PromaSoft AutoResponder Help
  PS Autoresponder Help (1.3035)
 

 


The PromaSoft AutoResponder help files for version 1.4xxx are no longer available online but are included with the installation package as a printable and indexed document. Below help file is kept here for users of version 1.3xxx.

Version 1.4xxx is available here

Thank you.

PromaSoft

 

About this help file

This is the latest available help file for PS Autoresponder. If you are not using the product already you can browse this help file to explore the features of PS Autoresponder.

NOTE: The helpfiles are being reviewed and put online as they are ready. Updated help sections are marked with r

DOWNLOAD THIS HELPFILE

A printable version (PDF) is available. Rightclick here and select Save target as. You will need Acrobat reader to read this downloadable document. Note that the downloadable version contains help related to version 1.3026. We try to update the PDF as much as possible. For new features always check the online version.

QUICK START

We recommend reading the How does PS Autoresponder work and Initial Configuration r chapters. Please navigate to the scenarios page which contains quick start guides to start using PSAR if you don't want to go through this help file immediately.

PSAR DISCUSSION BOARD

Questions you might have could already have been answered on the PSAR Discussion Board. If you can't find an answer there feel free to post your question. The board is constantly monitored for new postings.  

ERRORS

When you encounter errors during your initial use of PromaSoft AutoResponder you can look up the meaning of these codes here. The most common internet conditions are covered but some might need more explanation. PSAR Also has an extensive debugging option which logs all messages to a log file.

ISSUES AND FIXES

If you run in to program errors make sure to check the known issues and fixes on the download page. 

FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS

On popular demand there is a PS Autoresponder FAQ available on the PSAR discussion board. If you feel that a question is missing feel free to post it

GIVING PSAR A HOME OF ITS OWN

The object of this article is to connect two computers so that PSAR can run independently in the corner of the office while still sharing the ISP connection with your normal work computer. Click here to view the document.

 

Important Notice

AOL Users: AOL Users might have problems to use PS Autoresponder. A*L does not allow it's users to use third party email programs. Please check with your ISP. However nothing is stopping you to try other email providers next to your email account. Several user did inform us that AOL does provide POP services bu we do not guarantee that.

Contents

The contents is organized according to the major functions of PS Autoresponder

General

Installation

Autoresponder

Group mailings and mailing lists

Newsletters

Form handlers

Other functions

 

Getting support [top]

PS Autoresponder support can be reached here . Use subject line 'Autoresponder Support'. As for any other program with this much functionality it might be hard to get going at first. Please feel free to contact Promasoft support with any question you might have.

When you are faced with a problem we ask that you attach the last few hundred lines of the log file so we can make a better diagnose. Click here to see how to setup a log file. The log file section has to look something like below screen shot.

Once you've done that try to recreate the problem and then send the newly created logfile to support.

Registering PromaSoft AutoResponder [top]

For an overview of all available flavors click here

How do I purchase and enter a registration code?

Step 1 - Select 'Help/Register' from the main menu (make sure you are connected to the internet) and click on the 'Purchase Online' button.

Step 2 - Your default browser will open and show the online registration page at Kagi.

Step 3 - Fill out your details and submit them.

Step 4 - As soon as your payment is done you will receive your registration code. This can take up to one day to be processed. But usually it only takes 5 minutes.

Step 5 - On the same panel enter your name, Company, Vendor and registration code and click the activate code button (once you have received the code through email)

Step 6 -  Now stop and start PS Autoresponder to start in registered mode.

Your registration code will stay valid for all minor releases. Example: if you register for version 1.05 you will be able to use your registration code until version 1.99.

Help!!! I'm not able to connect [top]

This is the most frequently asked question that's why we've put it here and not in the FAQ section.

When people start using PS Autoresponder for the first time they often get a message on the log screen telling them that PS Autoresponder was not able to connect to the internet. This can have several reasons

(1) You are not connected to the internet. It's obvious that you need to connect to the internet first before PS Autoresponder can make a connection.

(2) You are located behind a firewall (proxy) and you did not specify the proxy hostname on the server settings panel. Make sure that you have all proxy data filled out correctly.

(3) You are running 1.0710. This version has the habit to freeze or time out when connecting to some POP servers. To get rid of this issue upgrade to the latest version available.

Offline Or Online? [top]

Promasoft Autoresponder is an internet tool. This means that it needs a working connection to the internet. But since you could do some work offline like defining your filters, mailings and such PromaSoft auto responder offers the possibility to work in offline mode. So what's happening in offline or online mode?

Online

This is the default. PS Autoresponder will, at regular intervals, try to verify your internet connection (in fact each time a cycle starts). This is useful if you leave PS Autoresponder running in the background while you are connecting and disconnecting from the internet. At the time you connect to the internet, with PSAR running in the background, PSAR will find your connection and start working.

Offline

PS Autoresponder will only check you internet connection once at startup. For the rest of the time PSAR won't go of to the internet anymore to check the connection. At the time you are ready to receive and send mail a connection will be made. This is useful to define your filters, mailings and such while not connected to the internet.

Activating Online or Offline mode

PS Autoresponder will manage this for itself. As soon as an internet connection is available PS Autoresponder will see that and start functioning. The application checks once for a live internet connection at the start of each cycle. If you are using the RAS function, PSAR will additionally create a dial-up connection.

How does PS Autoresponder work? [top]

To be able to understand everything what is in this help file, it helps if you know how PS Autoresponder works. Basically PSAR does not run real time meaning that it will not see a mail as it comes into your POP mailbox. However PSAR runs in cycles. You can instruct PSAR to run a cycle every minute or e.g. every hours or so. Setting the cycle time to 0 will make PSAR run constantly. This makes is more or less real time, meaning that it will respond to incoming mail within 30 seconds or so.

What happens during a cycle?

A cycle consists of 4 things PSAR will do:

1 - Retrieve email from the POP Server

In this part PSAR will connect to your email server and retrieve any new messages on that server. It will not delete any of them as yet. All messages are saved in the so called 'Message Queue' which you can view at all times and perform certain actions on it.

2 - Run the filters

In this part PSAR will go over all filters you have defined looking for matching messages which have been retrieved in the first cycle. If a message is matched by a filter it will be marked as ready to send. In other words it won't be transmitted as yet but it will be flagged. Next to all of this PSAR will also perform any form handling which you might have defined and store the data from the forms into your form database.

3 - Do mailings, newsletters and form handling

In this part PSAR will see if it has to do mailings or send newsletters. If it finds mailings/newsletters that are due to be submitted it will pump all necessary messages into the so called 'Message Queue'. Again no messages are being transmitted as yet. 

4 - Send out mail

In this part PSAR will actually send out replies to all the mails that have been marked as ready to send and also send out mails part of mailings and newsletters. If you use the FME (Fast Mailing Engine), PSAR will send the email to the queue of the FME where it will be transmitted by the FME at high rates.

Notes: 

In automatic mode PSAR will perform a cycle every x minutes, where x can be defined in the setup. 

In manual mode you have to click the cycle button to start a cycle.

Downloading and installing [top]

Open the downloaded package with WinZip or just decompress the ZIP file to a directory of your choice.

Now click setup.exe in the WinZip window or in the directory where you decompressed the ZIP file. This will install the program and put an icon in your startup/programs menu.

Installing a new version of PS Autoresponder over an older version will not void your settings and filters, the database will simply be converted when you first start the new version. Even though PSAR will keep all your data intact it is safe to make a backup of the PSAR program directory before you upgrade to a new version. 

