Patent ID: 8583654

Claim:
A method comprising: at a computer having one or more processors and memory storing one or more programs for execution by the one or more processors so as to perform the method: obtaining a plurality of index entries in an index, a respective index entry corresponding to a respective term in one or more messages, and having a plurality of index components, a respective index component of the respective index entry identifying a message that is associated with the respective term; responsive to receiving a first message; updating the index by: associating the first message with a conversation having one or more other messages; identifying text in the first message as quoted text based on text that occurs in one or more of the other messages of the conversation; and updating, in the index, a plurality of first-message index components that each includes an identifier of the first message, including; one or more original text index components that correspond to terms that occur in original text of the first message; and one or more quoted text index components that correspond to terms in the first message that occur in the quoted text of the first message; wherein the one or more quoted text index components include information indicating that the corresponding terms are terms in the quoted text of the first message; and wherein, in the index, the one or more index components indicative of the terms that occur in original text of the first message are distinguished from the one or more index components indicative of terms in the first message that occur only in the quoted text of the first message by partitioning an address space for the first message, the address space having a respective address for each term that occurs in original text of the first message and each term that occurs in quoted text of the first message, wherein the respective address for a respective term in the quoted text of the first message is indicative of a mapped location of the respective term within the address space for the first message.