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isaiah55
Starting Member
3 Posts |
 Posted - 14 March 2006 : 19:14:33
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I am not sure where to add this post so if I'm in the wrong place - sorry.
Basically I am trying to find out if anyone has added the functionality to be able to create topics by sending an email to the forum...
Basically we want to use our forum to manage some of our support requests. At present we have an email list, which is all well and good but with the quantity of emails recieved now adays this is becoming less desirable. What would be great is if a client was able to email us at support. The subject of the email becomes the topic name and the content becomes the topic. If one of us in support then replied to the email, this email would be sent to the forum which would add a reply to the current topic.
This would enable us to populate our forum and move us away from the email lists.
Has this been done? If not, would others find this useful. If it has been done how successful is it?
Cheers< |
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AnonJr
Moderator
United States
5768 Posts |
Posted - 14 March 2006 : 19:36:45
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| I don't know if this has been done or not, but I can see where it would be useful in certain situations.< |
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tribaliztic
Senior Member
Sweden
1532 Posts |
Posted - 15 March 2006 : 03:35:42
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It has been asked a few times before, I don't remember that it has been done though. Have you searched the forums?
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/Tribaliztic
- www.gotlandrace.se -
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HuwR
Forum Admin
United Kingdom
20584 Posts |
Posted - 16 March 2006 : 16:24:35
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it has been asked for manymany times, and has been answered the same way on every occasion, this is a forum, it is not a newsgroup, in order to do what you want you will have to write a custom pop3 server to process the emails and put them in the forum, it is not an easy thing to do unless you are an experienced programmer, but then you wouldn't need to ask the question if you were.
When I firstgot involved with Snitz many years ago, I wrote such a system because it was part of the spec I was given, I spent 2 months writing and debugging it and it was turned off 3 weeks after going live because nobody used it they prefered the forum to their old email list way of doing things< |
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isaiah55
Starting Member
3 Posts |
Posted - 16 March 2006 : 17:11:01
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Thanks HuwR for the response.
I realise that a POP server would be required to process the emails and put them into the forum. I might be able to modify our existing email list server to accomplish this...
I also understand the argument that the forum is not a newsgroup.
Our clients are flat out most of the time and sending emails is much quicker than going to the forum, posting a topic etc etc. I know it is only a few mouse clicks but that can make all the difference especially for our clients.
I agree that a forum was not designed for this purpose. I just wanted to know whether anyone had done anything using the later versions of the forum. I have read that your mod was designed for an older version of the forum and isn't compatible with the later versions. I was hoping that someone had, had a go since your success, but it unfortunately looks like I am going to have to build this one from scratch 
Thanks for your responses, if I get a viable solution up and running I'll let you all know!!< |
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Nertz
Junior Member
Canada
341 Posts |
Posted - 17 March 2006 : 10:07:52
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isaiah55, I'm looking at the possibility of implementing a snitz forum within our corp intranet for support application, I'd be interested too in this type of feature. It's not high on my priority list but I'd be interested in anything you'd undertake and may even be willing to participate and help with the project.
quote:
Originally posted by HuwR
in order to do what you want you will have to write a custom pop3 server to process the emails and put them in the forum, it is not an easy thing to do unless you are an experienced programmer, but then you wouldn't need to ask the question if you were.
When I firstgot involved with Snitz many years ago, I wrote such a system because it was part of the spec I was given, I spent 2 months writing and debugging it and it was turned off 3 weeks after going live because nobody used it they prefered the forum to their old email list way of doing things
Huw, would you still have and willing to share that code? Also curious as to why you'd go the POP server route as that would require constant periodical polls to an email server. Why not a custom SMTP server to relay incoming email to the forum in a custom post.asp? In either case, the logic of sorting out creating a new topic versus a reply to an existing topic just from the subject field would not be a trivial matter.
cheers,
Nat
< |
Sadly, most Family Court Judges wrongfully reward opportunistic gold diggers
that use our children unjustly as "instruments" of power.
www.fathers-4-justice-canada.ca |
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tribaliztic
Senior Member
Sweden
1532 Posts |
Posted - 17 March 2006 : 10:18:51
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Somewhere I saw a script that took the contents from an email (or maybe an attachment) and added it to a database. Maybe that would be another way to do this? Skipping the step via post.asp I mean..
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/Tribaliztic
- www.gotlandrace.se -
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HuwR
Forum Admin
United Kingdom
20584 Posts |
Posted - 17 March 2006 : 19:24:16
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quote:
Originally posted by Nertz
isaiah55, I'm looking at the possibility of implementing a snitz forum within our corp intranet for support application, I'd be interested too in this type of feature. It's not high on my priority list but I'd be interested in anything you'd undertake and may even be willing to participate and help with the project.
quote:
Originally posted by HuwR
in order to do what you want you will have to write a custom pop3 server to process the emails and put them in the forum, it is not an easy thing to do unless you are an experienced programmer, but then you wouldn't need to ask the question if you were.
When I firstgot involved with Snitz many years ago, I wrote such a system because it was part of the spec I was given, I spent 2 months writing and debugging it and it was turned off 3 weeks after going live because nobody used it they prefered the forum to their old email list way of doing things
Huw, would you still have and willing to share that code? Also curious as to why you'd go the POP server route as that would require constant periodical polls to an email server. Why not a custom SMTP server to relay incoming email to the forum in a custom post.asp? In either case, the logic of sorting out creating a new topic versus a reply to an existing topic just from the subject field would not be a trivial matter.
cheers,
Nat
it is simpler to use a POP client if you are using an existing mail address as the drop point, not everyone can run a mail server, but the POP client can be run anywhere, I'm afraid I do not have the code anymore.< |
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Lon
Starting Member
USA
47 Posts |
Posted - 29 July 2007 : 01:06:14
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I am interested in doing this. I run a local community forum and I'd like to have some specific emails that are sent to me (or a specific email account) posted directly to the forum. This would include AMBER ALERTS (Missing children) or local school closings.
Any Ideas???
I think the best way to do this would be to keep Outlook running and let it select the email and export it to a "Pick-up Folder". Then have some type of script make the topic.< |
Edited by - Lon on 29 July 2007 01:10:59 |
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AnonJr
Moderator
United States
5768 Posts |
Posted - 30 July 2007 : 14:07:06
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Use a mailing list instead of a forum? that's what they were made for...
Or maybe pull stuff like that off of an RSS feed or some page scraping as that's probably already been posted somewhere where they want to disseminate that information.< |
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