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Automating emails

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    Automating emails

    I'm on the latest official build. Currently my app handles emails based on user action that initiates it. They press a button and an email is sent, for example.

    I have a need to automate emails for another purpose. For example, how would I generate an automatic weekly email to my users? One idea I had was to use the task scheduler on my server to run an A5W page. The A5W page would just be code that generates my weekly email. Am I on the right track? Thoughts?

    Thanks
    Mike Brown - Contact Me
    Programmatic Technologies, LLC
    Programmatic-Technologies.com
    Independent Developer & Consultant​​

    #2
    Re: Automating emails

    Mike, I'm sure that it is quite possible to write code to handle this if that is what you are looking to do.

    A few years back I purchased a third party package called REA Automailer to handle this from REA Inc ... http://reainc.net/?page_id=33
    The price was very reasonable and well worth the time investment savings (for me anyway). Basically it's a pre-packaged kit designed for Alpha and runs a Cron/Curl script on the server.
    It will Queue, process and send emails configured to your requirements.

    When I look at the code behind it, it is still something I'm not personally inclined to write myself. Just a thought
    Alpha Anywhere v12.4.6.5.2 Build 8867-5691 IIS v10.0 on Windows Server 2019 Std in Hyper-V

    Comment


      #3
      Re: Automating emails

      Thanks Stephen. At this point I'm looking for a home grown version. I have email methods in place already (user initiated) so I'm good there. Just looking for ideas on how to do non-user initiated emailing.
      Mike Brown - Contact Me
      Programmatic Technologies, LLC
      Programmatic-Technologies.com
      Independent Developer & Consultant​​

      Comment


        #4
        Re: Automating emails

        Create a desktop based process....

        Run it from task scheduler.
        Al Buchholz
        Bookwood Systems, LTD
        Weekly QReportBuilder Webinars Thursday 1 pm CST

        Occam's Razor - KISS
        Normalize till it hurts - De-normalize till it works.
        Advice offered and questions asked in the spirit of learning how to fish is better than someone giving you a fish.
        When we triage a problem it is much easier to read sample systems than to read a mind.
        "Make it as simple as possible, but not simpler."
        Albert Einstein

        http://www.iadn.com/images/media/iadn_member.png

        Comment


          #5
          Re: Automating emails

          I built an a5w page to accept requests (be an API). This page does some checks then fires off the email / batch required or sends it on to SendGrid or Mailchimp etc. I then use Node-red (node based app). https://nodered.org running on the server on a separate port. Lots of other things this allows you to do as well. Best of all its open source and free
          Alex Collier

          "The spread of computers and the Internet will put jobs in two categories. People who tell computers what to do, and people who are told by computers what to do"

          AA Builds from 5221_5152 to Pre-releases >> Deploying to IIS in AWS

          Comment


            #6
            Re: Automating emails

            your thought works quite well, although I think it will leave the web browser open on your server (please let me know if you get it to close automatically).
            I also have a few desktop apps monitoring / doing other things that also send email either on a scheduled basis (morning reports) or on a dynamic basis
            (a process is stuck).
            Gregg
            https://paiza.io is a great site to test and share sql code

            Comment


              #7
              Re: Automating emails

              Hey Gregg, Not sure what you mean "your thought works quite well, although I think it will leave the web browser open on your server (please let me know if you get it to close automatically).", it does not open any browser nor does it require any browser to be open to operate. Node is a web server in its own right. It will send a request to the Alpha server and Alpha server will process it. You will need to open a web page to config the app other then that node.exe is more happy to sit in the background. You can however start stop and check node instances using Alpha anywhere server to manage if you like. Otherwise plently info on the web to have it start up on the machine if computer resets. When you do setup node ensure that you port used is not accessible in the public domain otherwise you are opening yourself up to the rest of the world. if this is desired ie You want to access your node-red settings remotely then you will need to secure it with username and password and firewall it with ip or domain level. Please note alpha anywhere is already using Node in conjunction with Alpha anywhere server. If you want to use only Alpha, you can always create a new instance of alpha or app if under IIS and have that purely run a service of triggers based on a schedule. Node-red setup you will have anything up and running within the hour.
              Alex Collier

              "The spread of computers and the Internet will put jobs in two categories. People who tell computers what to do, and people who are told by computers what to do"

              AA Builds from 5221_5152 to Pre-releases >> Deploying to IIS in AWS

              Comment


                #8
                Re: Automating emails

                Another quick point. Probably confused myself. Gregg you were probably referring to the desktop proposed solution my bad I personally use AWS Hosting and have separate dedicated Node js apps running on separate servers to Alpha within my secured environment.This dedicated separate server running node is not public facing except only to my test/config server and alpha IIS server/s. These Node Based apps are calling A5W pages all the time based on schedules. I even have A5W pages calling the Node services. Its all just API's
                Alex Collier

                "The spread of computers and the Internet will put jobs in two categories. People who tell computers what to do, and people who are told by computers what to do"

                AA Builds from 5221_5152 to Pre-releases >> Deploying to IIS in AWS

                Comment


                  #9
                  Re: Automating emails

                  Actually, node is a new solution to me. I have been using task scheduler to open an a5w page that has only xbasic code, but I couldn't get it to close by itself.
                  I now have something else to learn about.
                  Gregg
                  https://paiza.io is a great site to test and share sql code

                  Comment

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