JP2000082027A - Terminal device, transmitting method, and information processing method - Google Patents

Abstract

PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To easily send and receive an electronic mail which contains both an image and characters together. SOLUTION: In a step S2, the header of an electronic mail is generated which consists of an address B entered into the top line of the electronic mail, and a sender A and a current date entered into its bottom line and in a step S3, it is decided whether or not a figure (image) is drawn in the electronic mail; when it is decided that the figure (image) is drawn in the electronic mail, an advance to a step S4 is made and image information data consisting of page information indicating the page of the electronic mail where the image is drawn, position information indicating the position of the image, and the name (given to image data) of the image are generated and added to the header of the electronic mail.

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to a terminal device, a transmission method, and an information processing method. The present invention relates to a terminal device, a transmission method, and an information processing method.

[0002]

[Prior art] At elementary, junior high and high schools and schools around the country,
The introduction of personal computers (personal computers) hastened,
Learning time using this computer is increasing year by year. Along with this, learning materials (software) for computers that make full use of multimedia have been developed, and various CAI systems integrating them have emerged.

The conventional CAI system has a drill format in which a textbook or a collection of problems is simply placed on a computer as it is, and there are few drills in which a learner can learn with interest. . Therefore, as a CAI system (learning material system for learning) that enables learners to enjoy and study while making use of the features and functions of a computer, for example, a system for learning English, which has a knowledge database and is capable of both-led dialogue, is there.

[0004] This English learning system is an environment providing type and communication type (both initiative type) system in which a learner can actively think through trial and error freely. ○ Simulation function ○ Search function ○ It has a user-friendly interface and can provide learning that is not restricted to a range and various learning methods by making full use of multimedia.

Furthermore, this English learning system is composed of five subsystems called "STUDY", "POST OFFICE", "LIBRARY", "PLAYROOM", and "LABORATORY" in order to create a fun school atmosphere. You.

[0006] The subsystem "STUDY" learns the grammatical basics of English based on textbooks, understands the contents, and conducts exercises for fixing knowledge, etc.
It is a basic study room.

Subsystem "POST OFFICE"
Simulates writing and sending a letter in English to help you develop practical English language expressions and letter formatting.

[0008] The subsystem "LIBRARY" is a support tool that has words used in the system (each subsystem) as a database and can be freely searched and referenced from other subsystems. The subsystem also provides pictures and sounds so that the learner can capture the image of words with the aid of visual and auditory sense without going through Japanese.

[0009] The subsystem "PLAYROOM" is for preventing learners from losing interest in studying English. While playing in an intelligent game, they can learn English without knowing it. You can learn.

[0010] The subsystem "LABORATORY"
Is used to conduct experiments in English conversation, combining images and sounds to create situations (virtual situations) as if they were actually talking to people, and to allow learners to experience the conversation in that situation Has become. In addition, this subsystem is capable of training English conversation by human-to-human dialogue instead of human-to-computer.

By the way, the subsystem "POST OF"
In FICE, it is possible to simulate writing and sending a letter in English using, for example, a UNIX mail system. However, the format and format of an e-mail and an actual English letter can be simulated. In order to cope with the difference between the presence or absence of an envelope, the address writing, and the like, a user interface shown in FIG. 8 is further provided, which can be operated as if writing an address on an envelope and writing text on a stationery.

The mail handler 31 is provided for the mail box 3
2. Comprehensively manages the envelope editor 33, the stationery editor 34, and the spell checker 35, displays received e-mails like envelopes and stationery, and sends and replies to the envelope editor 33 or stationery. The editor 34 is started. The mail box 32 manages mail received in the past, and creates and displays a mail list. Editor 33 for envelopes or editor 34 for stationery
Is an editor dedicated to filling in envelopes or filling in stationery, which can be operated as if to fill in actual envelopes or stationery. Envelope editor 33 and stationery editor 3
In No. 4, for an entry where the entry location is determined, such as an address, the entry location is displayed. The spell checker 35 is a stationery editor 34
Corrects spelling by pointing out misspellings in emails created by.

