US 2009/0157818 A1 · METHOD TO IDENTIFY AND DISPLAY CONTRIBUTIONS BY AUTHOR IN AN E-MAIL COMPRISING MULTIPLE AUTHORS

Abstract

A method, system and computer program product for displaying authorship and time stamp data within an electronic mail (e-mail) message comprising multiple contributors. The recipient of a multiple author e-mail may view an e-mail inclusive or exclusive of an author's comments. The e-mail client is capable of identifying the author and insertion date of content included within an e-mail message by hovering on or near the word(s)/or phrase utilizing a pointing device. E-mail content may be viewed in chronological order of contribution(s) as selected by the recipient. Contributed content may be displayed chronologically, or color coordinated to avoid displacing key information.

Claims20

Dependent claims

A method comprising:

dynamically associating author information with text inserted into a body of an electronic mail (e-mail) message;
and
displaying within the email message the author information in association with the text, wherein the text is identified as being contributed by the author.

A computer program product comprising:

a computer readable medium;
and
program code on the computer readable medium that when executed by a processor provides the functions of:
dynamically associating author information with text inserted into a body of an electronic mail (e-mail) message;
and
displaying within the email message the author information in association with the text, wherein the text is identified as being contributed by the author.

3 more elements

An electronic device comprising:

a processor component;
a mail user agent (MUA) for transmitting e-mails executing on the electronic device;
and
a utility associated with the MUA executing on the processor component and which comprises codes that enables completion of the functions of:
dynamically associating author information with text inserted into a body of an electronic mail (e-mail) message;
and
displaying within the email message the author information in association with the text, wherein the text is identified as being contributed by the author.

4 more elements

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.

Facts

Application

11/954,492Filed 12 Dec 2007

Published

18 Jun 2009

Term ends

Not estimatedThe source records don’t support an estimate.

Classification5 codes

G06Q 10/107
Office automation; Time management: computer-aided management of electronic mailing [e-mailing]
G06F 3/04817
Based on specific properties of the displayed interaction object or a metaphor-based environment, e.g. interaction with desktop elements like…:…
G06F 40/103
Text processing: formatting, i.e. changing of presentation of documents
G06Q
Information and communication technology [ict] specially adapted for administrative, commercial, financial, managerial

Method to identify and display contributions by author in an e-mail comprising multiple authors

Life of this patent

Method to identify and display contributions by author in an e-mail comprising multiple authors

Life of this patent

Abstract

Claims20