Patent ID: 7305441

Claim:
A method of handling time-sensitive messages, comprising steps of: marking a message, by a creator thereof, as time-sensitive; sending the marked message from a computing device of the creator to a computing device of a recipient for whom the message was created, such that after the marked message is received at the computing device of the recipient, it will be processed by: determining that the marked message is marked as being time-sensitive and that a time period of the time-sensitivity has been reached but not exceeded; determining whether a hierarchy of recipient notification techniques has been defined for various intervals of the time-sensitivity, and if so, performing steps of: determining an applicable one of the various intervals that corresponds to a current time; selecting one of the recipient notification techniques which corresponds to the determined one of the various intervals; and notifying the recipient of the marked message using the selected recipient notification technique; and automatically rendering the marked message to the recipient using an application adapted for processing the message within a time period of the time-sensitivity, further comprising steps of: automatically starting execution of the application, at the computing device of the recipient, if the execution of the application is not currently started; automatically bringing a window rendered by the application to a foreground of a display of the computing device and making the window active; automatically rendering the marked message in the active window; and requiring the recipient to take action with the marked message before performing any other tasks with the application by preventing the recipient from performing other actions with the application until the recipient provides a response to the marked message; and automatically receiving a reply from the recipient, sent from the computing device of the recipient to the computing device of the creator following the recipient's response thereto.