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Bulk Emailing from Alpha

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    Bulk Emailing from Alpha

    Looking for ideas of the best and most up to date methods of dealing with this tricky problem.
    In the past have used Netmailer with quite a degree of success but its not really the best solution given ISP's dislike of bulk mail.
    Thanks in advance
    Bob
    Bob Whitaker


    #2
    Re: Bulk Emailing from Alpha

    I use Mandrill - most ISP's don't like pop 3 anymore
    It is quite inexpensive - and it just plain works, never a failure.
    Cole Custom Programming - Terrell, Texas
    972 524 8714
    [email protected]

    ____________________
    "A young man who is not liberal has no heart, but an old man who is not conservative has no mind." GB Shaw

    Comment


      #3
      Re: Bulk Emailing from Alpha

      Originally posted by martinwcole View Post
      I use Mandrill - most ISP's don't like pop 3 anymore
      It is quite inexpensive - and it just plain works, never a failure.
      Thanks Martin
      Is it suitable for integrating into a desktop application. Where could I find more information ?
      Bob Whitaker

      Comment


        #4
        Re: Bulk Emailing from Alpha

        I am desktop-only, so yes.
        I have a function (originally written by Selwyn) that sends one email at a time (as a PDF) I use in a loop. It is also fast.
        I had to have my IT guy help me set it up, it was too complicated for me.
        Google "Mailchimp" and "Mandrill."
        If you go that route and get it working, I will give you my code.
        Cole Custom Programming - Terrell, Texas
        972 524 8714
        [email protected]

        ____________________
        "A young man who is not liberal has no heart, but an old man who is not conservative has no mind." GB Shaw

        Comment


          #5
          Re: Bulk Emailing from Alpha

          Thanks Martin I will get back to you.
          Bob
          Bob Whitaker

          Comment


            #6
            I have been using Gmail for many years in business a management system to email invoices and monthly statements. Like Martin use a function that I wrote for sending.
            Simply the relevant form attached as PDF. Recently Gmail has tightened up, won't recognize A5 as an authorized app.

            Any suggestions OR could Mailchimp or Mandrill possibly provide a solution?

            Comment


              #7
              Ray - mailchimp and mandrell definitely work
              bypasses Alpha's email and your provider
              Cole Custom Programming - Terrell, Texas
              972 524 8714
              [email protected]

              ____________________
              "A young man who is not liberal has no heart, but an old man who is not conservative has no mind." GB Shaw

              Comment


                #8
                @Ray.
                Gmail settings for, "use less secure apps" should work.
                See our Hybrid Option here;
                https://hybridapps.example-software.com/


                Apologies to anyone I haven't managed to upset yet.
                You are held in a queue and I will get to you soon.

                Comment


                  #9
                  Thanks for the suggestions Martin and Ted.

                  I had begun last night (Africa Time) looking at Mailchimp and it hadn't become clear to me how to use it. They have a free version with more than sufficient volume limits, so that's promising.

                  Ted has offered what may be the quickest solution right now. Under pressure, several of my clients have to get Dec month-end account statements delivered before close of 2020. That means three days time.

                  I will revert, thanks again.

                  Comment


                    #10
                    Great suggestion Ted, that did it. Thanks for doing the research.

                    Comment


                      #11
                      Well I can't celebrate anything!
                      Anyone following this, Google has a workable "Get Out"
                      See our Hybrid Option here;
                      https://hybridapps.example-software.com/


                      Apologies to anyone I haven't managed to upset yet.
                      You are held in a queue and I will get to you soon.

                      Comment


                        #12
                        yeah, agreed Google really does not care to send email from anywhere but their own datacenters and slowly or in small increments. I have an IP camera that used to send me an email when there was motion detected - since they really locked it down ( my best guess is about 6 months to a year ago) I now get "alerts" of suspicious attempts to sign in and even though I say it's ME the emails never go through. I have tried many times to solve it by allowing 3rd parties and unsecured apps but to no avail. I would suggest that you use your own domain and an email service such as sparkpost which so far has worked out great. Gmail is for gmail and anything else is considered spam or suspicious...sometimes the bigger companies just don't have the ability to adapt anymore with so many moving parts. All of this email fraud could go away if the providers would simply enforce a rule that says you need to be accountable for the unsolicited BS you send or get terminated so the rest of us can keep working. I am not a desktop user but the same thing applies to the web side.
                        NWCOPRO: Nuisance Wildlife Control Software My Application: http://www.nwcopro.com "Without forgetting, we would have no memory at all...now what was I saying?"

                        Comment


                          #13
                          Bob, we use Sparkpost, hosted in the EU (not sure which country) https://www.sparkpost.com/pricing/eu/ . There's an option to create a free test account, if you move the slider to left on the link.

                          Once you've created an API key you can use the Alpha functions email_smtp_open(), email_smtp_send() and email_smtp_close() to send an individual email. It's very easy to create batch emailing with a loop[, or you can create template emails on Sprakpost and use their bulk emailing with a csv with all your parameters.

                          Unfortunately, you can't use the Alpha builtin Sparkpost functions as they are hard-coded to the US service.

                          pm me if you want code examples or help setting thigs up

                          Comment


                            #14
                            I don't use Gmail for important stuff.
                            They had an outage on 14th Dec last which caused me a ton of grief as the Gmail recipient didn't get the messages apparently but others not on Gmal, did.
                            Usually you get an "undeliverable" reply, but as Gmail doesn't support a confirmed delivery to server, it's a bit "pants"
                            See our Hybrid Option here;
                            https://hybridapps.example-software.com/


                            Apologies to anyone I haven't managed to upset yet.
                            You are held in a queue and I will get to you soon.

                            Comment


                              #15
                              Actually, email is a very forgiving service. If a server isn't available to receive the message, the service will try again at a later time, I think for up to 2 days, before saying the message could not be delivered.
                              Do not confuse this with a server rejecting an email based on either a RBL, a non-existent user, a full mailbox, or simply something about the sender.

                              Obviously in the description described by Ted, whether or not you use email has no relationship to the emails being delivered to gmail users.
                              Gregg
                              https://paiza.io is a great site to test and share sql code

                              Comment

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