Method and apparatus for archive processing of electronic messages

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-9235641-B1
Application number	US-78496307-A
Country	US
Kind code	B1
Filing date	Apr 10, 2007
Priority date	Jan 31, 2007
Publication date	Jan 12, 2016
Grant date	Jan 12, 2016

Abstract

A method and system for detection, storage and/or display of archive tracking information regarding archiving process history for archived and/or non-archived messages (e.g., email messages). Such information may be useful in determining reasons why a message, or group of messages, was archived or not, and thereby assessing the functioning of an archiving system. The process history information may include a processing type for the electronic message indicating whether the message was archived or not, and if the message was not archived, may indicate whether the message is a duplicate of another archived message, the message was filtered, or the archiving of the message failed. Event data may be recorded indicating a detailed reason why a message was not archived, a current location of the message, one or more rules applied to the electronic message during an archival filtering operation, and/or one or more rules that caused the electronic message to be selected for archiving.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1. A method for generating information for an electronic message as it is being archived, comprising:
receiving, by a message archiving system, a plurality of electronic messages;
determining, by the message archiving system, whether each of the plurality of electronic messages is designated for archiving or filtering out by applying one or more rules from a first set of rules stored in the message archiving system;
automatically applying, by the message archiving system, at least one rule from a second set of rules stored in the message archiving system to determine an archive location for each of the plurality of electronic messages;
attempting to archive each of the plurality of electronic messages in the archive location;
generating a process record for each of the plurality of electronic messages, each process record comprising a plurality of fields configured to display message details and processing details including: an identification of the electronic message, the archive location for the electronic message, one or more rules from the first set of rules applied to the electronic message during the archival filtering operation, one or more rules from the first set of rules used to determine that the message was selected for archiving, and a time for when the electronic message was attempted to be archived, wherein the plurality of fields enable a user to determine how the electronic message was indentified and selected for archival processing, wherein at least one process record is for an electronic message that was not archived, the at least one process record further including a text narrative explaining a reason why archiving of the electronic message that was not archived was not successful; and
displaying the process records for each of the plurality of electronic messages, including the at least one process record for the electronic message that was not archived.

2. The method of claim 1 , the process record further comprising one or more of:
a type of the at least one electronic message;
sender and recipient address information for the at least one electronic message;
a number of attachments to the electronic message;
a size of the at least one electronic message;
a source of the at least one electronic message;
an identification number for the at least one electronic message;
a message handling system from which the at least one electronic message was obtained;
a server from which the at least one electronic message was obtained; and,
a processing type for the at least one electronic message indicating whether the at least one electronic message was archived or not archived, and if not archived, indicating whether the at least one electronic message is a duplicate of another previously archived message, whether the at least one electronic message was filtered, or whether archiving the at least one electronic message failed.

3. The method of claim 1 , wherein the process record includes information for one or more of the following categories:
a number of electronic messages processed by the message archiving system;
a number of electronic messages that were archived;
a number of duplicate electronic messages;
a number of filtered messages; and
a number of messages for which archiving failed.

4. The method of claim 3 , wherein the process record includes total numbers of electronic messages for at least one category for a plurality of different time periods.

5. The method of claim 3 , wherein the process record includes total numbers of electronic messages for at least one category for a plurality of processing systems for electronic documents.

6. The method of claim 3 , wherein the process record includes a total number of electronic messages for at least one category for a plurality of sources of electronic documents.

7. The method of claim 3 , wherein the process record includes at least one link that when activated, causes a second display of archive tracking information stored for at least on electronic message associated with the link.

8. The method of claim 7 , wherein the at least one link is associated with a displayed number of messages for a particular category.

9. The method of claim 1 , wherein the process record is organized based on at least one of the following organization criteria:
a timeframe during which the archiving was performed for the at least one electronic message;
a source of the at least one electronic message processed by the message archiving system;
a server on which the at least one electronic message processed by the message archiving system is stored; and
an outcome of the archiving process for the at least one electronic message.

10. The method of claim 1 , wherein the message archive system also replaces at least a portion of the at least one electronic message with a short cut identifier, further comprising:
maintaining at least one archive tracking data set that stores information about archiving activities of the message archive system; and
storing in the at least one archive tracking data set at least some information identifying a first electronic message in response to a determination by the message archive system about whether to archive the first electronic message from among the plurality of electronic messages.

11. The method of claim 10 , wherein storing in the at least one archive tracking data set comprises storing information identifying the first electronic message in response to a determination by the message archive system to archive the first electronic message.

12. The method of claim 10 , wherein the step of storing in the at least one archive tracking data set comprises storing at least some information identifying at least one rule from the first set of rules applied by the message archive system in making the determination to archive the first electronic message.

13. The method of claim 10 , further comprising:
determining whether the at least one electronic message is a duplicate and wherein the step of storing in the at least one archive tracking data set comprises storing a processing type for the at least one electronic message indicating whether the at least one electronic message was archived or not, and if the at least one electronic message was not archived, including an indication representing whether the message is a duplicate of another previously archived message, the message was filtered out, or archiving of the message failed.

14. A computer program product, comprising a non-transitory computer usable medium having a computer readable program code embodied therein, the computer readable program code configured to be executed to implement a method for generating information for an electronic message as it is being archived, the method comprising:
receiving, by a message archiving system, a plurality of electronic messages;
determining, by the message archiving system, whether each of the plurality of electronic messages is designated for archiving or filtering out by applying one or more rules from a first set of rules stored in the message archiving system;
automatically applying, by the message archiving system, at least one rule from a second set of rules stored in the message archiving system to determine an archive location for each of the plurality of electronic messages;
attempting to archive each of the plurality of electronic messages in the archive location;
generating a process record for each of the plurality of electronic messages, each process record comprising a plurality of fields configured to display message details and processing details including: an identification of the ele

Assignees

• Kumar Anil
• Emc Corp

Inventors

• Kumar Anil

Classifications

• G06F16/951

  Indexing; Web crawling techniques · CPC title

• G06Q10/107 Primary

  Computer-aided management of electronic mailing [e-mailing] · CPC title

• G06F17/30864 Primary

  Physics · mapped topic