Subsystem "POST OFFICE"
First, in the mail handler 31, the mailbox 32, the editor 33 for the envelope, and the editor 3 for the stationery
4 is activated. When the mail has arrived, a list of mails is displayed in the mailbox 32. When the mail displayed by the selection command is selected, the editor 33 for the envelope and the editor 34 for the stationery
The selected mail is displayed.

When sending an e-mail, the envelope editor 3
3 or the stationery editor 34, the address and the sender's name of the envelope, or the head, body and postscript of the stationery are respectively created. When a send command for sending an e-mail is operated, the spell checker 35 checks the spelling of the document created by the stationery editor 34. As a result, if there is no spelling error, the data created by the envelope editor 33 Is output to the UNIX mail system.

In the UNIX mail system, an envelope address and a sender name are referred to, and an e-mail according to a predetermined format is created in which an address corresponding to the address and an address corresponding to the sender name are added to a header. Sent.

[0016]

As described above, the conventional
For example, according to an e-mail system such as the subsystem "POST OFFICE", a message (document) can be transmitted and received more quickly than an actual mail.

However, in such a system,
Messages that can be transmitted and received are generally limited to characters (text), and there is a problem that messages containing images cannot be handled.

Further, in a CAI system to which such an electronic mail system is applied as a subsystem,
Since messages containing images cannot be handled, e-mail cannot be used as if it were an actual mail, and there was a problem that made learners feel uncomfortable.

The present invention has been made in view of such a situation, and it is an object of the present invention to easily transmit and receive an electronic mail in which an image and a character are mixed.

[0020]

According to a first aspect of the present invention, there is provided a terminal device comprising: first detection means for detecting a transmission command instructing transmission of electronic information;
Second detecting means for detecting the additional information from the electronic information, converting means for converting the additional information into character data based on the detection result of the second detecting means, and converting the character data converted by the converting means into text data. It is characterized by comprising an adding means for adding to information, and a transmitting means for transmitting body information to which character data has been added by the adding means.

The adding means may insert an identifier between the text information and the character data converted by the converting means.

[0022] The adding means may insert the insertion position of the additional information in the text information into the electronic information.

According to a fourth aspect of the present invention, in the transmission method, a first detection step of detecting a transmission command instructing transmission of electronic information, and a second detection step of detecting additional information from the electronic information when the transmission command is detected. A converting step of converting the additional information into character data based on the detection result of the second detecting step, and an adding step of adding the character data converted by the processing of the converting step to the body information. And transmitting the text information to which the character data has been added by the processing of the adding step.

In the adding step, an identifier can be inserted between the text information and the character data converted by the conversion step.

In the adding step, an insertion position of the additional information in the body information may be inserted into the electronic information.

According to a seventh aspect of the present invention, there is provided a terminal device for detecting a reception command for receiving electronic information, and a second detection for detecting additional information from the electronic information when the reception command is detected. Means, and conversion means for converting additional information composed of character data into bit data based on the detection result of the second detection means.

A display control means for extracting an insertion position of the additional information in the text information from the electronic information and inserting and displaying the additional information converted into bit data in the text information based on the insertion position is provided. Further, it can be provided.

According to a ninth aspect of the present invention, in the information processing method, a first detection step of detecting a reception command for receiving electronic information and a second detection step of detecting additional information from the electronic information when the reception command is detected. It is characterized by including a detecting step and a converting step of converting additional information composed of character data into bit data based on a detection result in the second detecting step.

A display control step of extracting the insertion position of the additional information in the body information from the electronic information and inserting and displaying the additional information converted into bit data in the body information based on the insertion position is performed. Further, it can be provided.

In the terminal device according to the first aspect and the transmission method according to the fourth aspect, when a transmission command instructing transmission of electronic information is detected, additional information is detected from the electronic information, and the detection is performed. Based on the result, the additional information is converted into character data, the converted character data is added to the body information, and the body information is transmitted.

In the terminal device according to the seventh aspect and the information processing method according to the ninth aspect, when a reception command for receiving electronic information is detected, additional information is detected from the electronic information, and the detection result is obtained. , The additional information is converted into bit data.