Note that the upgarde version come as executables which you have to decompress in the PSAR program folder.

Dial-Up support (RAS)

Dial-up Support (RAS)

How it works

When dial-up support is enabled, PSAR will do following every time a cycle is executed. As explained in this help file you can choose how frequently PSAR should run a cycle. For example if you want to have PSAR connect to the internet and process your mail once a day simply set the download frequency to 1440 minutes.

  • A cycle is started

  • PSAR connects using the dial-up connection you specified

  • PSAR retrieves your email and executes the defined filters

  • PSAR replies or/and sends out replies or/and mailings

  • PSAR Disconnects from the internet

How to activate dial-up support

Select [File][Settings] and click on the RAS tab

Select enable remote dial-up connection

From the select dialup connection to use selection box choose the windows dial-up connection that you are normally using to connect to the internet.

Click ok

Do not disconnect when cycle finished

If you want PSAR to stay online and connected to the internet after it made a dial-up connection select do not disconnect when cycle finished. This is useful if you want PSAR to create a dial-up connection only when there is none available (e.g. in an internet sharing environment).

Maintaining dial-up connections

Three buttons are provided to edit, add or delete windows dial-up connections. These buttons will bring up the standards windows dial-up maintenance tools also available through your control panel.

How do I create a filter? [top]

Note: please make sure to check the repetition settings because depending on it's value you will get or won't get replies when testing.

Next thing to do is to define the filters. These are the filters used to define which messages will be responded to.  You can define as many filters as you want for different kinds of messages.

Let's consider following example: we want to automatically respond to all messages that have following subject line 'Successful submission'. We don't care who the message is from but we don't want to respond immediately but only two hours later.

Step 1 - getting to the filter definition panel

go to [Edit][Filters] using the program menu or click the filter button on the button bar.

Step 2 - starting to define a new filter

First thing to do is to tell the program that we want to create a new filter. Do this by clicking on the 'New' button (top left button on the filter window)

Step 3 - naming the filter

You will be prompted to enter a title for your new filter. Just because we would be able to easily identify the use of the filter we will enter a descriptive name. Let's say we put 'This is my first filter' in there. As you can see it does not matter what you put there as long as there's no other filter with the same name. 

Step 4 - entering the filter criteria

Below the name field, in the filter settings section, you will see 4 'criteria' fields. For a message to be successfully matched by the filter it needs to contain the keywords specified in these 4 fields. In our case we want the filter to be triggered if the subject line of the message contains 'Successful submission'. So we put exactly these words in the 'Subj.' field. If we would put other words in the other fields then these conditions also have to be met. In other words there is a logical AND relation ship between the fields. 

You can use wildcard characters in these fields.

Characters in pattern Matches in string
? Any single character.
* Zero or more characters.
# Any single digit (0–9).
[charlist] Any single character in charlist.
[!charlist] Any single character not in charlist.

If you leave all 4 fields empty PSAR will trap all mail. 

Note that PSAR does not care about upper and lower case.

Also remember that PSAR will first try to match a message using the first filter in line. This is the filter listed on top of the 'List of filters' section. You can change the position of a filter using the up and down buttons below the 'List of filters' section.

Note: as of version 1.2020 PSAR now also allows you to use advanced filter criteria. This allows the use of AND, OR and NOT operators and more.

Step 5 - define the behavior of the filter

The behavior of the filter is defined in the 'Additional Settings' section.

  • Del from POP if matched: This setting is perfect to keep your POP server clean. You can also use it to remove Spam mail. If checked any mail that matches your criteria will be deleted from your POP server. Note that this will only happen in the next cycle run.

  • Del from PSAR if sent and del from POP: if checked the message will be deleted from the Responder database after it has been replied to and if it's not any more on your POP server. This means that the message will stay in the PSAR database until you download and delete the message with your normal email application.

  • Do not reply: if checked the message will NOT be replied to. This is useful if you receive messages that your are NOT interested in at all (e.g. messages from mailer daemons telling you that you've sent a message to a non existing email id).

  • Mark all ID's as blacklisted: selecting this option will scan the body of the incoming mail (if matched by your criteria) and will put any email id in the body on the blacklist. Again this can be used to remove non existing ID's from you ID log.

  • Bypass repetition delay: Selecting this will make sure that messages matched by the filter will get a reply no matter how high the global repetition delay has been set. Use this for messages that need a reply in all cases no matter how frequently they are coming into your mailbox.

  • Use Address for return-Path: When selected PSAR will try to use the address defined in the Address field as return-path for the email sent out. 

  • Delay: Setting this value to 0 will make sure that the responder will reply to the incoming mail as soon as possible (at the next run). Setting this value to a higher value (let's say 2) will make sure that the reply will be sent at least two hours later than when the message was received. 

  • Hits: this box indicates how many times the filter has matched an incoming message. If you wish you can reset this field to 0 or to any other value. Counting will begin starting from that value.

  • Scan Body: This option will make sure that PSAR replies to the first email address encountered in the body of the received email address. (This function has been replaced as of version 1.3015 by the Reply To setting)

  • 'Reply To' selection: (Available as of version 1.3015). This function allows you to define which source PSAR should use as recipient when sending the reply.

Following sources can be selected:

  • From: PSAR replies to the email address found in the From field of the email message

  • Body 1st: PSAR replies to the first email id found in the body of the received email.

  • Body 2nd: PSAR replies to the second email id found in the body of the received email.

  • Return-Path: PSAR replies to the email id found in the return-path header of the received email.

  • Reply-To: PSAR replies to the email id found in the reply-to header of the received email

Note (1): this function replaces the scanbody function

Note (2): When no valid email id is found PSAR will always use the From header as a default. If the from header is invalid too, PSAR will use DUMMYMAIL.

Note (3): The same detected email id will also be used when doing subscription processing for mailing lists.

Step 6 - the reply itself

  • Name: this field has to contain your name (or can contain). You can put whatever you like in this field. This value will appear on the from line of the email in the email reader of the person you are sending the reply to.

  • Address: this field has has to contain your email address (or can contain). This is the address that will be used when a reader hits reply in his email reader when reading your message.

Example for above two fields

Name: PromaSoft Support
Address: support@autoreplying.com

will result in following being displayed in the recipients inbox

When the recipient hits Reply his reply will be sent to support@autoreplying.com

  • Reply subject: this obviously is the subject of your reply. You can for instance put 'Hi there how are you' but you can also put 'Re: $subject$'. Note that $subject$ is a reserved keyword and will be replaced with the original subject of the message that was received. There are more keywords you can use (see Keywords)

  • Message body: in here simply put the message body of your reply. Again you can use keywords in the body.

Step 7 - finish

Make sure the active checkmark is selected. Deselecting this will obviously disable the filter.

To end you definition session simply click the done button (top right) to save and close the window or click 'New' to enter the next filter or click 'Delete'  to delete the currently selected filter.

We won't go into the other sections you can find on the filter definition panel like 'Forwarding and Actions' or 'attach'. These will be discussed elsewhere.

Advanced filter criteria

This function allow to create highly complicated filter criteria. You can setup things like 'body contains test and body does not contain Spam' (this is just a plain English example. The actual formula will look different)

You are not obliged to use the advanced filter criteria instead of the simple criteria using the four 'contains' fields on the filter definition panel. 

If you use the advanced filter criteria in a filter the normal criteria will not be in effect and visa versa. The currently selected tab specifies wheter the simple or advanced filter criteria are in effect.

How to use the advanced criteria?

