Email application using dreamweaver MX and ASP...Is this possible?

[aman16]

Hello

I would like to create a web application that would allow users to create and send emails a bit like Outlook but a bespoke version.

There are a few things that this email application should do such as:

1) Allow you to enter name, address, email address and job category for each contact.

2) filter email list based on that above criteria eg. list all the contacts that have a job category of Manager. One contact may have one or more job category so the list would need to remove any duplicates.

3) The email should get sent to everyone on the filtered list so it would need to be able to send to multiple email addresses

4) The user should be able to send attachments.

I hope this makes sense. It would be great if I could do all this in Dreamweaver.

Any help would be much appreciated on how I could develop such a application and also if there any tutorials that I could follow which allow me to do something similar.

Thanks

[Newsgroup_User]

1. Why remake the wheel? There are plenty of web-based mail clients. Why
not try one of those and see if you like it? You should then be able to
customize it a bit for your purposes, like adding in custom address book
listing or tying a database to your address book.

2. You can do it all in DW (except for the database), but you're going to
have to hand-code most of it. Are you OK with that?

3. You will first need to setup and design a database. If you've not done
this before, you will need to spec out exactly what each email will have in
it, and all the different methods of delivering it (ie, individual, group,
mailing list, group/and.mailing list, but not duplicates, etc.). You can
then post this or just hire a database dude to come in and help you out.

This is pre-coffee, so I might drop by and tell you I was full of it. ;o)

HTH,

Jon
"aman16" <webforumsuser@macromedia.com> wrote in message
news:e63sve$njs$1@forums.macromedia.com...
> Hello
>
> I would like to create a web application that would allow users to create
> and
> send emails a bit like Outlook but a bespoke version.
>
> There are a few things that this email application should do such as:
>
> 1) Allow you to enter name, address, email address and job category for
> each
> contact.
>
> 2) filter email list based on that above criteria eg. list all the
> contacts
> that have a job category of Manager. One contact may have one or more job
> category so the list would need to remove any duplicates.
>
> 3) The email should get sent to everyone on the filtered list so it would
> need
> to be able to send to multiple email addresses
>
> 4) The user should be able to send attachments.
>
> I hope this makes sense. It would be great if I could do all this in
> Dreamweaver.
>
> Any help would be much appreciated on how I could develop such a
> application
> and also if there any tutorials that I could follow which allow me to do
> something similar.
>
> Thanks
>

[aman16]

Thank you for your reply. Its much appreciated.

I have made website in Dreamweaver before using ASP and databases. I dont usually hande code though and just use the built in tools that Dreamweaver MX has as standard. I just need a step in the right direction really thats why I would appreciate any tutorials that you may no of which do something similar or maybe do a part of what I am trying to do. I could get as far as making a database with contacts and all there details and then making an ASP page to display that information and maybe filter it in some way but I dont know how to then extract the email address from that filtered info and then make a form to type the message and attach any attachments and then email the form to all the email addresses from the filtered list.

You mentioned that there are web based email applications out there that I can customize to do a similar thing. Could you let me know of any names of these programs so I can then read up about them? I would like to customize it quite a bit though to try and make them as bespoke as possible.

[Newsgroup_User]

Hopefully this will set you in the right direction.


1. Create a user table. You will need to do this mentally before actually
creating the database. What will the table contain? After you have this
spec'd out, you can create it. You should create your entire database
before creating it in whatever software you'r eusing (mySQL, Access, SQL)

2. Design your jobs table. This will contain all info you need to store
about the job.

3. Create a form that uses lists to build your "email". This should be a
form that says, select Name, Adress or job category. This will feed into
your SQL statement(or DW recordset), which will bring up all your contacts
where your Name field in your user table (or Address, or Job Category or all
three). You can tweak this until you get it just how you like it.

4. Lastly you should have a very simple form (you don't mention what server
language you're using) that will build an email based upon the contacts you
have selected and email them.

You will need to get the database up and structure setup before I could help
you more with it. Do you feel comfortable doing that?

"aman16" <webforumsuser@macromedia.com> wrote in message
news:e64tks$6ic$1@forums.macromedia.com...
> Thank you for your reply. Its much appreciated.
>
> I have made website in Dreamweaver before using ASP and databases. I dont
> usually hande code though and just use the built in tools that Dreamweaver
> MX
> has as standard. I just need a step in the right direction really thats
> why I
> would appreciate any tutorials that you may no of which do something
> similar or
> maybe do a part of what I am trying to do. I could get as far as making a
> database with contacts and all there details and then making an ASP page
> to
> display that information and maybe filter it in some way but I dont know
> how to
> then extract the email address from that filtered info and then make a
> form to
> type the message and attach any attachments and then email the form to all
> the
> email addresses from the filtered list.
>
> You mentioned that there are web based email applications out there that I
> can
> customize to do a similar thing. Could you let me know of any names of
> these
> programs so I can then read up about them? I would like to customize it
> quite a
> bit though to try and make them as bespoke as possible.
>