Wolfie Posted October 18, 2004 Share Posted October 18, 2004 First thing, make IPB capable of collecting email from one (or more) email accounts. Option setting to delete emails (and if so, immediately or those that are X hours/day/weeks old). Second thing, parse each email. Topic would have Re or Re: or (Re:) etc as expected, but would ignore all that. eftid=(forum#).(topic#) Topic name for example. Then somewhere in the email (required to work), the member would have to reply quoting a line that has MEMBERID=(member id #) followed by their encyrpted password That way a member could reply via email and have their replies added to the topic. Would require a bit of work since it would have to figure out what part of the email is a reply and what part is just unwanted quoting or an email signature. :) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Michael_C Posted October 18, 2004 Share Posted October 18, 2004 Why don't you just use gmail? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Wolfie Posted October 18, 2004 Share Posted October 18, 2004 The idea would be for the forum to be able to receive and process emails for different function related purposes. The initial thing to do would be to get it to start accepting emails. Then add-on modules could be made.. The posting via email was the main idea, but it could also be used as email verification (get the email, then just select to reply/send and it's done - admin selectable to be link/email or members choice).. Could also be used for detecting expired/bad email accounts via scheduled checks. I'm sure you've been signed up for services before that check your email status by sending an email, and if it doesn't get an invalid email response, it's good. :) The possible uses extensive and I can only imagine a few. :) Could also be used as a method for integrating 2 or more different forums/sites. Add-on's could be used for exchanging banned IP's/emails/etc between boards that are related and separate but are in league with one another enough to trust each others bans (as an example). Or for sharing of accounts - member decides to sign up on a sister-forum that detects the cookie can give the member the option to 'import' their account. They select yes, it fires off the email, tells the member to browse the board and that they'll be notified when the account has been created. This should usually only take a matter of a minute or two, saving the member the annoying steps of signing up for another forum and then waiting on another email (and in some cases, checking a filter). :) But to make it simple, giving the members the ability to read new posts to topics and to reply to them via email would be a definite start. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Michael_C Posted October 18, 2004 Share Posted October 18, 2004 Oh, I misread, personally I don't think this is necessary, forums and email are meant for 2 different purposes and I can't see any good reason why they would be combined. :) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Wolfie Posted October 18, 2004 Share Posted October 18, 2004 Some people are forgetful or busy enough that they only check the forums once in awhile. Email responding to topics would let them remain in the conversation by only having to read/reply to emails. :) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jasonawojo Posted October 18, 2004 Share Posted October 18, 2004 Oh, I misread, personally I don't think this is necessary, forums and email are meant for 2 different purposes and I can't see any good reason why they would be combined. :)<{POST_SNAPBACK}> I agree with you on this and feel that browsing the forums would be quicker than doing it through e-mail anyways. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
neomax Posted October 19, 2004 Share Posted October 19, 2004 I certainly understand the various functions of email and message boards but there is a reason to have a way to parse email to a particular forum that does make sense. The function is to take 'email' reports from email enabled cell phones. "reporters' who may observe car accidents, or report game scores (including attached audio/image files) would find this an effective way to file news reports to a forum from the field. I wouldn't recommend it for reading and responding to a forum but it does have some functional benefits. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
-Strider- Posted October 19, 2004 Share Posted October 19, 2004 I would like to see this as one of the free modules :) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dleight Posted October 20, 2004 Share Posted October 20, 2004 I think this would be a great addition. Regardless of how I try to explain to our users the benefits/differences of email lists vs. discussion boards, they continue to want a hybrid. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paul B Posted October 31, 2004 Share Posted October 31, 2004 I wrote a script that currently does this... every 5 mins. it checks the mail server, gets the email and posts into a specific forums. The post is added as an upapproved post awaiting moderation. It also check to see if the user is register with the board, and if not it sends out an email telling the to register. The main purpose I use the script is from a support stand point, customer email in there issues, and they get posted to the forums. I can then reply via email or make a post normally... because the inital email auto subscribes to the thread... ipb emails them when I replay. However, it would be nice to see something official from IPB adding this function. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
XanthicBB Posted November 12, 2004 Share Posted November 12, 2004 I wrote a script that currently does this... every 5 mins. it checks the mail server, gets the email and posts into a specific forums. The post is added as an upapproved post awaiting moderation. It also check to see if the user is register with the board, and if not it sends out an email telling the to register. The main purpose I use the script is from a support stand point, customer email in there issues, and they get posted to the forums. I can then reply via email or make a post normally... because the inital email auto subscribes to the thread... ipb emails them when I replay. However, it would be nice to see something official from IPB adding this function.<{POST_SNAPBACK}> Paul B, this is something exactly like what I'm looking for. Would you be so kind as to share your script (if not publicly, than by PM)? :) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bridgeaddict Posted November 12, 2004 Share Posted November 12, 2004 Yes, I'd be very interested too, especially if it works with 1.3 as well! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Germany Posted November 12, 2004 Share Posted November 12, 2004 I like the idea, albeit a tad unnecessary, but it takes a big step in the right direction (In the opinion of the sole supporter of the Invision Email Sytstem). :thumbsup: Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
