Voicemail Outbox

Abstract

The subject matter of this specification can be embodied in, among other things, a method that includes receiving a voicemail message from a first telephone user for a second telephone user; providing, for display in a messaging inbox of the second telephone user, the voicemail message or information used to retrieve the voicemail message; and providing the voicemail message or information used to retrieve the voicemail message in a messaging outbox of the first telephone user, wherein the messaging outbox is formatted to display to the first telephone user a plurality of messages sent by the first telephone user.

1 . A computer-implemented method for processing voice messages, the method comprising:
 receiving, by an electronic mail application in an account of a first telephone user, a voicemail message that the first telephone user has recorded for a second telephone user;   generating, by the electronic mail application, a sent messages folder that includes (i) information about a plurality of electronic mail messages that have been sent from the account of the first telephone user, and (ii) information about the voicemail message that the first telephone user has recorded for the second telephone user;   displaying, with the electronic mail application, a representation of the sent messages folder that shows respective representations of the voicemail message and particular ones of the plurality of sent electronic mail messages;   sending the voicemail message by the electronic mail application and for receipt by a messaging account of the second telephone user;   receiving a confirmation that the voicemail message has been accessed; and   displaying, with the electronic mail application in the account of the first telephone user and in response to receiving the confirmation, an indication that the voicemail message for the second telephone user has been accessed.   
     
     
         2 . The method of  claim 1 , wherein sending the voicemail message by the electronic mail application comprises receiving a selection of a user interface control associated with the sent messages folder, and providing, for receipt by the messaging account of the second telephone user, an e-mail message that contains data automatically incorporated from the voicemail message. 
     
     
         3 . The method of  claim 2 , wherein the data automatically incorporated from the voicemail message includes a computer-generated transcript of the voicemail message in a body of the e-mail message. 
     
     
         4 . The method of  claim 2 , wherein the data automatically incorporated from the voicemail message includes an audio file of the voicemail message automatically attached to the e-mail message. 
     
     
         5 . The method of  claim 1 , further comprising saving an audio file of the voicemail message at a central server,
 wherein information used to access the voicemail message from an account of the second telephone user and information used to access the voicemail message from the sent messages folder for the account of the first telephone user both point to the audio file.   
     
     
         6 . The method of  claim 5 , further comprising saving the audio file until both the first telephone user and the second telephone user have indicated an intent to delete the audio file. 
     
     
         7 . The method of  claim 1 , further comprising generating data for displaying a plurality of sent messages for the first telephone user in a plurality of messaging modalities, in a single list of messages in the sent messages folder, wherein the messaging modalities include two or more modalities selected from a group consisting of e-mail, voice mail, text messages, and micro-blog posts. 
     
     
         8 . The method of  claim 1 , further comprising identifying an e-mail address for the second telephone user by using a telephone number of the second telephone user, and automatically addressing a follow-up e-mail message that is to be sent from the account of the first telephone user to the messaging account of the second telephone user with the identified e-mail address. 
     
     
         9 . The method of  claim 8 , further comprising receiving by the electronic mail application a selection of a representation of an e-mail that has been sent to the messaging account of the second telephone user, and automatically dialing a telephone number for the second telephone user from only a selection of a dialing control, displayed concurrently with the selected representation of the e-mail message, by the first telephone user. 
     
     
         10 . The method of  claim 1 , further comprising displaying a portion of the voicemail message. 
     
     
         11 . The method of  claim 1 , further comprising providing respective messaging inboxes and sent messages folders for every user in a private branch exchange network. 
     
     
         12 . A voice messaging system, comprising:
 a personal information manager configured to store e-mail and telephone number information for a plurality of contacts;   a voicemail manager to receive and store voicemails for review of the voicemails, after they have been sent, by voicemail senders;   a voicemail forwarder to re-send previously sent voicemails stored by the voicemail manager to respective recipients of the previously sent voicemails; and   a messaging manager to identify information about the voicemails stored by the voicemail manager, to display on an electronic display of a device of a sender of voicemails and electronic mails, a combined sent messages folder that shows a list of sent voicemails and sent electronic mail messages, and to display indications that the sent voicemails have been accessed by voicemail recipients upon a determination that the sent voicemails have been accessed.   
     
     
         13 . The system of  claim 12 , wherein the messaging manager is configured to receive a user selection to forward a sent voicemail, to automatically associate the sent voicemail with an e-mail address of a voicemail recipient using the personal information manager, and to send the voicemail message in an e-mail message. 
     
