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Editing Netmailer Job Parameters

IN THIS PAGE

From List
Embedded
Expression
Load Message Body From File
Insert a Mail Merge Field
Insert a Mail Merge Expression
Insert Command
Copy From HTML Text
Put all email addresses in the To field
Put the first address in the To field, and all others in the CC field
Put the first address in the To field, and all others in the BCC field
Supply an email address for the To field, and put all others in the BCC field
Reply-To Address
Custom Headers
Preview
Save
Run
Including Images in HTML Email
Inserting Commands in Email

Description

You use the Netmailer Editor to compose your email message and finish specifying the parameters for your mailing.

Netmailer is sold as an add-in to Alpha Anywhere. Contact sales at Alpha Software for more information.

To configure Netmailer:

On the Tables tab, you specify:
- the Email List - who receives emails
- the Exclude List - who does not receive emails
- whether to update a field in the source table
- whether to create a log file.
In the Filter Expression field specify the records to include in your mailing list. Optionally, click the 'funnel' icon to use the Filter Builder to help define the filter expression.
Optionally, in the Order Expression field specify the sequence of selected records. Optionally, click the 'up down arrow' icon to use the Order Builder to help define the order expression. The default order is ascending alphabetical order, by email address. [Picture]
Use the Email Field drop-down list to specify the field that contains the addresses for your mailing.
Under Exclude Lists, click the green plus sign (+) to specify an Exclude list table. The Exclude list contains addresses that should not receive email. Netmailer excludes the email addresses in this list from the mailing. The exclude list is where you store removed and invalid email address lists.
Select Update a field in the source table.
Specify the Field to Update and the Update Expression. If you selected a batch size number greater than 1, the field update option is disabled.
Specify a name for a Log File table, which catalogs the email addresses and time stamps for when email was sent. If your mailing job is interrupted, and you are unable to resume the mailing, you can use the log file as an exclude list and avoid sending email to logged addresses.
Display the Options tab.
Specify the following parameters:
- Enter text into the Subject control. For custom email, the Subject control may contain expressions and references to fields. Optionally, click to use the Expression Builder to help define an expression that returns a character value.
- Select an Email profile from the Sending using profile list.
- Select the Message format. The options are:
  - "Send both HTML and plain text"
  - "Send HTML based on expression"
  - "Send plain text only"
  - "Send HTML text only"
- If the field is enabled, enter the expression that determines when to send HTML in the Send HTML Expression control. Optionally, click to use the Expression Builder to help define an expression that returns a logical value.
- In the Send type control choose whether to send the same or custom messages to recipients.
- Select the Batch Size.
- Select the Delay between sends. Lets you pause between sending each message for the specified interval. This feature accommodates servers that limit the number of connections that you can make to the server within a certain time interval. For example, if your server lets you make only ten connections per minute, you would specify a delay between sends of 6 seconds.
- Select the Maintenance Job to be run before sending the mailing (Netmailer Professional only).
- Choose whether to Only send to Unique email addresses. This prevents recipients from receiving multiple copies of the same email.
- If you have an attachment, select the Attachments method. the options are:
  - From List
    Enter the name of a file or click the 'open folder' icon and select a file to include with the message.
  - Embedded
    Enter the name of a file or click the 'open folder' icon and select a file to include with the message. For more information, see Including Images in HTML Email.
  - Expression
    For example, if you are sending attached PDF files, that are named by Lastname, you can enter the expression:
```
"c:\PDF_files" + chr(92) + Alltrim(Lastname) +".pdf"
```
    This expression would send the files "smith.pdf", "brown.pdf", and "rabins.pdf" to recipients, John Smith, Aaron Brown, and Selwyn Rabins. Optionally, click the 'xy' button to use the Expression Builder to help define an expression that returns a character value.
Display the Text Email or HTML Email tab.
Type in your email message or load the message body from a file.
When creating custom email messages, you can select from the following options:
- Load Message Body From File
  Inserts text from a file.
- Insert a Mail Merge Field
  Display fields from the source table or set.
- Insert a Mail Merge Expression
  Display any valid Alpha Anywhere expression.
- Insert Command
  Display text based on a condition.
- Copy From HTML Text
  Copy and paste the HTML text to the plain text.
- A custom email message using the AlphaSports Invoice set as its data source, might appear as follows: [Picture]
  This message body includes fields from the Invoice set, which contains a one-to-many linked child table.
Optionally, click Insert Command and insert values into the custom message body. For more information, see Inserting Commands in Email.
To view the custom messages, click the Preview button in the toolbar, and use the navigation buttons below the text pane.
Click Close when you are finished.
In the Netmailer Editor, display the Headers tab.
If you are sending the same email message, with a batch size of 2 or more, you can select from the following Header options:
- Put all email addresses in the To field
  Addresses in the To are visible to other recipients.
- Put the first address in the To field, and all others in the CC field
  Addresses in the To and CC field are visible to other recipients.
- Put the first address in the To field, and all others in the BCC field
  Addresses in the BCC field are not visible to other recipients.
- Supply an email address for the To field, and put all others in the BCC field
  Specify a custom or bogus email address, that is visible to all recipients. The recipients' email addresses will not be visible to other recipients.
- Reply-To Address
  Address to which message replies should be sent.
- Custom Headers
  Specify message header information here, such as X-mailer, or other user-defined information. Heading information is not typically visible to recipients, unless they examine the message header directly.
When you finish specifying your mailing information, you can select from the following options:
- Preview
  Netmailer builds the email job, displays recipient addresses, formats and displays the message body. Use the navigation buttons to view the messages or click the Explorer button to view the HTML version.
- Save
  Name and save Netmailer job. Displays the job name in parenthesis and removes the asterisk from the title bar.
- Run
  Netmailer builds the email job, prompts you for confirmation, and then sends the mailings.