XanthicBB Posted November 18, 2004 Share Posted November 18, 2004 Just FYI for anyone else who may be waiting for Paul B's reply: I PMed him a few days ago but was ignored, so I assume that he is not willing to share his script. I still think this would make a great feature :). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paul B Posted November 18, 2004 Share Posted November 18, 2004 Just FYI for anyone else who may be waiting for Paul B's reply: I PMed him a few days ago but was ignored, so I assume that he is not willing to share his script. I still think this would make a great feature :).<{POST_SNAPBACK}> Not ignored, just to busy this week with work. The script still needs alot of work, I may have some free time this weekend to work on it. I don't have a problem releasing it to the public when it is done. I won't have time to support it, but I'm sure there will be enuff people around to support it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
XanthicBB Posted November 19, 2004 Share Posted November 19, 2004 Good to know Paul, thanks :D. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jkeroes Posted November 22, 2004 Share Posted November 22, 2004 I'm interested, too. In fact, this is a make-or-break feature as far as choosing a BBS is concerned. Our community is migrating from a listserv to a BBS [hopefully] and retaining the old functionality is mandatory for the BBS move. I'm willing to help hack - I was expecting to have to write this anyway so the head-start is handy. Thanks, Joshua Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
capbiker Posted December 13, 2004 Share Posted December 13, 2004 I am currently working on a module that enable users to set up access to any of there email accounts through the board etc. But once the alpha version of this is up and running hopefully by the New Year I am planning to expand it so that you can reply to posts through the email, approval emails, check to see if any email accounts have closed etc. Once the core stuff have been done. But before you ask, I am planning to have this released as a paid module as there is features that will require a server set up. Like up todate spam lists etc. How much have not decided yet. cap Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fmorelli Posted February 2, 2005 Share Posted February 2, 2005 Oh, I misread, personally I don't think this is necessary, forums and email are meant for 2 different purposes and I can't see any good reason why they would be combined. :)<{POST_SNAPBACK}> The fact that you can't see any good reason why they should be combined simply means you have no need for this capability, at least that you can perceive as useful to you. Having run mailing lists for close to a decade, the fact is the forums and mailing lists are community building tools, with different delivery mechanisms and features. The ability to have them interact is very useful. For one, mailing lists have the benefit of delivering content to the desktop on the most pervasive application on the planet -- e-mail. With a forum, you have to remember to go there to read up on topics. It would probably be trivially easy to allow members to subscribe to forums such that each post could be delivered via e-mail. A simple link back for replying would solve needing to handle inbound e-mail ... that is, it's really secondary. The key benefit to e-mail is the fact that it is ..... push technology that is pervasive. We already have "Enable email notification of replies" for a posted message. Expand that capability to have "Forum Subscription via email". Cheers, Filippo Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
maz Posted February 4, 2005 Share Posted February 4, 2005 I have members asking me to unsubscribe, because they have come from yahoo groups and are annoyed with the digest because they can't reply via email. I can't even unsubscribe for them, most my members have never used a forum before so this is a real problem. I think there still are people paying by the minute, the more time they spend in email offline the better. The rest of us would rather not deal with email, but we need to help those who do. ... the post about gmail, is there something that works with the forum? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fmorelli Posted February 4, 2005 Share Posted February 4, 2005 I have members asking me to unsubscribe, because they have come from yahoo groups and are annoyed with the digest because they can't reply via email. <{POST_SNAPBACK}> Yahoo!Groups may be the biggest pile of crap on the Internet. It is a great example of why companies failed on the Internet. I wouldnt begin to use that as an example of how to integrate e-mails with forums. That's like using the Yugo as a design standard for cars! It's simple to implement an interface that gives a minimal, but useable integration between content delivery via forum and e-mail: a) members can subscribe to forums b) forum messages are sent to members as e-mails c) each e-mail can have, at the header or footer, a reply link, such as:Click to reply to this topic Simple. How much work would this be for Invision? They already have mail delivery built-in. All you need is the ability to select e-mail delivery for a forum, store that in SQL for the user, pull messages for e-mail delivery from the Database, format an e-mail, including the correct reply link and send it on home! Filippo Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Trigger_this Posted February 4, 2005 Share Posted February 4, 2005 This sounds extra kool. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Graphixer Posted February 11, 2005 Share Posted February 11, 2005 I'm also trying to migrate from a listserv to BBS. The problem is that most of my users don't have time to login to a forum, and use email as their primary interaction tool. But I recognize that forums have a tremendous advantage over traditional listservers for archiving, access control, attachment mangagement, user management, etc. A great start would be adding a "send copy of message to forum members via email" checkbox in the message composition screen, which would be enabled at the discression of the forum admin. There would be security issues to overcome for posting to a forum via email. Maybe each message emailed to a member could contain a unique code, and the forum would recognize and post incoming replies that contain the code? Dunno. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jgriggs Posted September 16, 2011 Share Posted September 16, 2011 This thread is about 7 years old, and I was wondering, has anyone solved this? I've searched and the only place I really find any sort of notion of an answer is on this thread. Is it possible yet to reply to a thread via email? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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