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Displaying Data in Emails

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Teambldr
User

Sep 25, 2002, 11:35 AM

Post #1 of 32 (13475 views)
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Displaying Data in Emails	Can't Post

Hi,

I recently tried using the syndicator to create content in an auto generated newsletter. What I fould was that the content does not show due to it being javascript.

Is there a way to place active or inactive headlines in an email template based on a specific category that updates before sending?

Thanks!
Brian

(This post was edited by Fraser on Oct 4, 2002, 11:17 AM)

Teambldr
User

Oct 1, 2002, 1:09 PM

Post #2 of 32 (13433 views)
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Re: [Teambldr] Content transmitted via email [In reply to]	Can't Post

BUMP!

Brian

Damon
Staff / Moderator

Oct 1, 2002, 2:22 PM

Post #3 of 32 (13422 views)
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Re: [Teambldr] Content transmitted via email [In reply to]	Can't Post

Hi Brian,

I previously tried using the syndicator to create an email newsletter with the same results - content doesn't appear because of JavaScript :(

So after brainstorming for a while I found a solution :)

Create a custom article index template. Next bring up the article results using that custom template using a search query.

Here is my steps:

1. Download the /templates/index/default.html template. Make a backup. Copy it and save it as email_default.html (or whatever you prefer to call it).

2. Modify the email_default.html template to only publish the content you want to include in your email. So for example, strip out the top section, left navigation and right latest headlines section. Maybe even add a separate graphic at the top.

3. Save changes and upload to the /templates/index/ directory.

4. Here is an example of the URL that will bring up the article results with the customized email template that can be emailed out:

http://www.yoursite.com/cgi-bin/artman/exec/search.cgi?perpage=5&template=index/email_default.html

5. Send out using your favorite email program. With Internet Explorer you can click Tools > Mail and News > Send Page to send the page as an email.

Couple of things to note:

Make sure that you have no JavaScript in the customized email template or people who receive the email may get a message from their email program that the HTML in the email contains a script and so on.

If you want to send out articles from one category, similar URL with the addition of the category number. Here is an example:

http://www.yoursite.com/cgi-bin/artman/exec/search.cgi?cat=3&perpage=5&template=index/email_default.html

I hope that helps. This evening I plan to test if I can use a similar link with AvantGo to create a Palm friendly page with headlines. :)

---------------------------------------------------
Cheers
Damon Edis
interactivetools.com

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Teambldr
User

Oct 1, 2002, 3:49 PM

Post #4 of 32 (13415 views)
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Re: [Damon] Content transmitted via email [In reply to]	Can't Post

Thanks Damon,

THe issue I have is not "can I send a page as an email" but "how to add AM content to a template based system" that is within another program. Namely, LinksSQL.

SO the issue is how can I get the data from point A (Artman) to point B (newsletter template within LinksSQL) and have the data (active or inactive) be able to be seen and used in an email.

Does that give you a little clearer picture?

Thanks again! Cool

Brian

(This post was edited by Teambldr on Oct 1, 2002, 3:52 PM)

Damon
Staff / Moderator

Oct 1, 2002, 4:28 PM

Post #5 of 32 (13410 views)
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Re: [Teambldr] Content transmitted via email [In reply to]	Can't Post

Hi Brian,

Even though my solution wasn't quite what you were after, I'm still quite pleased with the result which is a nice way to create email and hopefully PDA ready content :)

Moving data from ArtMan newsletter template within LinksSQL. Hmmmm...

Unfortunately I'm not familiar with LinksSQL and it sounds like it would probably take some programming ability which I don't have. :)

I will turn this over to all the other forum users for their thoughts and suggestions.

---------------------------------------------------
Cheers
Damon Edis
interactivetools.com

Hire me! Save time by getting our experts to help with your project.
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Teambldr
User

Oct 1, 2002, 4:31 PM

Post #6 of 32 (13408 views)
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Re: [Damon] Content transmitted via email [In reply to]	Can't Post

Hi Damon,

Don't get me wrong, actually your idea would work well with mobile HTML as well as PDA's. It is a good idea. It is just that my newsletters are template based and require dynamic content based on a specific category in a format that can be read via email.

It is a different application than the one you are working with currenlty.

Thanks again!
Brian

(This post was edited by Teambldr on Oct 1, 2002, 4:33 PM)

Dave
Staff / Moderator

Oct 2, 2002, 4:26 PM

Post #7 of 32 (13384 views)
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Re: [Teambldr] Content transmitted via email [In reply to]	Can't Post

Brian,

Is it possible to just "View Source" on a page generated with Damon's method and then cut and paste the content into your other application? Failing that, is there any documented ways that your other program might accept input or data from a program like ours?