[0032]

FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing a configuration of an embodiment of an electronic mail system according to the present invention. The N terminals 21 to 2N are connected to each other via a bus 1 to form a computer network, and include CRTs 31 to 3N, for example, a UNIX workstation (EW).
S) It is composed of 41 to 4N, keyboards 51 to 5N, and mice 61 to 6N.

Since all terminals 21 to 2N have the same configuration, only terminal 21 will be described below.

The EWS 41 is a CP that controls the entire apparatus.
U, a ROM storing system programs and the like, and a RAM (both not shown) storing data necessary for the operation of the apparatus.
For example, a message handler (MH) program as a control program for controlling transmission and reception of electronic mail and an X window system as a control program for controlling display of the CRT 31 are installed.

The CRT 31 is controlled by the X window system installed in the EWS 41, and displays a received e-mail, an e-mail to be transmitted, and the like in response to a signal output from the EWS 41. The keyboard 51 and the mouse 61 are connected to the EWS 41, and are operated when a command for creating an e-mail or transmitting / receiving an e-mail is issued.

Next, the operation of the terminal 21 as a transmitting terminal when an electronic mail is transmitted from the terminal 21 to the terminal 2N will be described with reference to the flowchart of FIG. First,
The keyboard 51 or the mouse 61 of the terminal 21 is operated,
For example, as shown in FIG. 2A, a body 12 consisting of only characters and an image 13 are placed on a stationery 11 displayed on a CRT 31.
Is drawn, and the keyboard 51 or the mouse 61 of the terminal 21 is operated to issue an e-mail transmission command. Then, in step S1, it is determined whether or not an address as an e-mail transmission destination is entered in the top line of the main body 12. If it is determined in step S1 that the address is not entered, the process ends assuming that the destination is unknown.

If it is determined in step S1 that an address has been entered, the process proceeds to step S2, where the text 12
, An e-mail header including the address B written in the top line, the sender A written in the bottom line of the text 12, and the current date is created, and the process proceeds to step S3. In step S3, it is determined whether or not a figure (image) is drawn on the stationery 11 (the created electronic mail). If it is determined in step S3 that a figure (image) is drawn on the stationery 11, the process proceeds to step S4,
An image composed of page information indicating the page of the stationery 11 on which the image 13 is drawn, position information indicating the position of the image 13 drawn on the page, and the name of the image 13 (name given to the data of the image 13) Information data is created,
It is added to the email header. Further, step S
In FIG. 4, an identifier is attached after the text 12 as text data, and after the identifier, the bit data of the image 13 is represented by a UNIX such as “uencode”.
The image data converted into the character code by the encoding program of the operation system or the like is added (added), and the process proceeds to step S5.

The name of the image 13 is automatically determined by the CPU of the EWS 41.

If it is determined in step S3 that no drawing (image) is drawn on the stationery 11, step S4 is skipped and the process proceeds to step S5.

In step S5, as shown in FIG. 4, the address, sender, current date, image information data (image 13
Is shown in the header consisting of page information indicating the page of the stationery 11 on which is drawn, position information indicating the position of the image 13 drawn on the page, and the name of the image 13 (name added to the data of the image 13). , The text (the text to which the image data is added in step S4) is added, and the
Proceeding to 6, the electronic mail is transmitted (transmitted).

Next, the operation of the terminal 2N as a receiving terminal will be described with reference to the flowchart of FIG. Terminal 2
In N, when the keyboard 5N or the mouse 6N is operated and an e-mail capture command is issued,
In step S11, the e-mail is read into the EWS4N, and the process proceeds to step S12. In step S12, the sender of the e-mail header is referred to and the CRT
The sender A is displayed on the 3N sender display unit 17 (FIG. 2B), and the process proceeds to step S13. In step S13, it is determined whether or not there is image information data in the header of the e-mail. If it is determined that there is no image information data in the header of the e-mail, the process skips steps S14 to S16 and proceeds to step S17.

