Reply to PM Notification email

[Hunter H Dolan]

Okay I know it would be hard but well worth it! What you could do is have an ID number on each PM Notification Email and then just have the system search for it. If it matches a PM have it post it for the user. It would make everything allot easier and I would be able to get rid of the old noreply@My-Domain.com!!!! Thanks!

[Biker.GA]

Huh?

[alex.1096@yahoo.com]

Huh?

Exactly,
What are you saying?

[Alan]

He wants users to be able to reply to the New PM Notification emails they get and for IP.Board to automatically add it as a reply to the PM in question.

Hopefully the new incoming email API will make things like this possible.

[Hunter H Dolan]

He wants users to be able to reply to the New PM Notification emails they get and for IP.Board to automatically add it as a reply to the PM in question.

Hopefully the new incoming email API will make things like this possible.

Exactly. I think it would be a great feature. Ticketing systems have been using it for years, I don't see why it hasn't caught on in the forum world.

[Biker.GA]

Ticketing systems normally don't care much about authenticating users to the ticket software itself. Forums, on the other hand, would need a way to verify that the user sending an email into the system is authorized to do so. Not sure how one would do that.

[.time]

Facebook allows this for comments, seems possible.

[Collin1000]

Ticketing systems normally don't care much about authenticating users to the ticket software itself. Forums, on the other hand, would need a way to verify that the user sending an email into the system is authorized to do so. Not sure how one would do that.

Facebook allows this for comments, seems possible.

Ticketing systems usually keep track by email address. For IPB, with the possibility of multiple threads and PMs going on at once, this is not a realistic option.



Facebook, on the other hand, has no way of directly knowing just what you are replying to. They send a unique hash as the reply-to in every single email.



IPB would have to go with the latter approach (unique email hashing replyto addresses) in order to get this to work. Which, on most servers, will cause the messages to be marked as spam. Keep in mind that Facebook owns huge server farms and has tons of money. IPB is mainly used on users with shared hosting accounts that have strict email and spam limits.

[Mat Barrie]

Collin, that's not true at all - ticketing systems parse the ID in the subject line of the email. Which is absolutely possible for IPB.

[Collin1000]

Collin, that's not true at all - ticketing systems parse the ID in the subject line of the email. Which is absolutely possible for IPB.

If thats the case, and you can get a decent way to integrate it without security issues, I think it might be a neat thing to have. I still think it would likely cause issues for shared hosting, though.

[Mark]

It certainly is possible. You just stick some of of key under the "Reply above this line" which would be verified.

It's something we're looking into. We wrote an API to do this which we're using in IP.Nexus, once it's proven stable I expect we'll look into expanding it to other areas such as PMs and posting.

[bfarber]

Yes, the functionality is entirely possible.

One of the main limiting factors is the fact that we distribute software to all sorts of customers in all sorts of hosting environments with all sorts of varying levels of access to configure their server. We tend to avoid working on features that we will have to tell a large portion of our userbase "you can't use that because you can't configure it on your server". That said, I think most hosting accounts, including shared hosting, support piping incoming emails to a script these days.

Personally, I'd love to have this feature.

[Hunter H Dolan]

Yes, the functionality is entirely possible.

One of the main limiting factors is the fact that we distribute software to all sorts of customers in all sorts of hosting environments with all sorts of varying levels of access to configure their server. We tend to avoid working on features that we will have to tell a large portion of our userbase "you can't use that because you can't configure it on your server". That said, I think most hosting accounts, including shared hosting, support piping incoming emails to a script these days.

Personally, I'd love to have this feature.

Well that is the thing, all you guys would have to do is have a random key in the email (could be in the subject line, footer, even the message header, like where the server info is... although that might be tricky) and have that same key linked to the PM conversation and the member. Have IP.Board hook up to IMAP along with SMTP and then when the board's email address gets a new email it would check for the key, if there is no key or an invalid one the message would be deleted. If there is one and it is valid it would then post it to the PM Conversation and then delete the email (for security). You could have it so the only configuration for the end user would be setting up the IMAP. It doesn't need to be like facebook where there is a separate email address for each message (That would be way to complex). I know PHP and how to make PHP use IMAP, SMTP, etc. I can write an example. Of course this would be completely separate form IP.Board (I know absolutely nothing about your API) but it would give you an idea on how it works and it would show that it can be done. Tell me if you want me to I got some free time this weekend. I really want to see this feature! It is such a pain getting a PM notification on your iPhone then having to switch to the IP.Board app navigate you your messenger, then type out the message. I think it would be so much better and so much cooler if you could just write the reply right there. Maybe even get this feature working on topics you are watching. ;) Anyways thanks for your time!
-HD

