spacer
 spacer
 spacer
Using the FuseTalk E-mail Posting Feature
Platform: ColdFusion

  • How Can I use E-mail Posting?
  • Does E-Mail Posting Work With Every Category?
  • How Secure is E-Mail Posting?
  • E-Mail Prefix Format
  • Debugging the Task

    E-mail Posting is a feature that lets people receive new topics and replies that are posted in FuseTalk by e-mail. Users can then read and reply to the e-mails using their normal e-mail client. The e-mails that have been replied to will be inserted into FuseTalk, in the correct topic, by a scheduled task that runs periodically.

    HOW CAN I USE E-MAIL POSTING?
    Setup
    E-mail posting is a feature that only Global Administrators (GA) can setup. The GA needs to have access to a POP e-mail account which soul purpose is to receive e-mailfor ONE forum. It is not recommended that you use the same POP e-mail account for multiple forums.

    To setup E-mail Posting the GA will have to update a forum, and enable E-mail Posting. Once it is enabled you will be able to enter the POP information for the e-mail account that will be used. Follow these steps to do so:
    1. Login to the Global Administrator.
    2. Enter the "Forums - Management" section.
    3. Update the forum you wish to use the wizard with by selecting the update icon, the update forum window will open.
    4. Select the "email posting" tab.
    5. Select "Yes" for the Enable E-mail Posting setting and click the "Update Settings" button.

      The GA will also need to select a default category and a default user. Because there are no "easy" way to tell FuseTalk which category to post new topics into, the default category will be used to post new topics when no category is specified (See below to learn more about how FuseTalk knows which category and thread to post the new message into). Also the default user is used to post messages when FuseTalk is unable to determine which user has sent the e-mail message.

    6. Select the "Default Category" in which NEW topics will be submitted to when no category is specified.
    7. Select the "Default User" in which FuseTalk will use when FuseTalk is unable to determine which user has sent the e-mail message.
    8. Enter the 5 settings for "POP" information.
    9. The forum is now setup for email posting.

    Schedule Task
    One scheduled task will be created which will run all e-mail posting tasks for all forums. By default the task will run every 10 minutes. If you want to change the task to run faster, you will need to manually do this by editing the scheduled task in the ColdFusion Administrator.

    User Setup
    Once e-mail posting has been enabled by the GA for a forum, the users who belong to the forum will now be able to select which category they wish to receive e-mails for. Users can specify the categories by updating their "Personal Options" within their profile and select each category from the drop down box. E-mail with replies and new topics from those categories will now start to arrive in their e-mail box.

     DOES E-MAIL POSTING WORK WITH EVERY CATEGORY?
    No. E-mails are not secure and unfortunately there is nothing that FuseTalk can do to make the process more secure (i.e. it is too easy to send e-mail using anyone's e-mail address). FuseTalk has no way to clearly identify a user, and for this reason e-mail posting only works with "Post and Reply" categories.

     HOW SECURE IS E-MAIL POSTING?
    Although every attempt has been taken by FuseTalk, e-mail posting is not very secure. Because there is no way to clearly identify who is sending the e-mail FuseTalk makes no security commitments to E-mail Posting. However, if the POP e-mail account tagged to the forum is not divulged and the users in your forum are trusted there is no reason why e-mail posting cannot work in a secure environment.

     E-MAIL PREFIX FORMAT
    When a new message arrives into FuseTalk, the scheduled task needs to know where to post the message. To accomplish this FuseTalk adds a prefix to every e-mail subject that it sends. The prefix might be long and ugly, but unfortunately it is needed and there are no other reliable methods that can be used.

    Prefix Sample: FTCID3 FTTID32 FTMID46

    FTCID3 means post the reply in Category ID 3
    FTTID32 means post the reply in Topic ID 32
    FTMID46 means that the Parent ID is Message ID 46

    To ensure that all e-mails get directed to the proper location users should not change the prefix in any way.

     DEBUGGING THE TASK
    If your task doesn't seem to be running there are several ways you can try and debug the issue before calling FuseTalk support.

    The easiest method to debug your task is to run it manually from an internet browser. Open a browser and go to http://YOURFORUMINSTALL/globaladmin/include/tasks/emailposting.cfm

    The screen will display some information about each Forum and E-mail messages it receives and posts. If there are any errors which you wish to clear, there are two URL parameters that you can add to the task.

    1.forumid (i.e. emailposting.cfm?forumid=5). By adding the forumid parameter you can run the task for only the forum ID you are having issues with.
    2.deleteonly (i.e. emailposting.cfm?deleteonly=y). By adding the deleteonly parameter you can delete all the e-mail messages that are in the POP e-mail account. This can be useful if one e-mail message is causing issues and you need to clear the POP account before trying the task again. Note that once the e-mails have been deleted from the POP account they are not recoverable by FuseTalk.

    NOTE: You can add both parameters together to delete all the e-mail messages from a distinct forum. (i.e. emailposting.cfm?deleteonly=y&forumid=5).

    To discuss this article or to ask question please visit our     forums.