If it is determined in step S13 that there is image information data in the header of the e-mail, the process proceeds to step S14, where the image data added to the text is decoded by a UNIX operating system decoding program such as "uudecode". It is expanded into bit data by the above. In step S15, the page information of the image information data is referred to, and it is determined whether the page to be displayed on the CRT 3N is a page on which an image is drawn. If it is determined in step S15 that the page to be displayed on the CRT 3N is not a page on which an image is drawn, step S16 is skipped and the process proceeds to step S17.

If it is determined in step S15 that the page to be displayed on the CRT 3N is a page on which an image is drawn, the process proceeds to step S16, where the position information of the image information data and the name of the image are referenced, and The image with the name is displayed at the position indicated by the position information. In step S17, the text is displayed on the CRT 3N, and the process ends.

By the above processing, the e-mail shown in FIG. 2A created on the terminal 21 is sent to the CRT of the terminal 2N.
In 3N, as shown in FIG. 2B, a text 15 and an image 16 composed of only characters are displayed on the stationery 14, and the sender A is displayed on the sender display unit 17.

Further, the terminals 21 to 2N can write a reply to the received e-mail while displaying the received e-mail. Hereinafter, the terminal 21 will be described.

That is, as shown in FIG.
In the left half of T31, the received e-mail is
And the sender of the e-mail is displayed on the sender display section 26. Further, on the right half of the CRT 31, a stationery 30 for writing a message for replying (transmitting) is displayed, and an envelope 21 for writing an address and a sender is displayed.

Thus, the user of the terminal 21 can operate the keyboard 51 or the mouse 61 and write a reply message (text 23 and image 24) on the stationery 30 while viewing the received e-mail.

When the received mail covers a plurality of pages, the stationery 2 on which the received mail is displayed is displayed.
The page is turned by clicking the previous page mark 27 or the next page mark 28 of 9 with the mouse 61,
You can read multiple pages of mail. Similarly, the previous page mark 2 of the stationery 30 on which a reply message is written
By clicking the second or next page mark 25 with the mouse 61, the page is turned and a mail covering a plurality of pages can be created. In addition, keyboard 51
Alternatively, by operating the mouse 61 and issuing an image paste command, the image 24 can be arranged at an arbitrary position on an arbitrary page of the stationery 30.

The e-mail system of the present invention has been described above. By applying the present invention to, for example, the above-mentioned CAI system, a message including an image can be handled. It can be used with the same feeling as postal mail, and the learner can more effectively learn how to write an actual letter.

In this embodiment, only the data format (FIG. 4) in the case where there is only one image in the e-mail message has been described. However, when there are a plurality of images, as shown in FIG. All of the image information data of the plurality of images are added to the header, and all of the image data is added after the body, so that e-mail can be transmitted and received as in the case where there is only one image. Is available. In the data format shown in FIG. 4 or FIG. 7, instead of adding the image data after the text, the corresponding image data can be added immediately after the image information data.

Further, by controlling the page information and the position information of the image information data so that a plurality of images are displayed at the same position on the same page on the receiving terminal side on the transmitting terminal side, An electronic mail including a simulated moving image in which the image (still image) changes over time can be transmitted.

[0052]

As described above, according to the terminal device according to the first aspect and the transmission method according to the fourth aspect, when a transmission command instructing transmission of electronic information is detected, the transmission of the electronic information is performed. The additional information is detected, the additional information is converted into character data based on the detection result, the converted character data is added to the body information, and the body information is transmitted. According to the terminal device described in claim 7 and the information processing method described in claim 9, when a reception command for receiving electronic information is detected, additional information is detected from the electronic information, and based on the detection result, Since the additional information is converted into bit data, an electronic mail in which images and characters are mixed can be easily transmitted and received.

[Brief description of the drawings]

FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing a configuration of an embodiment of an electronic mail system of the present invention.

FIG. 2 is a diagram illustrating an e-mail transmitted or received in the embodiment of FIG.

