for the container to the display, wherein the blended item count for the container is the sum of the local item count and the amount.

9. The method of claim 8, further comprising:

in response to determining that the user device is connected to the electronic messaging server and that a synchronization between the local store and the remote store has not yet been performed;

obtaining a new remote item count from the electronic messaging server;

calculating a new amount by determining the difference between the new remote item count and the local item count; and

presenting a new blended item count for the container to the display, wherein the new blended item count for the container is the sum of the local item count and the new amount.

10. The method of claim 8, further comprising:

in response to determining that the user device is connected to the electronic messaging server and that a synchronization between the local store and the remote store has been performed;

obtaining a new remote item count and a new local item count resulting from the synchronization;

calculating a new amount by determining the difference between the new remote item count and the new local item count; and

presenting a new blended item count for the container to the display, wherein the new blended item count for the container is the sum of the new local item count and the new amount.

11. The method of claim 8, further comprising:

in response to determining that a user of the user device has performed an action on a particular electronic message that causes the total number of electronic messages in the container that have the particular state to change;

determining if the particular electronic message is stored in the local store;

in response to determining that the particular electronic message is stored in the local store, incrementing or decrementing the local count to account for the change.

12. The method of claim 11, further comprising:

in response to determining that the particular electronic message is not stored in the local store, incrementing or decrementing the amount to account for the change.

13. The method of claim 8, wherein the electronic messages comprise e-mail messages and the container comprises an e-mail folder.

14. The method of claim 8, wherein the particular state comprises one of:

included in the container, read, unread, flagged or unflagged.

15. A method performed by an electronic messaging client installed on a user device, comprising:

(a) receiving a query from a user of the user device;

(b) executing a first search against a plurality of electronic messages cached in a local store of the user device based on the query;

(c) displaying information about at least one electronic message identified as a result of the execution of the first search in a graphical user interface (GUI) rendered to a display of the user device;

(d) determining if the user device is connected to an electronic messaging server; and

(e) in response to at least determining that the user device is connected to the electronic messaging server, causing a second search to be executed against a plurality of electronic messages available in a remote store accessible to the electronic messaging server and displaying information about at least one electronic message identified as a result of the execution of the second search in the GUI.

16. The method of claim 15, wherein steps (d) and (e) are performed only if it is determined that the remote store includes electronic messages that are not cached in the local store.

17. The method of claim 15, wherein step (e) is performed in response to determining that the user device is connected to the electronic messaging server and receiving input from a user of the user device indicating that the second search should be executed.

18. The method of claim 15, further comprising:

concurrently displaying information about a first electronic message that is cached in the local store and information about a second electronic message that is not cached in the local store in the GUI as a result of the execution of the second search;

in response to user interaction with a first component of the GUI, obtaining the contents of the first electronic message from the local store for display in the GUI; and

in response to user interaction with a second component of the GUI, accessing the contents of the second electronic message from the remote store for display in the GUI without saving a copy of the contents of the second electronic message in the local store.

19. The method of claim 15, further comprising:

in response to at least determining that the user device is not connected to the electronic messaging server and that the remote store includes electronic messages that are not cached in the local store, presenting information to the user indicating that the results of the first search may be incomplete.

20. The method of claim 15, wherein the electronic messages comprise e-mail messages.