Background process for email

[Tbrondolo]

I have an email process that is triggered manually with a button click. I would like to have this process run on it's own once a week at night. Is there a way of running a background process like this through the WEB side? Or should I consider running a runtime version of Alpha on the WAS that does this task?

Thanks,
Tom

[madtowng]

Re: Background process for email

You can setup an .a5w page that will send the email.
I use task scheduler to open a webpage like that on schedule.
Other people like to use cron.

[Sparticuz]

Re: Background process for email

http://msgboard.alphasoftware.com/al...nders&p=624324

[Tbrondolo]

Re: Background process for email

Thanks,

I had searched for background process but didn't find that one.

Tom

[calyxte]

Re: Background process for email

Hi All,

I believe I have a solution to this.

I have a similar situation where I must send out emails to different groups at different times of the week.
I am sure there are more sophisticated approaches/solutions but to be honest I am not a programmer by trade and needed to approach this problem with a simple solution that I can on-goingly manage as I need to add more scheduled tasks. I hope this approach can help others too.

This is a web based solution, I don't know anything about the desktop version of Alpha.
I am currently using Alpha5V10.5

There are 3 component needed to this solution.
1) An Internet Browser
2) A program called batchrun. This can be found at http://www.downloadcrew.com/article/19531-batchrun or at http://www.outertech.com/en/create-batch-file
I use batchrun to create simple batch files because it is so easy to use and test my batch files.
3) Windows task manager, built into windows.

The concept here is to have windows task manager run a batch file that
1) Calls up the browser and loads your alpha5 web page that runs the code which sends the email out or does the other process.
2)Closes the browser window when finished. I usually use time and set the browser to be closed 10 minutes after loading the window.

It is assumed you already created and tested your alpha5 web page which will get loaded by the browser which runs the code that you wanted automated.
If you have not created that page yet, go and do so and test it. If needed there are ways to pass parameters to this web page as well if any kind of filtering needs to be done.
For example: You may have to choose a single group from many and only want to send that group this email at this time. Yet tomorrow you may need to send this email to an entirely different group. So by passing parameters through the web page to process the needed info( to alpha5) you can use just one web page and still take care of many different groups.

(I am assuming that you will learn how to use batchrun to do the following)
In the Batchrun program you will need to create 2 batch files.
The first file is to start the web browser and to load the alpha5 web page. call this run_email.brs or whatever is appropriate for your needs.
The second file runs about 10 minutes later to close the web browser. call this close_browser.brs or whatever is appropriate for your needs.

In the windows task manager I setup two tasks.
The one task (I call it run_email) is setup to run the batch file called run_email.brs on the days of the week and times that you need it to run.

The other task (I call it close_browser) is setup to run the batch file called close_browser.brs to run 10 minutes after (or what ever time is appropriate) after the first task is run.
If you do not close the browser window you may run into problems with to many windows opened etc.

So this is a pretty simple solution pulling together these components to schedule an alpha web based task.

You can automate a lot of alpha5 tasks this way and keep all the brs batch files in a BRS folder with each batch file appropriately named exactly what it is that it does.

Hope this is helpful to others. For all of you other folks that have found other ways please by all means share it with the rest of us.
I am clear one size here does not fit all.
All the best.
Calyxte

[Sparticuz]

Re: Background process for email

Hey calyxte,

I think you've got the right idea, but I think the 'batchrun' program may not entirely be necessary. If you are using a server that includes powershell, you can call up a webpage directly from the command line.

Steps:
1) Create an a5w page that does everything that you need it to do using xbasic.
2) Create a task in the task scheduler that calls powershell and the correct argument.

C:\Windows\System32\WindowsPowerShell\v1.0\powershell.exe -command "(new-object system.net.webclient).downloadstring('http://www.example.com/nightly.a5w')"

and that's it.

(see this thread for more information: http://msgboard.alphasoftware.com/al...mail-reminders )

[calyxte]

Re: Background process for email

Hello Sparticuz
Thanks for sharing how you would/could do it.
I do know about the powershell and to be honest after looking at it, I just didnt want to spend the time to learn how to do it.
The batchrun program for me was so simple having never seen it, it only took me 5 minutes if that, from installation to having 2 working batch commands ready to go. The powershell program seemed to me a whole lot more intimidating.

In the end I think it would be agreeable that programmers should use what they know and what makes sense to them.
I am sure if I already knew about the powershell program and how to use it, I may have then chosen to already use it to solve this problem.

One thing I don't know is if the powershell program would already be included on the windows WAS or can it be downloaded to work on the server being used.
I know the batchrun program is small and will run on all the windows servers if need be.

No matter how you all decide to do it, in this thread are now 2 examples of how it can be done.
Hope this helps you all.

Perhaps in version 12 some kind of scheduling can be included in the WAS to run certain xbasic programs when needed.
Heck for all I know it's already in there..

Have a great day!!!
Calyxte

[aburningflame]

Re: Background process for email

REA Automailer
http://www.alphadevnet.com/store.a5w...REA_AUTOMAILER

Allows for queuing of emails to be sent immediately or at a later date.
Automatic retries on failure, up to 10 retries
High Level functions for queuing and sending email using SMTP settings
Send Email method loads SMTP settings from database (SQL/MySQL)
Send Email method allows for manual SMTP settings (instead of loading from database, you can provide your SMTP settings)
Comes with Thorough Documentation


Hope it helps!