To use this type of matching criteria select the 'Advanced Filter' tab on the filter definition panel. You will be presented with an editing box where you can enter your formula. Enter your formula and click test syntax to see if the formula has a correct syntax. Click Edit to make the edit box bigger.

Which commands can I use in the formula?

Fields Logical Operators
[subject] AND like
[body] OR >
[from] NOT <
[to] =
[date] <>

Wildcards

You can use both * and ? wildcards in combination with the like operator

VBScript support

Advanced filters allow you to use VBScript. This means that you can use VBScript functions. An example of that could for instance be

val(format$(now,'hh')) >= 18
OR
val(format$(now,'hh')) <= 9

This formula will instruct the filter only to match messages between 6pm and 9am.

For a full overview of all available functions refer to VBScript on the Microsoft website.

Examples

Below are some examples of advanced filter criteria. This will clearly instruct how they can be used.

[subject] like '*test*'

Will match when the subject contains the word test

[subject] like '*test*' AND [body] = ''

Will match when the subject contains the word test and when the body is empty

[from] like '*@autoreplying.com*' AND NOT like '*support*'

Will match when the the message was sent to any email address in the autoreplying domain except for the support account

[subject] = 'Info'

Will match when the subject exactly contains the word test. No more no less.

[body] like 'hi*'

Will match when the message body starts with the word hi

[subject] like '*AB?D*'

Will match any subject that contains for example ABXD, AB1D, AB9D and so on.

Further Information

When the advanced filter field is left empty the filter will never match

You can use different level of brackets. Example ([body] like '*a' OR [body] = 'test') AND [subject]=''

When the simple filter is visible the advanced filter will not be used and visa versa

 

How do I use HTML messages

PromaSoft AutoResponder has the ability to send replies, mailings and newsletters in full HTML. This means that you can send messages using full color including pictures and even forms if wanted. 

Embedded images

When you embed images into your HTML replies these images have to be stored on your hard disk. At the time when the reply or mailing is sent, PSAR will load these images from your hard disk and code them into the email message. The recipients of your email will be able to read the HTML message including all images even if they are not connected to the internet.

You can embed images that are stored on the internet but then the recipient will only see them if he/she is reading the email message while connected to the internet.

Using keywords in HTML replies

As you can use keywords in plain text replies you can also use them in HTML replies. If you format the keyword (e.g. $name$) the keywords will be replaced and formatted too.

Choosing between HTML and Plain text messages

On the filter definition panel, mailing definition panel and follow-up definition panels you will see a checkbox called HTML. To switch from plain text to HTML and back simply select or deselect the HTML checkbox.

Note: switching from HTML to plain text will of course remove all formatting from the reply or newsletter you have written. During the switch over all HTML tags are removed.

Editing HTML full screen

It's always easier to edit your message in a full screen edit window instead of the small window available on the filter panel. Click the 'Edit' button to bring up a full screen wysiwyg HTML editor. Once done editing you can select either [file][Accept Changes] to store your changes or [file][Revert to original] to discard any changes you made.

Full screen editing options

Toolbar

Using the toolbar you can perform basic formatting to you text. This toolbar is also available in the editing window on the filter panel.

[File][Open]

If you have created an HTML document using another editor like frontpage you can load that document into the editor and work from there.

[File][Save]

Enables you to save your document for later use. You can for instance load the saved document into other new filters.

[View][Borders]

If you embedded tables with invisible borders use to option to view them in the edit window only.

[View][Document Details]

Will display special formatting characters like line breaks etc.

[Insert][Picture]

Used to embed a picture into your HTML reply. 

[Insert][Anchor]

Used to assign a hyperlink to a piece of text or image.

[Insert][Horizontal Line]

Will insert a horizontal line into your HTML document

[Table]

This menu allows you to work with tables

[2D]

Using these options you can use absolute positioning. This means that you can position images on top of text or below text or even images on top of other images.

Keyboard Accelerators

During the editing of an HTML document following keyboard accelerators are active.

Movement

Description Key
Move one character to the right. If an absolutely positioned element is selected, nudge the element one pixel to the right. RIGHT ARROW
Move one character to the left. If an absolutely positioned element is selected, nudge the element one pixel to the left. LEFT ARROW
Move down one line. If an absolutely positioned element is selected, nudge the element down one pixel. DOWN ARROW
Move up one line. If an absolutely positioned element is selected, nudge the element up one pixel. UP ARROW
Move right one word CTRL+RIGHT ARROW
Move left one word CTRL+LEFT ARROW
Move to the end of the current line END
Move to the start of the current line HOME
Move down one paragraph CTRL+DOWN ARROW
Move up one paragraph CTRL+UP ARROW
Move down one page PAGE DOWN
Move up one page PAGE UP
Move to the beginning of the document CTRL+HOME
Move to the end of the document CTRL+END
Cycle selection through block-level elements within the control TAB
Reverse-cycle selection through block-level elements within the control SHIFT+TAB

Selection

Description (Command) Key
Extend the selection one character to the right SHIFT+RIGHT ARROW
Extend the selection one character to the left SHIFT+LEFT ARROW
Extend the selection right one word CTRL+SHIFT+RIGHT ARROW
Extend the selection left one word CTRL+SHIFT+LEFT ARROW
Extend the selection up one line SHIFT+UP ARROW
Extend the selection down one line SHIFT+DOWN ARROW
Extend the selection to the end of the current line SHIFT+END
Extend the selection to the start of the current line SHIFT+HOME
Extend the selection down one page SHIFT+PAGE DOWN
Extend the selection up one page SHIFT+PAGE UP
Extend the selection to the end of the document CTRL+SHIFT+END
Extend the selection to the beginning of the document CTRL+SHIFT+HOME
Select all elements in the document  CTRL+A

Editing

Description (Command) Key
Delete the selection or, if there is no selection, the character to the left of the insertion point BACKSPACE
Delete all of a word to the left of the insertion pointer, not including the space before CTRL+BACKSPACE
Copy the selection to the Clipboard CTRL+C
Paste the contents of the Clipboard to the current location CTRL+V
Cut the selection to the Clipboard  CTRL+X
Delete the selection without placing it on the Clipboard  DELETE
Toggle between inserting and overwriting text INSERT
Undo the most recent formatting commands  CTRL+Z
Re-do the most recently undone commands  CTRL+Y
Find text CTRL+F
Display the context menu, if any (equivalent to right-clicking the document) SHIFT+F10

Formatting

Description (Command) Key
Toggle bold formatting CTRL+B
Toggle italic formatting CTRL+I
Toggle underlining CTRL+U
Increase paragraph indent CTRL+T
Decrease paragraph indent CTRL+SHIFT+T

How do I send attachments with my replies? [top]

PSAR allows you to send as many attachments as you want with your replies, mailings and newsletters. To add an attachment to a reply simply click the Att button on the filter or mailings panel. The combo box next to the button will list your attachment. If you click Att again another attachment will be added. To remove an attachment click the Del button next to the Att button.

Note: the attachments need to be stored (and stay stored) on your hard disk. PSAR will, at the time it sends a reply or mailing, retrieve the file from you hard disk and encode it into the email message. If the file has been removed from its original location PSAR will send out the reply or mailing without the attachment. You will see an error on the log panel.

Which keywords can I use in the filters? [top]

Following keywords can be used in the 'Reply, From and subject field' of the filter definition.

