Outlook Express Question

[TheJackal]

I have a rather complicated question that I hope someone can help me with.

I host a project on SourceForge.net, and for my project I have a weekly newsletter. Anyway, it is getting to be a big pain in the rear to type out 50+ different e-mail addresses whenever I want to send out a newsletter or a project-wide update...

Is there anyway that I can put all of the addresses into an editable template, so that I can just create mail, and have them all there, so I dont have to retype them each time?

[ktkendall]

I've been poking around in OE help and options and I don't see a way to do what you are trying to accomplish, and I'm thinking that may be one of the limitations with OE, but I'm quite sure you can do that with Outlook the full version..

[LiVeWiRe]

I'm not very familiar with OE but if you have 'Contacts' or some sort of address book in Outlook Express you could perhaps create a group or distribution list that includes all of the email addresses you want to send to. (In Outlook you have 'Contacts' and can set up distribution lists)

Then, when you need to send out the newsletter or an update you could simply select (or type) the group/dist. list name in the 'To:' field and it will be delivered to all addresses in the group/list.

HTH,
-LW

[ktkendall]

There it is, just go to address book, click new up in the left corner, then group and create your group...

[glc]

I highly recommend you do 2 things if you use distribution lists or groups:

1. Send the mail to yourself and put the recipients in the BCC, so everyone doesn't see everyone else's address in the To: line. In my eyes, this is a violation of privacy and if I were on your list and you did this, I'd be unsubscribing immediately.

2. Separate the lists into groups of no more than 15 to 20 recipients, as many ISP's see more than this as spam. This will require that you send it out more than once, but the only viable alternative is use a commercial bulk mailing service that sends it out as individual copies.

You could avoid all this hassle by using something like Yahoo Groups.

[TheJackal]

Thanks for your help all.

Oh, and glc, I dont see what the point would be to keeping the e-mail addresses secret, as all of them are available on project's page on the SourceForge website.

[glc]

It's just a considerate practice - all it takes is for one spammer to get his hands on one of those e-mails and you will all want to shoot them. You might want to reconsider how you post the addresses on the website too.

[TheJackal]

Its not my choice as to how the addresses are posted, Its part of the SourceForge website, and how they choose to post the list of active developers on the sites of the hosted projects.