     
         14 . The system of  claim 12 , further comprising a voice-to-text translation module programmed to generate a textual representation of a voicemail message and provide the textual representation to the messaging manager for display in a displayable message associated with the voicemail message. 
     
     
         15 . The system of  claim 12 , wherein the messaging manager is programmed to generate display data for a plurality of sent messages in a plurality of messaging modalities, in a single list of messages in the combined sent messages folder, wherein the messaging modalities include two or more modalities selected from a group consisting of e-mail, voice mail, text messages, and micro-blog posts. 
     
     
         16 . The system of  claim 12 , wherein the voicemail manager is programmed to maintain a single copy of a voicemail audio file for access by a voicemail sender and a voicemail recipient of a corresponding voicemail message, and to delete the voicemail audio file only after both the voicemail sender and the voicemail recipient have chosen to delete the voicemail message. 
     
     
         17 . The system of  claim 12 , wherein the messaging manager allows a voicemail sender to search the voicemail messages stored by the messaging manager. 
     
     
         18 . The system of  claim 12 , wherein the personal information manager is programmed to send an invitation to the voicemail sender to connect the messaging manager to the personal information manager and the voicemail manager. 
     
     
         19 - 21 . (canceled) 
     
     
         22 . One or more non-transitory computer-readable media having instructions stored thereon that, when executed by one or more processors, cause performance of operations comprising:
 generating, by an electronic mail application, a sent messages folder that includes information about a plurality of electronic mail messages that have been sent from an account of a first telephone user;   displaying, with the electronic mail application, a representation of the sent messages folder that shows respective representations of the plurality of sent electronic mail messages;   displaying, with the electronic mail application in the sent messages folder of the first telephone user, a representation of a voicemail message sent by the first telephone user to a second telephone user that was recorded by the first telephone user for the second telephone user;   receiving a confirmation that the voicemail message sent by the first telephone user to the second telephone user has been accessed; and   displaying, with the electronic mail application in the account of the first telephone user and in response to receiving the confirmation, an indication that the voicemail message has been accessed.   
     
     
         23 . A computer-implemented method for processing voice messages, the method comprising:
 receiving, by an electronic mail application in an account of a first telephone user, a voicemail message from the first telephone user for a second telephone user who the first telephone user has called;   providing, by the electronic mail application, a sent messages folder that holds information about a plurality of electronic mail messages that have been sent from the account of the first telephone user;   providing information about the voicemail message in the sent messages folder of the first telephone user;   displaying, with the electronic mail application, a representation of the sent messages folder that shows respective representations of the voicemail message and the plurality of sent electronic mail messages;   sending the voicemail message by the electronic mail application and for receipt by a messaging account of the second telephone user;   receiving a confirmation that the voicemail message has been accessed; and   displaying, with the electronic mail application in the account of the first telephone user and in response to receiving the confirmation, an indication that the voicemail message for the second telephone user has been accessed,   wherein displaying the indication that the voicemail message for the second telephone user has been accessed comprises changing the representation of the voicemail message from an emphasized status to a deemphasized status.   
     
     
         24 . The computer-implemented method of  claim 1 , wherein:
 the voicemail message comprises at least one of audio of the voicemail message, a textual transcription of the voicemail message, and information for retrieving audio of the voicemail message, and   sending the voicemail message comprises sending at least one of the audio of the voicemail message, the textual transcription of the voicemail message, and the information for retrieving the audio of the voicemail message.   
     
     
         25 . The computer-implemented method of  claim 1 , wherein the confirmation that the voicemail message has been accessed is received in response to the voicemail message being accessed from a voicemail account of the second telephone user outside of an e-mail application that provides access to e-mails in the messaging account of the second telephone user. 
     
     
         26 . The computer-implemented method of  claim 1 , further comprising delaying the sending of the voicemail message for receipt by the messaging account of the second telephone user until a pre-defined period of time is determined to have passed, from when the voicemail message was originally provided to an account of the second telephone user, in which no indication is received that the originally provided voicemail message has been accessed by the second telephone user. 
     
     
         27 . The computer-implemented method of  claim 1 , wherein displaying the indication that the voicemail message for the second telephone user has been accessed comprises displaying the indication in the sent messages folder of the first telephone user. 
     
     
         28 . The computer-implemented method of  claim 1 , wherein the confirmation that the voicemail message has been accessed is received in response to the voicemail message being accessed from the messaging account of the second telephone user.