$subject$  will be substituted with the subject of the original message

$body$ will be substituted with the body of the original message (cut off after the number of characters specified in the cutoff parameter on the settings panel)

$email$ will be substituted with the email id of the original sender

$name$ will be substituted with the name of the original sender

$hits$ will be replaced with the number of hits of the current filter. This allows you to give ticket numbers to your replies for later reference. This is the first step to the implementation of a DigiTrak system for helpdesk which will be available in a later release of PSAR.

$to$ will be replace with the email address the original message was sent to.

$hi$ will be substituted with the friendly name of the original sender if that ID is in the ID Log and you have entered something in the Friendly column (can only be used in the body for time being)

* Next to these keyword you can define your own keywords.

How to activate the program? [top]

You can use the program manually, each of the cycle part separately or automatically

Manually

To start a cycle session click the Cycle button (or use the controls menu). This will download all messages from your POP server (not delete them), then it will check if any of the messages fulfill any of your filters. Lastly the responses will be sent. If you only want to respond and not download any new messages from your POP server use the controls/respond now option. 

Each of the cycle parts separately

On the program window you will notice a bar that has the big capital letters B, R, F and S on it. When you click the cycle button you will see that each of these capitals changes color as PSAR is going over each of the cycle parts. 

Clicking on R (or pressing F1) will read the mail from your POP server and stop there. Nothing else will happen

Clicking on F (or pressing F2) will execute the defined filters on any new messages in PSAR's database. (e.g. the ones you have just read by clicking on R)

Clicking on S (or pressing F3) will send out the replies and bulk mailings. You will notice that the capital B changes color when PSAR is queuing bulk mail.

At any point in time you can click the break button to stop PSAR from processing. You can not click on the capital B (Bulk).

Automatically

To select automatic unattended operation click on the 'Auto' button. The status indicator on the bar below will turn green and on the bottom of the screen you can see when the next cycle will start. From this point you can just minimize the program.

Breaking

If you want to stop a cycle at any time just click the 'Break' button and the program will stop after finishing it's last operation.

Forwarding mail 

What is forwarding

A filter definition also holds so called forwarding destinations. If you don't choose any destinations the message will not be forwarded to anywhere. The forwarded message will arrive identically at the forwarding destination. 

On top of forwarding the message, all other functions will still operate. In other words if you have specified to reply to the mail a reply will be sent. If you selected a form handler, the form handler will still be called and so on.

NOTE: The same destinations can be used for mailings

Calling the destinations panel

Simply click the Forwarding and Actions button if you are in the filter definition panel or click the recipient button if you are in the mailing definition panel.

Which destinations will the mail be forwarded to

At the bottom of the destinations panel you will see the High level recipient list. All destinations listed here will be used for the forwarding operation. Initially this list is empty as you did not choose any destinations yet.

Previewing final destinations

After you have selected a number of destinations you can quickly look at the detailed email id's where the message will be forwarded to by clicking on the Preview button.

Possible forwarding destinations

All of below possible destinations can be combined. Each of the destination types can be selected as many times as you want. 

Single email address

Incoming mail trapped by your filter can be forwarded to the specified email address. You can easily specify as many single email addresses as you want. The email will then be forwarded to all specified addresses in one single operation. To specify a single email address enter it in the single Email Id section and click Add or press enter.

Mailing lists

Incoming mail trapped by your filter can be forwarded to all the email id's in a predefined PSAR email list. To select an email list simply choose (double click) one of the existing lists in the Available mailing List section. You can call the ID lists panel to create a new mailing list on the spot. Again you can add several mailing lists to the High level recipient list. 

Using this method of forwarding you can run your own email discussion lists as if you would run a list server.

Mail merge file

Incoming mail trapped by your filter can be forwarded to all the email id's in a mail merge file you have stored on your system. This file can be a plain list of email ID's but it can also be a CSV file. To choose this type of destination first enter the field of the mail merge file that contains the email address into the field box in the mail merge File section, then click select and choose the file itself.

Use the preview button to see if indeed you have chosen the correct field. The preview panel should show a list of all id's in your mail merge file.

Logging File

If you want to archive incoming mail trapped by the filter you can choose a logging file. Simply click the Select button in the Logging File section. The result will be that all email trapped will be written into a plain text file (the one you specified). All details of the email are logged like for instance the subject, the time the message was sent, the time the message was replied to, the hits counter value of the filter at the moment, and so on ..

Form handler database

You can also forward mail to all id's in a PSAR form handler database. To choose this destination first enter the field (the data field is 0) where the email address is stored. Then double click on one of the available form handler databases.

External Program

You can decide to launch an external program on reception of a certain email and pass information to the external program and use its output in your reply. Click here for details.

Sound (available as of version 1.3035)

PSAR can also play a user defined sound in response to a matched email. To define a sound select the Other Actions/Sounds tab on the forwarding destinations panel.

Examples of using forwarding

This function is very useful to be used in a filter that is positioned last in row and that traps all messages (4 blank simple criteria fields). Any message that filters through all other filters and probably is important will be forwarded to another email address (or several other destinations) where you can read these probably important messages. 

Filtering Spam: To give another example. You could define several filters that will trap so called 'Spam' mail and instruct PSAR to delete them. Whatever is left over for the last filter that will trap all messages will most probably not be Spam.

Basically you could have one email ID that you use for your auto responder and one email ID that you use to read all left over mail. This forwarding email id can be a free id like you can get at hotmail.

Other uses

  • Email discussion lists

  • Customer tracking

  • Helpdesks

  • Automatic registration code generation for software vendors

Blocking replies and/or bulk mail [top]

At any point in time you can block outgoing replies or/and outgoing replies. 

To block outgoing bulk (even while it's going out) click the 'NoBulk' button on the main program window. As long as this button is depressed PSAR will NOT send out bulk but will keep it queued. This is useful if you know that some important replies are waiting to be sent. 

The same can be done to hold replies (depressing the 'NoReply' button). Selecting both buttons will have as an effect that PSAR will not send out anything anymore until you deselect one or both buttons.

PSAR Will still read incoming mail and run the filters.

I think my database is corrupt? [top]

Automatic Backup Mechanism

For one reason or another it is perfectly possible that your database gets corrupted. PS Autoresponder will inform you if there is a database corruption. When you start the program a window will popup notifying you of that fact . To protect yourself from database corruption and possibly loose a database of thousands of email ID's and all your defined filters, PS Autoresponder will create a backup of the database every time it starts. Of course it will not make a backup of a corrupt file. To save disk space PS Autoresponder will only keep 3 copies. These are named psarbkup01.mdb, psarbkup02.mdb and psarbkup03.mdb. With 01 always being the most recent copy. The popup window that appears when a database corruption happens gives you following options:

1 - Make a backup of the corrupt file and continue operation with psarbkup01.mdb (which is the most recent backup)

2 - Exit PS Autoresponder. Useful if you want to troubleshoot the database yourself.

3 - Continue with the corrupted database. This will most probably generate database errors during operation.

4 - Restore to one of the three backup copies (and also make a backup copy of the corrupt file to corrupt.mdb)

Choose one of the four options and click 'Continue'. 

The only way to get rid of the corruption is to recreate the database. To do this start PS Autoresponder and select 'File/Recreate database' and answer yes to the question. Now stop PS Autoresponder and restart it again. You database will be recreated but of course will be empty.

Backing up the database yourself

Imagine loosing an email ID list of 3000 IDs. You'll be very unhappy to loose that so it's always good practice to make a backup of your database. To do this select 'File/backup database as' and choose a location and name for the backup copy. Whenever you want to revert to this backup simply copy the backup over autoresponder.mdb in the program directory.