[bfarber]

[font="arial, verdana, tahoma, sans-serif"][size="2"]Well that is the thing, all you guys would have to do is have a random key in the email (could be in the subject line, footer, even the message header, like where the server info is... although that might be tricky) and have that same key linked to the PM conversation and the member. Have IP.Board hook up to IMAP along with SMTP and then when the board's email address gets a new email it would check for the key, if there is no key or an invalid one the message would be deleted. If there is one and it is valid it would then post it to the PM Conversation and then delete the email (for security). You could have it so the only configuration for the end user would be setting up the IMAP. It doesn't need to be like facebook where there is a separate email address for each message (That would be way to complex). I know PHP and how to make PHP use IMAP, SMTP, etc. I can write an example. Of course this would be completely separate form IP.Board (I know absolutely nothing about your API) but it would give you an idea on how it works and it would show that it can be done. Tell me if you want me to I got some free time this weekend. I really want to see this feature! It is such a pain getting a PM notification on your iPhone then having to switch to the IP.Board app navigate you your messenger, then type out the message. I think it would be so much better and so much cooler if you could just write the reply right there. Maybe even get this feature working on topics you are watching. ;) Anyways thanks for your time![/size][/font][font="arial, verdana, tahoma, sans-serif"] [/font][font="arial, verdana, tahoma, sans-serif"][size="2"]-HD[/size][/font]

Oh yes, that's "all" we'd have to do. :lol: Be done in 5 minutes!

/kidding

[Hunter H Dolan]

Oh yes, that's "all" we'd have to do. :lol: Be done in 5 minutes!

/kidding

LOL! :)

Well I know that isn't all you have to do, it is a very big job, trust me I know. What I am saying is you could write the whole script in PHP with your own API as opposed to working with every popular mail servers api.

[Biker.GA]

Not sure I want the forum software tied directly into the mail server. I have enough security headaches without having to worry about another avenue of attack coming in via email. Just because it's "neat" isn't enough for me (and I suspect other admins) to justify opening up that particular "hole" as a possible avenue that could compromise our server.

[Hunter H Dolan]

Not sure I want the forum software tied directly into the mail server. I have enough security headaches without having to worry about another avenue of attack coming in via email. Just because it's "neat" isn't enough for me (and I suspect other admins) to justify opening up that particular "hole" as a possible avenue that could compromise our server.

How does it affect security. It doesn't work with the mail server's api at all. That is what I am saying. It would only connect to imap. You would give IP.Board its own email address and thats it. When a user gets a new PM it would generate the email as usual then give that email a random key and stick it in the message, in the header, or in the subject line, then IP.Board would send the message. When the user responds IP.Board would take the message and look for the key, if the key is there and valid, it would take the contents of the new reply and post it in the PM Conversation. I don't see how it could compromise the server's security. It isn't like someone could guess the key and if they somehow did manage to guess the key they would have no clue what post it went to.

[Biker.GA]

Yes, the functionality is entirely possible.

One of the main limiting factors is the fact that we distribute software to all sorts of customers in all sorts of hosting environments with all sorts of varying levels of access to configure their server. We tend to avoid working on features that we will have to tell a large portion of our userbase "you can't use that because you can't configure it on your server". That said, I think most hosting accounts, including shared hosting, support piping incoming emails to a script these days.

Personally, I'd love to have this feature.

While this is something that has been requested by my users in the past, it's not something I've been too wild about pursuing. IF this can be accomplished in a secure manner, I'd definitely have some happy users. Especially if it can be applied to posting as well as private messaging. However, it has to be able to follow the posting permissions set by the administrators on the boards, including the use of PMs. If it fails to follow those permission settings, it's not something I'd even consider using.

[bfarber]

The hardest part is ensuring that the email came from who it says it came from. You wouldn't want random user x emailing in a topic reply from you, the site admin, by spoofing email headers or similar.

That said, it would require some server level setup (i.e. defining the email, piping it to the script, etc.) so even if we did implement at some future point, it would never be just a straight out of the box thing. It would require you to specifically set it up.

[Hunter H Dolan]

The hardest part is ensuring that the email came from who it says it came from. You wouldn't want random user x emailing in a topic reply from you, the site admin, by spoofing email headers or similar.

That said, it would require some server level setup (i.e. defining the email, piping it to the script, etc.) so even if we did implement at some future point, it would never be just a straight out of the box thing. It would require you to specifically set it up.

Yes I agree. Well thanks for considering the idea. I really wish I could help out with it if you guys do end up developing it but I am not good enough (Yet :))) Anyways Thanks!

-HD