Grouping email messages into conversations

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-9824314-B2
Application number	US-201113007547-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Jan 14, 2011
Priority date	Jan 14, 2011
Publication date	Nov 21, 2017
Grant date	Nov 21, 2017

Abstract

Exemplary methods, apparatuses, and systems determine that an indication that a received message was sent in response to another message is present in the received message, parse a stored message, in response to the indication being present, for at least a partial match between a subject of the received message and contents of a subject of the stored message, and for at least a partial match between sender and recipient participants of the received message and sender and recipient participants of the stored message, and display the received message as grouped with the stored message. A further exemplary feature includes parsing text of the received message for text that is redundant of text of the stored message, determining that a minimum threshold of consecutive matching characters has been reached, and displaying the received message with the consecutive matching characters at least partially hidden from view.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1. A computer-implemented method of managing email message grouping comprising:
determining, by the computer, whether a prefix or a suffix is present in the subject of a received message;
displaying, by the computer, the received message as the start of a new email message group in response to determining that a prefix or a suffix is not present in the subject of the received message;
determining, by the computer, whether header information is included in the received message that identifies a message to which the received message is a response;
determining, by the computer, whether the identified message is a stored message, in response to determining that the received message identifies the message to which the received message is a response;
displaying, by the computer, the received message as grouped with the identified message, in response to determining that a prefix or a suffix is present in the subject of the received message and in response to determining header information is included in the received message that identifies the message to which the received message is a response, and in response to determining that the identified message is a stored message;
parsing, by the computer, a stored message for at least a partial match between a subject of the received message and a subject of the stored message, and for at least a partial match between sender and recipient participants of the received message and sender and recipient participants of the stored message; and
displaying, by the computer, the received message as grouped with the stored message in response to determining that:
(i) a prefix or a suffix is present in the subject of the received message, and
(ii) header information is not included in the received message that identifies the message to which the received message is a response, and
(iii) there is at least a partial match between the subject of the received message and the subject of the stored message, and
(iv) there is at least a partial match between sender and recipient participants of the received message and sender and recipient participants of the stored message.

2. The computer-implemented method of claim 1 , wherein the displaying the received message as grouped with the stored message includes displaying a preview pane listing a plurality of messages, the plurality of messages including the grouped messages displayed as a single preview pane item with an indicator that the single preview pane item represents a group of multiple messages, the method further comprising:
expanding the single preview pane item, in response to a received input, to further display a selectable preview pane item for each of the grouped messages.

3. The computer-implemented method of claim 2 , further comprising:
receiving an input selecting one of multiple messages in the expanded preview pane item; and
scrolling a message pane display of the multiple messages to bring a corresponding message view of the selected one of the multiple messages to a predetermined position.

4. The computer-implemented method of claim 1 , further comprising:
displaying a preview pane listing a plurality of messages, wherein at least one of the plurality of messages is displayed as a preview pane item including a stack of overlaid thumbnail images representing a plurality of files attached to the at least one message, wherein the topmost of the stack of images shows the content of one of the plurality of files on top of the stack and the remaining of the overlaid thumbnail images are at least partially obscured; and
expanding the stacked images, in response to a received input, into a plurality of individual thumbnail images in the preview pane item, each thumbnail image showing the content of a different one of the plurality of files.

5. The computer-implemented method of claim 1 , wherein the displaying the received message as grouped with the stored message includes displaying the received message and the stored message in a single window and labeling each of the grouped messages with an indication of the chronological order of messages in the conversation.

6. The computer-implemented method of claim 1 wherein the header information includes a reference header or an in-reply-to header.

7. The computer-implemented method of claim 6 , further comprising:
identifying a second stored message that was processed prior to the received message that includes header information referencing the received message; and
displaying the received message as grouped with the second stored message.

8. An apparatus comprising:
a processing device, wherein the processing device executes instructions that cause the processing device to:
determine that whether a prefix or a suffix is present in the subject of a received message;
display the received message as the start of a new email message group in response to determining that a prefix or a suffix is not present in the subject of the received message;
determine whether header information is included in the received message that identifies a message to which the received message is a response;
determine whether the identified message is a stored message, in response to determining that the received message identifies the message to which the received message is a response;
display the received message as grouped with the identified message, in response to determining that a prefix or a suffix is present in the subject of the received message and in response to determining that header information is included in the received message that identifies the message to which the received message is a response, and in response to determining that the identified message is a stored message;
parse, a stored message for at least a partial match between a subject of the received message and a subject of the stored message, and for at least a partial match between sender and recipient participants of the received message and sender and recipient participants of the stored message, and
display the received message as grouped with the stored message in response to determining that:
(i) a prefix or a suffix is present in the subject of the received message, and
(ii) header information is not included in the received message that identifies the message to which the received message is a response, and
(iii) there is at least a partial match between the subject of the received message and the subject of the stored message, and
(iv) there is at least a partial match between sender and recipient participants of the received message and sender and recipient participants of the stored message.

9. The apparatus of claim 8 , wherein the displaying the received message as grouped with the stored message includes displaying a preview pane listing a plurality of messages, the plurality of messages including the grouped messages displayed as a single preview pane item with an indicator that the single preview pane item represents a group of multiple messages, and wherein the processing device executes instructions that further cause the processing device to:
expand the single preview pane item, in response to a received input, to further display a selectable preview pane item for each of the grouped messages.

10. The apparatus of claim 8 , wherein the processing device executes instructions that further cause the processing device to:
display a preview pane listing a plurality of messages, wherein at least one of the plurality of messages is displayed as a preview pane item including a thumbnail of stacked images representing a plurality of files attached to the at least one message, wherein the stacked images show the content of one of the plurality of files on top o

Assignees

• Thorsen Alicia
• Hsu Karl
• Bovet Simon
• Jhaveri Neil
• Woods Nick
• Langoulant Brendan
• Deutsch Jonathan Michael
• Guzman Angela
• Lemay Stephen O
• Coffman Patrick L
• Decker Stephen
• Halchin Judy
• Apple Inc

Inventors

• Thorsen Alicia
• Hsu Karl
• Bovet Simon
• Jhaveri Neil
• Woods Nick
• Langoulant Brendan
• Deutsch Jonathan Michael
• Guzman Angela
• Lemay Stephen O
• Coffman Patrick L
• Decker Stephen
• Halchin Judy

Classifications

• G06F17/30601

  Physics · mapped topic

• G06Q10/00 Primary

  Administration; Management · CPC title

• H04L51/216

  Handling conversation history, e.g. grouping of messages in sessions or threads · CPC title

• G06F16/287

  Visualization; Browsing · CPC title