Including Images in HTML Email

When including images in HTML email, you have the following two options:

Embedding the image and sending each recipient a copy of the image.
Placing the image on a public website and including a reference to it.

In the first option, your HTML email message includes an image, for example, using the image tag . The embedded image potentially produces a very large message size that could bog down the server and slow down your mailing. If you select to use the image tag in this format, and do not attach the image using the embedded method, the image does not appear in the message.

In contrast, using the second option, referencing the image on a public website, for example, using the image tag , results in a smaller message size, since the image is not sent along with the message.

This is the preferred method for sending images in HTML email, however, the drawbacks are that you must have a public website to which you can upload the image, and your message recipients must connect to the website to view the image.

Inserting Commands in Email

In the Netmailer Editor, clicking the Insert Command button displays the following Insert Command dialog:

Netmailer supports commands that let you perform the following tasks:

Include conditional text in the body of the email. For example, if a "DaysOverdue" field is greater than 90, you might include a more strongly worded paragraph asking for payment.

[.IF days_overdue < 90]
If you have not yet sent in payment, can you please send it in as soon as possible
[.ELSE]
Your account is now more than 90 days overdue, and we would appreciate your immediate payment.
[.END_IF]

Include content in the body of the email that is dynamically loaded from disk files. This lets you include boilerplate text in your email messages. You can control which boilerplate text is loaded by an expression.
Suppress lines in the email that are blank. For example, if you include a Company, and an Address2 field in an email, and the field contains no data, Netmailer can suppress the blank line.
```
<Firstname|>><Lastname|>><Company|>> [Suppress Blank Line]
<Address_1|>><Address_2|>> [Suppress Blank Line]
<City|>>, <State|>><Zip|>>
```
Include fields from one-to-many linked child tables. This option is only available if the data source for your Netmailer job is a set which has one-to-many child tables.
```
[.ONE_MANY:Invoice_Items]
<Product_id|>><Price||10|2>>
[.END_ONE_MANY]
```