Dave Edis - Senior Developer
interactivetools.com

Damon
Staff / Moderator

Oct 2, 2002, 4:33 PM

Post #8 of 32 (13382 views)
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Re: [Teambldr] Content transmitted via email [In reply to]	Can't Post

Hi Brian,

I understand what you are after now. I'm glad you posted your previous question because it got me thinking about other ways to create content for email and palm without using the Syndicator. I did manage created a Palm friendly page with current headlines from my test site that will be updated to my PDA using AvantGo every time I sync with the computer and it seems to work great. :)

---------------------------------------------------
Cheers
Damon Edis
interactivetools.com

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http://www.interactivetools.com/consulting/

Teambldr
User

Oct 2, 2002, 4:38 PM

Post #9 of 32 (13381 views)
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Re: [Dave] Content transmitted via email [In reply to]	Can't Post

Hi Dave,

What I need for these newsletter templates is automation. I have 28 categories that generate newsletters that are category specific. So the copy n paste for each newsletter would not be the option of choice due to the labor.

As per your second point relative to an interface, I am working hard to find this out from both sides of Vancover Wink

.

What I may have to do is multi part:
1. Create a stripped down template for each category that houses only the headline and link data.
2. Grab the data from AM with a program from LinksSQL and bring it into a table there.
3. Use a global on the newsletter template to display the data from the table.

*If we were on MySQL with AM this might be REALLY easy!

The real trick here is the grabbing of data from AM.

Is it possible to give access to the flat file to LinksSQL? If so, can the data be parsed easily? Or can the flat file data be saved on MySQL in a table that had columns for each category data?

Gee...do I need the MySQL version or what! LOL Cool

Brian

Teambldr
User

Oct 2, 2002, 4:40 PM

Post #10 of 32 (13379 views)
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Re: [Damon] Content transmitted via email [In reply to]	Can't Post

That is VERY cool Damon!

SO does the AvantGo change the formatting of the page for the Palm?
Brian

Dave
Staff / Moderator

Oct 2, 2002, 4:41 PM

Post #11 of 32 (13379 views)
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Re: [Teambldr] Content transmitted via email [In reply to]	Can't Post

Since all the content you want is in a web page, it should be pretty straightforward to download it and insert it into a mySQL table if that's what you need. Does the other program let you import external data in that way (or any way?).

Dave Edis - Senior Developer
interactivetools.com

Teambldr
User

Oct 2, 2002, 4:43 PM

Post #12 of 32 (13377 views)
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Re: [Dave] Content transmitted via email [In reply to]	Can't Post

I think if the data is in MySQL (unsure of format yet) I believe that it should be accessible with a global in the LinksSQL.
Brian

Dave
Staff / Moderator

Oct 2, 2002, 4:56 PM

Post #13 of 32 (13373 views)
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Re: [Teambldr] Content transmitted via email [In reply to]	Can't Post

I think LinksSQL might let you write plugins, or bits of code to load things in. All you need is a little bit of code that loads a web page and saves the data in LinkSQL. Just use the URL of the search engine how Damon demonstrated and it will generate the content the way you need.

Dave Edis - Senior Developer
interactivetools.com

Damon
Staff / Moderator

Oct 2, 2002, 5:09 PM

Post #14 of 32 (13371 views)
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Re: [Teambldr] Content transmitted via email [In reply to]	Can't Post

AvantGo makes the webpage available as a custom channel that can be downloaded and viewed offline each time I sync my PDA.

For the format of the webpage, I formatted it so the header graphic and the table width was small enough to be viewed on the PDA screen without having to scroll to the right.

---------------------------------------------------
Cheers
Damon Edis
interactivetools.com

Hire me! Save time by getting our experts to help with your project.
http://www.interactivetools.com/consulting/

Teambldr
User

Oct 2, 2002, 6:09 PM

Post #15 of 32 (13365 views)
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Re: [Dave] Content transmitted via email [In reply to]	Can't Post

Hi Dave,

So what you are describing is as follows if I read it right:

1. Create a custom template within AM to have just the data needed for each category (*hidden templates).

2. Create a plugin for LinksSQL that accesses that page and grabs the data and loads it into the MySQL database broke out by categories.

3. Create a global for LinksSQL that will display data from the MySQL database within the newsletter template based on the category.

Does that sound about right?
Brian

Dave
Staff / Moderator

Oct 3, 2002, 10:41 AM

Post #16 of 32 (13337 views)
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Re: [Teambldr] Content transmitted via email [In reply to]	Can't Post

Well, I'm not exactly sure how LinksSQL works. Maybe you can bypass the whole mySQL bit and load it from the web page right before you send it out. But generally, yes that looks like the process as best as I can tell.

Dave Edis - Senior Developer
interactivetools.com

Teambldr
User

Oct 3, 2002, 10:44 AM

Post #17 of 32 (13334 views)
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Re: [Dave] Content transmitted via email [In reply to]	Can't Post

Thanks Dave
Brian

Zyllyx
User

Oct 3, 2002, 7:56 PM

Post #18 of 32 (13319 views)
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Re: [Damon] Content transmitted via email [In reply to]	Can't Post

RE: AvantGo: I can add my channel fine manually, but I want to be able to offer users a link to do it automatically on my site.