 

Can I see which messages have been received and replied to? [top]

Yes you can look at all messages in PS Autoresponder's database. To pull up the message window choose [View][Messages] in the menu or click the [msgs] button on the button bar. A new window will popup with following elements on it.

Message list

On top of the window is the complete list of messages. Note that when a message is deleted from the database or server it's also not anymore in this message log. The messages will have different colors depending on the state they are in. To view the legend select the [legend] tab. You can click on the different fields in the legend to only show those messages in the message list. To view subsets of the message list select the [Select] tab and click on any of the items listed. Also note that when you instructed PSAR to remove a message from the database it will of course no longer show up.

All: Shows all messages in the database

Bulk: Shows only the bulk mail and newsletters.

Forwarding: Shows messages that have been forwarded.

On Server: displays all messages that are still on your POP server.

Not processed: These messages have just been read from your POP server but no filter processing was done yet on them.

Not matched: These messages were not matched by any of your filters.

No Reply: these are the messages that were matched by a filter where you selected no reply.

Failed: these are messages that for one reason or another have not been sent (e.g. wrong email address)

Success: Show all messages that were successfully replied to.

Out Now: Shows the messages that a ready to be send out now.

Out Later: Shows the messages that have been delayed and will not yet go out.

Mark options

Marking a message to be sent: it is possible that you want a message to be sent immediately without waiting for the delay to expire. To do this select the message and click the button. You can select one or multiple messages by clicking on the record selectors (small gray squares next on the far left of the message list). Once you select the [Other][Mark Selected to send now] function PSAR will flag the selected messages to be sent as soon as the next cycle begins. Remember that this will only be true for messages that have been matched. 

Database/Synchronised/Delete Selected

This function will delete the selected messages from the PSAR message database but also from your POP server the next time a cycle is run.

Database/Synchronised/Delete All

Same as above function but acts on all messages in your database and POP server.

Database/Not ynchronised/Delete Selected

This function will delete the selected messages from the PSAR database. The next time a cycle is run, PSAR will retrieve these messages again from your POP server and perform filter matching on them.

Database/Not ynchronised/Delete All

Same as above function but for all messages.

Add to List button

While you are going over the mails listed you can decide to add the id of the currently selected mail to one of your mailing lists. To do that simply click the 'Add To List' button. A panel will popup asking you to choose an existing mailing list or to enter the name of a new one. When you select the 'Set As Default' option each time you click the 'Mailing List' button the selected mailing list will be highlighted by default. This is useful if you quickly want to add people to the same mailing list while going over the message list. 

Black List button

To put the email id of the originator of the currently selected mail on the blacklist simply click the 'Black List' button. This is useful if you encounter a mail of someone that is asking you to be removed but did not specify the correct 'Remove Phrase'.

Clean button

This function will clear the whole PSAR message database including all messages on the POP server. This happens the next time a cycle is run.

Quick Reply

When on the messages panel you can quickly reply to a mail which is listed in there without needing to start your normal email application. To perform a quick reply simply select the message and click the 'Quick Reply' button. This will bring up a reply panel. To send the reply click then 'Send' button. 

Note that the reply will be queued like any other reply and will go out at the next cycle.

 

Can I see who has sent mail to me? [top]

To show the ID Log click F7 or select [Edit/ID Log] from the menu.

The ID Log contains a list of all email ID's you (or PSAR in this case) have ever received mail from. If the color of the record is black this email id is on the black list meaning that they will never receive a replies, newsletter or mailings  from you. You can put an email id on the black list just by ticking the selector in the record. Remember that you can override this for mailings and newsletters.

Searching for an ID

If you have lot's of ID's in the ID log and want to look for it (e.g. to put it on the black list) just enter the email id (or the first few letters) in the locate field.

Filtering ID's

In the event that you want to lookup all email ID's containing a certain string of character you may use the 'Filter' field. Example: entering aol.com will show all aol id's. Now you can perform other functions on that subset of ID's like putting them on the blacklist.

Importing and Exporting ID's

To export or import a selection of email id's to or from a file use the function under the File menu. The format of import and export files has to be as follows: one and only one email id per line.

If you have a list of email ID's (that you have gathered before) and want to put them on the black list in PS Autoresponder then use the [import into blacklist] function.

Deleting ID's

To delete a selection of email ID's use the function under the Database menu. You can delete all ID's at once or just a selection of them. To select click on the record selectors (small squares on the left of the ID list) and use shift and control to select more ID's. Then select [Database][Delete] and what needs to be deleted.

Expiring ID's

Once you received email from a certain email ID it will be flagged as blocked (no mail will be sent to it) until the repetition delay (see settings) has expired. If you want to expire an email ID or selection of email ID's immediately then use the functions under [Database][Expire]

Viewing

Use the functions under the View menu to view selections of ID's. e.g. you can desire to show only the blacklisted ID's. 

Sorting

Click on the column header of any of the columns in the ID log to sort on that column.

Note: you will also find the Mailing list menu here but those options will be discussed later.

How do I setup a mailing list? [top]

Basically the ID log is a mailing list but it can become a very big one. You might want to setup different smaller mailing lists. There are different ways to build mailings lists.

Creating a new mail list

To create a new mailing list click the [New Mailing List] button and enter a name for it on the panel that pops up.

How to populate your mailing lists

1 - Starting from the ID log

It is possible to make a selection in the ID log and from those ID's create a new mailing list or add them to an existing mailing list. To do this follow these instructions

  • Step 1 - Pull up the ID Log (F7)

  • Step 2 - Select the ID's in the ID log panel that you want to put in a new or add into an existing mailing list. To select click on the record selectors (with the black triangle) and use ctrl and shift to make multiple selections.

  • Step 3 - Choose 'Mailing list/Add selected' or 'Mailing list/Add all'.

  • Step 4 - Now you can choose an existing mailing list or you can enter the name for a new one.

2 - Starting from a file (with one Id per line format)

if you have a file containing email id's that you want to use to create a PS Autoresponder mailing list do following

  • Step 1 - Click the Lists button

  • Step 2 - Select 'File / import into mailing list...' or click the [Import] button and select an existing mailing list or enter the name for a new one. Click ok.

  • Step 3 - Now select the file containing the ID's and the import process will start. On the bottom of the panel you can follow what is happening.

3 - Manually

If you want to add an email ID to a mailing list manually do following

  • Step 1 - Click the Lists button

  • Step 2 - In the Add new ID panel enter the ID and name of the list where you want to add the ID. You can use the list of mailing lists on the far left of the panel to enter an id into that mailing list.

4 - Automatically

This is where we start to talk about newsletters. It is possible for users to send you an email with certain subject line and let PS Autoresponder add them to a specified mailing list completely automatic. This is called subscribing. Also it is possible to automatically remove someone from a mailing list. This is called unsubscribe. (See newsletters on how to setup something like this)

5 - Using the clipboard monitor function

When this function is active, PSAR will monitor the clipboard and will whenever it detects an email id on the clipboard put it into the selected mailing list. To use this function first select the mailing list where you want the ID's to go and then click the monitor clipboard button. Now go to whatever other application (e.g. word). Whenever you copy a piece of text onto the clipboard that somewhere contains email ID's they will all be added into the selected mailing list. Again note that PSAR will search for the ID's so you can copy the surrounding text too or even whole texts.

Exporting mailing lists

PSAR also allows you to export all ID's in a certain mailing list to file. To do this simply select the mailing list that you want to export and click the [Export] button.