FIG. 3 is a flowchart illustrating an operation of a terminal 21 as the transmitting terminal in FIG. 1;

FIG. 4 is a diagram showing a data format of an electronic mail transmitted or received in the embodiment of FIG. 1;

FIG. 5 is a flowchart illustrating an operation of a terminal 2N as the receiving terminal in FIG. 1;

6 is a CRT 31 of the terminal 21 as the transmitting / receiving terminal of FIG.
FIG. 6 is a diagram showing an e-mail displayed in FIG.

FIG. 7 is a diagram showing a data format of an electronic mail transmitted or received in the embodiment of FIG. 1;

FIG. 8 is a diagram showing a configuration of an example of a user interface of a conventional electronic mail system.

[Explanation of symbols]

1 bus, 21 ~ 2N terminals, 31 ~ 3N CR
T, 41 to 4N workstations (EWS),
51 to 5N keyboard, 61 to 6N mouse, 1
1 stationery, 12 body, 13 images, 14 stationery, 15 body, 16 images, 17 sender display section, 21 envelope, 22 previous page mark, 23
Body, 24 images, 25 Next page mark, 26
Sender display part, 27 Previous page mark, 28 Next page mark, 29, 30 Stationery

Continued on the front page (72) Inventor Keiko Sakuragi 6-7-35 Kita-Shinagawa, Shinagawa-ku, Tokyo Inside Sony Corporation (72) Inventor Fumitaka Kawate 6-35-35 Kita-Shinagawa, Shinagawa-ku, Tokyo Sony Stock In company

Claims (10)

[Claims] 1. A terminal device for transmitting electronic information having text information composed of character data and additional information composed of bit data, comprising: a first terminal for detecting a transmission command instructing transmission of the electronic information. Detecting means; second detecting means for detecting the additional information from the electronic information when the transmission command is detected; and converting the additional information into character data based on a detection result of the second detecting means. A conversion unit for converting, the addition unit for adding the character data converted by the conversion unit to the text information, and a transmission unit for transmitting the text information with the character data added by the addition unit A terminal device characterized by the above-mentioned. 2. The terminal device according to claim 1, wherein the adding unit inserts an identifier between the text information and the character data converted by the converting unit. 3. The terminal device according to claim 1, wherein the adding unit inserts an insertion position in the text information of the additional information into the electronic information. 4. A transmission method of a terminal device for transmitting electronic information having text information composed of character data and additional information composed of bit data, wherein a transmission command instructing transmission of the electronic information is detected. A first detection step, a second detection step of detecting the additional information from the electronic information when the transmission command is detected, and the additional information based on a detection result in the second detection step. A conversion step of converting the text data into text data; an addition step of adding the text data converted by the processing of the conversion step to the text information; and the text information to which the text data is added by the processing of the addition step. And a transmitting step of transmitting the data. 5. The method according to claim 4, wherein in the adding step, an identifier is inserted between the text information and the character data converted by the processing of the converting step.
Transmission method described in. 6. The transmission method according to claim 4, wherein in the adding step, an insertion position of the additional information in the body information is inserted into the electronic information. 7. A terminal device for receiving electronic information having text information and additional information composed of character data, wherein: a first detecting means for detecting a reception command for receiving the electronic information; A second detection unit for detecting the additional information from the electronic information when the additional information is detected, based on a detection result of the second detection unit, converting the additional information composed of the character data into the bit data. A terminal device, comprising: conversion means for converting. 8. An insertion position of the additional information in the body information is extracted from the electronic information, and the additional information converted into the bit data is inserted into the body information based on the insertion position and displayed. The terminal device according to claim 7, further comprising a display control unit that performs control to perform the control. 9. An information processing method for a terminal device that receives electronic information having text information and additional information composed of character data, a first detection step of detecting a reception command for receiving the electronic information, A second detection step of detecting the additional information from the electronic information when the reception command is detected; and the additional information composed of the character data based on a detection result in the second detection step. And a converting step of converting the data into the bit data. 10. An insertion position of the additional information in the text information is extracted from the electronic information, and the additional information converted into the bit data is inserted into the text information based on the insertion position and displayed. The information processing method according to claim 9, further comprising a display control step of performing control to perform the control.