AvantGo allows you to export the URL to add a Custom Channel, but the way this is set up the URL for the search.cgi includes an & with the template and such ... which is unfortunately cut off by the AvantGo engine because of its OWN & variables in their URLs.

Is there any way to output the PDA-friendly page as a static page or at least isolate the link so that the AvantGo engine doesn't think the Article Manager & variables are the AvantGo variables?

Also, in AvantGo I get the headline list just fine... but the articles themselves don't show up in the downstream links (just the headlines). Not even the printer-friendly pages...

I'm thinking that if AM is going to properly support Mobile/PDA data that it will have to publish articles using a dedicated separate subsystem and index/article templates, using static URLs (especially for AvantGo). Unfortunately, that may be beyond the scope of your already impressive forum advice. Please consider it, therefore, for AM 2.x.

Here's the URL if you want to test my channel:

http://www.racingpress.com/exec/search.cgi?perpage=8&template=index/email_default.html

Unimpressed

(This post was edited by Zyllyx on Oct 3, 2002, 8:03 PM)

Teambldr
User

Oct 4, 2002, 9:59 AM

Post #19 of 32 (13296 views)
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Re: [Dave] Content transmitted via email [In reply to]	Can't Post

Hi Dave,

When building a stripped down template:

a. All I want to show is a linked title. Nothing else.
*This seems pretty straight forward. Just the <a href="$detail_link$">$art_name$</a> code.

b. I only want to show the top 5 for each category.
*I am not sure how to limit it here.

c. Each category would have its own template.
*How do you limit the data within the template to just the one category?

Note: This is the templates I am building to get scraped over into MySQL so I can get content set up for emailing.

Second Note: Could I just use the headlines template to do this? Make a copy, rename, make changes, etc...

Thanks!
Brian

Dave
Staff / Moderator

Oct 4, 2002, 10:11 AM

Post #20 of 32 (13293 views)
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Re: [Teambldr] Content transmitted via email [In reply to]	Can't Post

You can use the search engine to specify exactly what you want like this:

search.cgi?template=my_template.html&perpage=5&cat=2

Just create a new template in the /templates/search/ folder.

The only thing it can't do is show the top 5 from each category, the only way to do that would be to use the global headlines template.

Dave Edis - Senior Developer
interactivetools.com

fraser_itools
Staff

Oct 4, 2002, 10:11 AM

Post #21 of 32 (13292 views)
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Re: [Teambldr] Creating Avantgo Templates [In reply to]	Can't Post

Hey folks, this thread was veering towards creating templates for PDA devices, so I thought I'd change the subject name to draw in more people looking for this kind of thing.
Fraser Cain - Product Manager

interactivetools.com, inc.
Tel: (604)689-3347 - Fax: (604)689-3342 - Toll Free: 1(800)752-0455
Software for your Website - http://www.interactivetools.com/

Teambldr
User

Oct 4, 2002, 10:18 AM

Post #22 of 32 (13290 views)
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Re: [Dave] Content transmitted via email [In reply to]	Can't Post

Hi Dave,

So you are saying to create only one stripped down template and not one for each and use the serch query to deliver the result to the stripped down template (within the code).

That looks easy enough...

In the template, what data must appear? Does it need head an body tags or can I strip them as well?
Brian

Dave
Staff / Moderator

Oct 4, 2002, 10:21 AM

Post #23 of 32 (13288 views)
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Re: [Teambldr] Content transmitted via email [In reply to]	Can't Post

Yea, that's right. It probably won't need body tags since you'll be cutting and pasting it into an email anyways.

Dave Edis - Senior Developer
interactivetools.com

Teambldr
User

Oct 4, 2002, 10:26 AM

Post #24 of 32 (13283 views)
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Re: [Dave] Content transmitted via email [In reply to]	Can't Post

<div>

<a href="$detail_link$">$art_name$</a>

</div>

So this is all that would be needed then? It does need the templatecell : row tags though right?

EDIT: Would I also need this tag? 
Brian

(This post was edited by Teambldr on Oct 4, 2002, 10:40 AM)

Damon
Staff / Moderator

Oct 4, 2002, 10:34 AM

Post #25 of 32 (13277 views)
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Re: [Zyllyx] Content transmitted via email [In reply to]	Can't Post

Hi,

To output the Palm friendly page as a static page, I used an SSI to include the search results into another page.

Here is my steps:

1.Created a palm friendly template using the previous steps in this thread (similar to the email template).

2.Created a new directory and page to publish the static palm friendly page.

Example: http://www.yoursite.com/palm_friendly/index.shtml

3. In the index.shtml page I added a Server Side Include to pull in the palm friendly page search results.

Example: 

And that's it. The palm friendly results should now be published to the /palm_friendly/index.shtml. Now this page can be used for Avantgo to add a Custom Channel.

One thing to note is that I'm on a Unix server so the SSI would be slightly different on a Windows server.

I tried out your URL for your channel and the format looks great on the Palm. :)

---------------------------------------------------
Cheers
Damon Edis
interactivetools.com

Hire me! Save time by getting our experts to help with your project.
http://www.interactivetools.com/consulting/

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