Deleting a mailing list

To delete a mailing list select the list to be deleted and click the [Delete this list] button.

 

How do I send bulk mail? [top]

Next to the auto responder functionality there is also a Bulk mailing feature. Based on the mailing lists you defined (or were created automatically) you can perform bulk emailing. There are a number of ways to do bulk mailings.

Note: when you have entered mailing information it is NOT sent out immediately but it is stored in the scheduled mailing list (a list of mailings to do basically). When you perform a cycle session this mailing information is scanned and if the time is right the mailing will be submitted to the mailing queue and eventually will be sent out.

IMPORTANT: If the title of the mailing turns green it means that the mailing will be submitted. If it is red it means that it will not be submitted until your scheduling parameters have been met.

One time mailing

Step 1 - Select [Edit][ Mailings] from the main menu or click the [mailings] button and click the New button on the panel that pops up.

Step 2 - You will be requested to enter a name for your mailing. Enter anything you like in here. This is just for your information so it does not matter what you put in here.

Step 3 - Enter your name as you want people to see you in their mail program and enter the reply address. This is the address you want people to send their replies to.

Step 4 - Select the mailing list (previously created) by clicking the Add Recipient button. IMPORTANT: If you select 'Use all ID's in the ID  Log' as destination your message will be sent to ALL people you ever received mail from and responded to (except for people who are blacklisted). Be careful to use this function because the ID Log can become very big. For a discussion on possible destinations for you mailing click here

Step 5 - Enter the subject and message body of your mailing. If you do not enter information in these fields PSAR will refuse to send out the mailing and will give an error message in the log window.

Step 6 - Define how many messages per hour can be sent out per hour. This setting is used to make sure your SMTP server does not get overloaded. Some SMTP servers will block your ID for a while when you send too many mails in a row. If you for example enter 60 for this setting, PS Autoresponder will send out one message every minute of the hour. NOTE: If you only perform a run every 5 minutes than it will send out 5 messages at once during that run. The way this works is that PSAR will spread the message out over time. They will all be submitted into the queue but the 'To be sent' field will hold a time in the future.

On the top of the window you will see following information details.

Title: This is the title of the mailing currently being edited.

Next: This is the date and time when the next delivery will be. If the current time exceeds this value at the time you perform a retrieve/filter/sent session the mailing will be submitted. It says never when the mailing has been sent out already.

Fu's: is the number of follow up messages for this mailing. See later on how to create follow up messages.

In the History section you can find following details

Times Submitted: Tells you how many times the mailing has been submitted to the message queue. Example: if it says 1 of 2 it means that the mailing has been submitted once out of the two times it will be submitted. Using the scheduling details tab you can set a mailing to be submitted for example 10 times every other week or so. 

Last Delivery: This is the time when the mailing was last submitted into the message queue. It says 'never' when the mailing has never been submitted before.

Always: Select this if you want the mailing to go out for ever and ever depending on the scheduling information (e.g. each and every day or week etc...)

Step 7 - To make the mailing active you need to select the active checkbox on top of the window. If you don't do this the mailing definition will just remain idle. PSAR will not submit anything. Later on you can come back to change or finish the mailing definition. 

Step 8 - Click Done

At this point in time the mailing has not been sent out yet. You will need to perform a Cycle session first or wait for the the cycle to start if you are running in automatic mode. Once the cycle starts PS Autoresponder will see that there is a mailing waiting to be submitted and will queue a message for each person in the mailing list you specified. Each message will get tagged with date and time when it can be sent out. If you specified 60 for the max number of message per hour you will notice that every message will be one minute apart.

Every time you perform another Cycle session (or automatic) PS Autoresponder will check this time tag and send out the mail if the current time exceed the date in the tag. You can look at this using the View/Messages function. Scroll right in the message table to locate the 'ToBeSubmitted date' field.

Repetitional mailings

It's perfectly possible that you want to send out the same mailing several times in a certain period of time (example: every month). To achieve this enter your mailing exactly like explained above but don't click the 'Done' button. Instead click on the [Scheduling] Tab.

Step 1 - Selecting the initial delivery date and time

This is the date and time when the mailing will be submitted. If you want it to be present time just click the Now button. Using the + and - buttons you can make it later or sooner in half hour increments. If you want to schedule the mailing in the feature simply select the date on the date panel.

Step 2 - Decide the time between mailings.

Example: if you want to submit the mailing every week enter 7 in the days box using the arrows. You will not be able to set both hour and day field to 0 because this would mean that PSAR would submit the mailing on every cycle run. Imagine what would happen if you have the cycle time set to one minute!

Step 3 - Decide how many times you want the mailing to be submitted

Setting this value to one will submit the mailing once and then never again. For example if you want to send out the mailing 12 times, once every month you would set this setting to 12 and the days setting to 31.

If you select the Repeat indefinitely check box the mailing will be submitted an unlimited number of times.

Other options

On the 'Parameters' tab you will find three additional settings

Delete from Active Mailings when submitted: checking this will make sure that your mailing definition will be deleted from the mailing definitions list when it has been submitted. The effect of this is that the mailing will be done once and after that it's no longer available.

Check ID Log for repetitions: Will take the repetition setting into account when sending out mailings. This will make sure that people won't get more than one email from you in the specified period of time (repetition setting). Note that this will only work for ID's that are in the ID Log. 

Submission Short Cuts

On the main panel of the mailing definitions you will find three buttons. See below for the effect of each of them:

Next Submission Now: clicking this button will make sure that the mailing will be submitted during the next cycle no matter what kind of scheduling parameters you have defined. The rest of the settings will remain intact so if you said that the mailing can be submitted three times every other day that will still be the case. 

Submit once now: clicking this button will make sure that the mailing will be submitted once now and only once.

Note: all scheduling details will be lost when you click this button.

Mail merging

What is mail merging?

Instead of using the internally defined mailing list from PS Autoresponder to perform mailings you can use your own mail merging files. These files need to be in a comma separated format. Each of the fields will be replaced in the mailing where you have specified them to appear.

e.g. "promasoft@pandora.be","Jo","De Vulder" could be one line in such a mail merge file. The file can contain as many lines as you want. The easiest way to create these kind of files is to make an excel document and then simply save the file in CSV format. Of course you can manually create the file. You can also use CSV files created out of the form handler database you have. You do have to make sure that the first field is the email address of the recipient.

The example above holds three fields. In the mailing definition use $1$ for the first field, $2$ for the second field and so on. If you specify a fields that is not present in your mail merging file it will not be replaced. Next to theses field keywords you can of course also use your own defined keywords. 

You can use the field keywords anywhere in the from, subject and message body of your mailing. Above example translates to:

Keyword Translation
$1$ promasoft@pandora.be
$2$ Jo
$3$ De Vulder

 

An example of a message body definition in a mailing could be:

Hi, $2$

your last name is $3$

When the mailing is submitted the message body will be translated to

Hi, Jo

your last name is De Vulder

How to use a mail merge file?

To use mail merging you simply have to select the mail merge file from disk on the destinations panel. This is all that is different from a normal mailing. Do as follows:

Step 1 - Create your mailing as usual

Step 2 - Click the 'Add Recipient' button and follow these instructions.

Step 3 - Select the CSV file from the file dialog

Send out your mailing as usual.

For an overview of all possible merging fields click here.

How do I setup follow up messages? [top]

Follow up messages are messages that you will sent to people after a certain period of time has gone by. This follow up mail is different from the initial mail you've sent. To create follow up messages you first of all need to create an initial mailing

Using the follow up messaging feature you can, instead of sending out the same message over an over again, send a different message each time you send out a bulk mail. 

