how to mail users from a webpage

[IPfreely]

hello,
my boss has commanded me to create a webpage where our members can send an email to all other members, like an alert email, or to individual members. i asked 'why?', and she said because our members are lazy and don't want to type in each others emails...
the page must be password protect so people can't spam our members.

any ideas where i can start with this or do you know of any existing script? we are runnin linux btw

thanks,
IPfreely

[edited by: IPfreely at 5:36 pm (utc) on Sep. 29, 2004]

[jezra]

Are you in the United States? If so, keep in mind that when your server sends and email to all of your members from [membersName]@[membersemail].com, you're machine is forging headers of emails. This is a violation of CAN-SPAM. Do not forget to add a "remove me from this list" so your members can opt-out of receiving future emails. Failure to do so is in violation of CAN-SPAM.
It only takes a few complaints to get blacklisted, and it happened to my company. Someone asked to be removed from our monthly email newletter, but still recieved the email, they complained to their ISP and the ISP blocked all emails from my company to any of their customers. There are safer options than running an open relay.

[dauction]

IPfreely (thats nice to know)..

Ummmm for starters you may want to consider looking for a new employer..one that treats you with a little more respect ..one that isnt "commanding you" to do things

[IPfreely]

little different here - opting out of these emails is not an option for the members because they are on a committee that deals with emergency issues. if they didn't want the emails they wouldn't be on the committee. also the emails will be coming from our own server so we're not forging anything.

back to the topic - any ideas?

[jezra]

hotscripts.com has quite a few email scripts for various scripting languages. I'd suggest looking into using PHP or PERL as there is a certain kickass webmaster forum that has both PHP and PERL forums. My personal preference is PHP, but that is just me and I don't want to start a PHP vs PERL argument. You will need access to a mail server, either on the actual webserver machine or accessable over a network. A search of the PHP and PERL forums may turn up some good info.

[IPfreely]

cool i'll post in that thread i didn't even see that they were there!
thanks,
IPfreely