[opencms-dev] Module to manage mailing lists and mass (group) mailings?

[M Butcher]

I worked on something like this a while back. I created a module that 
connected OpenCms to Lyris' mailing list software. I used a JSP to 
create HTML-based email messages, and used the mail libraries in 
mail.jar to send messages to the lists. Rendering the mail was 
difficult... seems to me I ended up reading through a good chunk of the 
XMLTemplate code to figure out how to get the JSP to render. Also had to 
be careful that I didn't use any code that relied on user-specific info 
from the session, etc.

With the Lyris module, I could subscribe users to lists based on their 
user information in OpenCms, and subscribing and unsubscribing could be 
done with the checking/unchecking of a text box (as well as through the 
standard listserv-like email commands).

Since then, I've wanted to try something similar with mailman -- a 
package I much prefer. However, I've not had the time.

If all you were interested in was creating an email list, what you might 
want to consider is creating OpenCms groups for each mailing list, and 
giving users the ability to change their membership to the group. Then, 
to send mailings, you could write some code to retrieve the email 
addresses of each of the members of the group and then send a formatted 
email to them.

Matt

Laurent Gauthier wrote:
> Many web projects require the possibility to collect email addresses, to 
> group these by interest profile and then to create and send (rich) 
> emails to these groups.
>  
> Has anybody worked on integrating such functionality into OpenCMS either 
> as a native function/module or a as a bridge to mailing list system?
>  
> One aspect of creating rich (HTML) email content for distribution lists 
> is QA. It should be possible to use OpenCMS templates and workflow to 
> handle this aspect (content creation, page assembly and preview). There 
> are some specific needs for HTML email such as the use of absolute HREFs 
> for images and links but the OpenCMS template and possibly the 
> publication process could take care of this aspect and make it easy and 
> opaque to the user. Some cutomers also want to be able to track email 
> delivery, again, an OpenCMS module could present reports on email 
> distribution, click rates etc. Obviously, we are talking about opt-in 
> and responsible email practices.
>  
> I would be interested in having people share their experience or plans 
> for handling email distribution for OpenCMS communities.
>  
> Laurent Gauthier
> Mirasol Op'nWorks Inc.
> www.opnworks.com
> tel (514) 229-8730
>