It's best explained with an example: Let's say you have 5 people interested in one of your money making deals. 

Now let's ask ourselves what we want to do with the follow up mailing. Well let's say that we want to send each of the 5 people in the mailing list a message at intervals of one week and we want to send them 3 letters. When they have received the last follow up message we want to stop sending them email.

1st letter: Hi, you've got to read this ...

2nd letter: Hi, it's been a week. Are you still interested ...

3rd letter: Hi, looks like I can not interest you in my deal ...

Setting up the initial mailing

Next thing to do is to setup the initial mailing and specify the mailing list (with 5 people in it created previously) in the recipient box.

On the 'Mailing Details' tab enter your 1st letter content.

Setting up the interval

Setup an interval of 7 days on the scheduling panel and mark the Repeat Always box. This has the effect that the mailing you are creating will be sent until the end of times every 7 days from now. You might want to click the Now button so that the mailing will go out for the first time during the next cycle.

Adding the two follow up messages

Now go to the 'Follow Up' tab. You will notice that all fields are empty. That is because we have not added a new follow up message yet. (at the moment we only have one mail).

Because we want to use the content of the initial mail and just alter the title and message body a bit we will check the 'Use initial mail' check box and click the add button next to it. The result is that we (at this point in time) end up with a follow up message with exactly the same content as the initial mail. What we will do next is to change the title and message body to reflect the intention of our 2nd letter.

If we finished editing the 2d letter (1st follow up) we will click the add button again an also alter the contents of this one.

You can also make the from field different for each of the three mails.

Stopping after the 3rd follow up mail

As we said in our example we want that PSAR stops sending mail to someone if they have received the three follow up letters. To make sure this happens mark the 'Stop when last follow up sent' check box. If you do not do that then the initial mail will be sent again after the 3rd message has gone out (7 days later of course)

If everything is ok the light should be green (on top of the window). This means that the mailing will be sent during the next cycle.

Someone join 2 weeks later

Let's say that someone joins your list of 5 people 2 weeks later. What will happen is that this person will not get the 2nd follow up letter immediately but he will get the initial mail. Which is how it should be.

Tracking

To see who of the mailing list HAS received which letter go to the tracking tab.

Last FU Sent on: indicates when this person has received one of the follow up letters.

Last FU: Indicates the last follow up message this person has received. 000 indicates the initial mail.

Stop: If marked this person has received the last follow up letter and no mail mails will be sent to that person. Let's say that one of the 5 people is interested. This means that there is no use sending him anymore follow up letters. Simply mark his ID on the tracking panel as Stop.

Newsletter threads [top]

What is that? Well it simply is a series of follow up messages that will be sent to someone asking for it. In other words you might have an form on your website that people can fill in to request more information on your offer. When they do that they will automatically receive a thread of messages spread over a certain period of time (like 1 message a week for 3 weeks).

How to set that up?

Create a filter that will match the mail you get that people sent when they apply for the news letter thread.

Mark the 'Add to list' box and specify in which list the persons have to go

Now simply create a mailing with a number of follow up messages using that same mailing list and set the interval to 7 days or so (unlimited) and with the stop option active. 

 

Form Handlers

A new addition the the arsenal of Promasoft Autoresponder are the so called form handlers. Using a form handler you can convert data contained in messages originating from mailers into a database. Examples of these form mailers you can find all over this site. An example is the feedback page. Every time you fill out the form listed on that page the copy of PSAR I am running adds an entry into a database I have called 'Feedback'. At any point in time I can look at that database and see the list of feedback I received from the visitors of my site. Later I can export that database to excel or any other application and work with the data. Now how can you setup such a thing yourself? 

Step 1 - Setting up the form mailer

To make use of a form handler you obviously need to setup a source from where you will receive data. A source can be the feedback form as I have said before. An example of a typical mail received from such a form mailer is listed below

name : test@hotmail.com

where : ZDNet

informed : ON

newsletter : download full

source : www.zdnet.com

You may use the same form mailer service as I am using or you can use your own CGI Form mailer if your provider allows the use of CGI scripts. For more information visit http://www.creative-dr.com

Step 2 - Create the form handler in PSAR

Click the [Frm Edit] button

The windows you will see has two list sections. The first list, lists all the form handlers you have defined. At this point in time it probably will be empty. The second list, lists all fields that are defined for the selected form handler in the first list.

Click the [new] button on top of the screen (1st button) to create a new form handler

A window will popup asking you for the name of your new form handler. Enter what you like in here. When you click ok you will see that the first list will list one form handler with no fields (listed in the second list). Now we are ready to add the fields

Cut and paste an example of the message into the Test window

To make sure that our form handler will work we can copy an example of an email (like displayed above in step 1) into the Test Window. 

Step 3 - Create the fields for our form handler

Now we are ready to create the fields. In our example we have a total of 5 fields (name, where, informed and so on). We will create 5 fields.

Click the new field button (3th button)

Enter the identifier of the first field. In our example this is 'name'.

Enter the field separator: in our case this is ':'

Enter a default value: this value will be used in case a field is missing from the email.

you can instruct PSAR to only look at a certain portion of the line by setting the line start position and the line end position.

If all goes well the box below the test field should show the value of the field. In our case this is 'test@hotmail.com'

Now repeat above for all 5 fields.

Step 4 - Finish

When all fields have been added to the form handler simply close the window

Step5 - Setting up the filter that will trap the mail to be passed on to the form handler.

We next need to make sure that the correct mail gets handled by the form handler we have just created. To do this we need to setup a filter that will trap the mail. In our example we can setup a filter that will trap on 'Body Contains: Newsletter download full'.

Now in the 'Form Handler' section of the filter (bottom of the window) select the name of the form handler we have just created. That's it.

Obviously you can at the same time reply to the originator of the message. At the moment you will also have to use the Newsletter settings option next to it with the scan body check mark enabled if the recipients email ID is located in the body of the message. If it's located in the from field you do not have to do this.

Viewing and exporting the data

Now whenever someone fills out a form on your site, that form data will be put into your form database. To view the data simply click the 'Frm View' button and select the form handler of which you want to see the data. Click the 'Export' button (the one with the disk) to export the data from the form handler into a comma separated file. This file can be imported in excel or another database application. You can even use it as an import file for a mailing list.

 

People accused me of spamming? What to do? [top]

Sending out mailings, newsletters and auto replies will make you subject to people accusing you of spamming. That's a fact of life. PS Autoresponder has options to make sure that you do all you can to give people the option to make sure that they don't get email from you anymore (unless you use your normal email program to send a mail to them).

Blacklist

PS Autoresponder is able to tag email ID's as being blacklisted. Now, how do people get on the blacklist? There are a number of ways that can happen.

Manually add people on the Blacklist

For example if you get a mail from someone telling you that they don't appreciate your mails and that they will inform your provider if you don't stop sending mails to them you can put that person on the blacklist. To do that perform following actions:

Step 1 - Select Edit / ID Log or click the [Id's] button

Step 2 - Lookup the email id by entering the first few letters of it in the lookup box. The table will scroll to that ID. 

Step 3 - Click on the ID in question selecting that record and tick the check box in the Black List Column

Step 4 - Close the window

To view all users marked as blacklisted select 'View / Blacklisted' from the menu

Import people into the Blacklist from a file you have

You might have a list of email ID's which you can't send email to. To import that list perform these actions:

Step 1 - make sure that the file is of following format: one email id per line. 

