Patent ID: 7346501

Claim:
In a computer system having access to an email message having a message body containing one or more embedded messages that comprise part of an email thread corresponding to the email message, a method of parsing the embedded messages from the message body, the method comprising the following: an act of identifying one or more divisions within an email message body and that comprise part of an email thread, said act of identifying the one or more divisions including an act of locating message breaks within the email that are characteristic of separations between embedded email messages of a thread of email messages, and wherein said identification of the one or more divisions includes identifying a common prefix that is present in contiguous lines between the message breaks; an act of evaluating each of the one or more divisions to determine whether said one or more divisions contain an embedded email message; and an act of identifying the material between consecutive message breaks, corresponding to one of the divisions, as comprising an embedded message.