Step 2 - Select 'File / Import into blacklist' and click yes on the question on the panel

Step 3 - Browse to your file and click the Open button

Automatically add people to the blacklist (option one)

A very efficient way to add people on the blacklist is to give them the option to do that themselves. To do that perform these actions:

Step 1 - Select 'File/Settings'. On the PS AutoResponder settings panel choose a remove phrase. Example: REMOVE ME

Step 2 - In all your mailings, newsletters and auto reply message bodies make sure to add a sentence like "To be removed from this mailing list send a mail to jacob@suchard.com with subject 'REMOVE ME' "

Now if someone sends you an email with as subject 'REMOVE ME' that person will be marked as blacklisted immediately.

Automatically add people to the blacklist (option two)

A lot of people that send you email do not use a valid email ID resulting in hundreds of failure messages coming back to your from your SMTP server. Using the 'Add to blacklist immediately' option on the filter definition panel will automatically blacklist all ID's in the failure message. This way you will exactly know which ID's are valid and which are not. Make sure to enter specific filter criteria for the failure filter.

 

Creating Newsletters [top]

Although you won't find any reference to newsletters in the menu's all options to create newsletters are foreseen. A newsletter is basically nothing more than a bulk email to a mailing list. The difference is that the mailing list is automatically maintained because your visitors ask to join the mailing list themselves through email. 

For the purpose of explaining how to setup a newsletters let's sa that we want to create a newsletter called 'PS Info Letter'. To create a newsletter perform following steps

Setting up the Newsletter

Step 1 - Create a new mailing list for the Newsletter

First thing to do is to create an empty mailing list. Look here to see how to do that (manually create a mailing list). We end up with an empty mailing list called 'PS Info Letter'

Step 2 - Create the subscription message and filter

On your website (or email) you will ask people to subscribe to your newsletter. Basically the way they will do that is to send an email to you with a certain specific subject. In our example we will choose 'Subscribe PSLetter' to be the subject.

On your website you would put something like: 'To subscribe to my news letter please send an email to you@host.com with subject 'Subscribe PSLetter'

  • Select 'Edit/Filters' or click the [filters] button

  • Click the  'New' button (1st button)

  • In the filter name field enter something like 'Subscription to PS NewsLetter'. It really does not matter what you put here. It's just so you can identify the filter.

  • In the Subject Contains field enter exactly 'Subscribe PSLetter'

  • In the reply from field enter 'PS Support' (or what ever you like)

  • In the Reply Subject field enter 'You have been subscribed to the PS Info Letter' (or what ever you like)

  • In the message window enter something like 'Hi, thank you for subscribing ......' (or what ever you like)

  • In the mailing List settings section tick the Add box and select 'PS Info Letter' in the combo box. The combo box will list all mailing list you have in the database.

  • Click the Done button.

Now whenever someone sends you an email with subject 'Subscribe PSLetter' their email ID will be added to the mailing list called 'PS Info Letter' and they will receive a confirmation message (the one you just entered).

You might want to put instructions in your confirmation email to cancel a subscription to the newsletter. (something like: 'To remove yourself from the newsletter send an email to ...)

Step 3 - Create the removal message and filter

  • Do exactly the same as in step 2 but now enter 'Remove PSLetter' in the subject contains field (or what ever you like)

  • Also enter the message info appropriately (e.g. Hi, I'm sorry that you ....)

  • Select the 'Remove from' check box in the Mailing List settings section

  • Select 'PS Info letter' in the combo box (or whatever or have named it)

Now when people send you an email with subject 'Remove PSLetter' their email ID will be removed from the mailing list called 'PS Info Letter' and they will also get your sad message.

Sending out a newsletter

To send out a newsletter basically you are doing nothing more that sending out a bulk email to a mailing list. In our example the mailing list is called 'PS Info letter'. To send a mailing see here. You can also use the scheduling option to send the newsletter more than once (if you desire). Note that you need to change the mailing message once in a while otherwise people will always get the same message.

User Defined Keywords

Next to the fixed keywords you can also define your own keywords that you can use in your reply definitions or mailing definitions. An example could be $sign$ which you could define to be your email signature. Where ever in your definitions you use $sign$ it will be replace with your keyword definition.

Step 1 - Goto [File][Settings] from the main menu

Step 2 - Select the keywords tab

Step 3 - Put the cursor in the record marked with '*' and in the Keyword colum.

Step 4 - Enter a keyword (e.g sign) don't include the dollar signs

Step 5 - Enter the definition in the Value field. This definition is also displayed in the text box below the keyword list and can be multi line and as big as you want.

Now close the panel. You can always come back later and change the definition or create a new one simply by putting the cursor in the line marked with '*'. To delete a keyword select it using the record selector (small square) and press the delete button (on your keyboard)

You can define as many keywords as you want. You could even define keywords that hold complete message body's. 

When you change the definition of a keyword obviously it will reflect in all mailings and replies where you have used the keyword.

 

Viewing statistics [top]

All over PS Autoresponder you will find statistics. These are important for you to know what is happening and what kind of mail you get in and are sending out.

Main window statistics

On left of the main window you can find about 20 statistics about the current status of the database.

Bulk To Send: This indicates the number of bulk messages that are about to leave during the next cycle. These are the bulk messages where the 'to be sent' flag has passed the current time.

Messages to send: This indicates the number of replies that are about to leave during the next cycle. These are replies where the 'to be sent' flag has passed the current time.

Messages to forward: This indicates the number of messages that are going to be forwarded during the next cycle. 

Message delay passed: This is the number of messages of which the delay has passed. These messages will go through the filters again.

Messages Delayed: This is the number of replies that has been delayed.

Bulk Delayed: This is the number of bulk emails that has been delayed (because you have asked PSAR to spread them over time)

Today In: Indicates the number of messages you have received today.

Today out: Indicates the number of messages that have been sent out today including bulk and forwarding.

Msg Out this hour: Indicates the number of messages that was sent out during the last hour. This stat can never be more than the maximum number of messages going out per hour which you selected on the settings panel.

Total Msg Out: indicates the total number of messages that you have sent with PSAR from the time you first installed PSAR and started using it.

Msg NoReply: the number of messages in the database that were matched by a filter with the NoReply option active and are still in the database.

ID Total: total number of email id's in the ID Log database

ID Black: total number of email id's in the ID Log database the have been marked as blacklisted

Messages on server: This is a rough estimate on the number of messages that are supposed to be on your POP server.

Filter Hits

On the filters panel you will see a column that says 'hits'. This is the total number of times that the specific filter has matched a message. This is nice to see which filters are being hit the most. You can then take special care of that reply because you are sure that the most people are seeing that reply.

ID Log statistics

On every ID in the ID Log statistics are kept. You can obviously find these statistics on the ID Log panel.

In: The number of messages you have received from that person. If this is a high reading then this person is really hitting you with mail. Maybe you could try to get of his mailing list.

Out: The number of messages you have sent to that person. If this is a high reading that person could accuse you of spamming.

Rep: The number of mails that got cancelled to that person because of the repetition setting.

Added On: Tells you when this ID was first added to the ID Log database

Expires On: No mail will be sent to this person until after the date in this column. Remember that mailing can bypass this parameter.

NOTE: You can sort the ID Log by simply clicking on the header of the column you want to sort on. This is easy to have an idea on for example you most popular email id's.

The Statistics panel

this panel (view/statistics) is a history of the most important stats kept by day.