INTRODUCTION: The Mass Contact module started out as a modified version of the core Contact module. It allows anyone with permission to send a single message to a role or group of roles (or even to all registered users). Over time, it evolved to something more than just a basic contact module to a group of users. FEATURES: Here are a list of some of the features this module has: * You can send a message to one or more groups (referred to as categories) of users, which are specified by role. * Large recipient lists may be broken up into smaller chunks. * The site administrator can control how many messages are allowed to be sent by a single person in an hour. * The message may be sent such that the recipients' e-mail addresses are hidden from each other. * The message may be sent as plain text or HTML, even specifying the input format filter to use. * The message may include one or more binary file attachments. * The site administrator may specify different texts to be placed at the beginning and/or the end of every message that is sent out. * A copy of the message may be saved as a node. * Users may opt-out, by category, of receiving mass mailings on their account settings page. INSTALLATION: This module is installed in a standard way. Generic instructions for how to do that can be found here: http://drupal.org/getting-started/install-contrib CONFIGURATION AND SETUP: The place where you create categories and modify the module's settings is found in the same place as core's Contact module, the Site building section of the Administer page (admin/build/mass_contact). You need to add at least one category before sending any mass e-mails, which can be done at the same location where the administrative settings are. MORE INFORMATION: This module works by sending a single e-mail to your mail server with the recipients' e-mail addresses in either the 'To:' or 'Bcc:' field. The mail server is then responsible for parsing out the recipients' addresses and forwarding the message along to everyone. Here is some scaling information: * This module retrieves user ids and emails in a scaled way: no * This module sends email in a scaled way: yes, within server limits * This module keeps connections up while the long process continues: no Here are all the menu items/links that are available and what they do: URL | Label | Description | To have access to | | | this URL, users | | | must have this | | | permission ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ /admin/build/ | Mass Contact form | The main | administer mass mass_contact | | administrative | contact | | interface, which | | | defaults to the | | | Category list page | | | below. | ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ /admin/build/ | Category list | List the currently | administer mass mass_contact/list | | defined | contact | | categories. | ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ /admin/build/ | Add category | Add a new | administer mass mass_contact/add | | category. | contact ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ /admin/build/ | Edit Mass Contact | Edit an existing | administer mass mass_contact/ | category (the | category. | contact edit/$category_id | 'edit' operation | | | in the Category | | | list) | | ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ /admin/build/ | Delete Mass | Delete an existing | administer mass mass_contact/ | Contact category | category. | contact delete/ | (the 'delete' | | $category_id | operation in the | | | Category list) | | ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ /admin/build/ | Settings | Administrative | administer mass mass_contact/ | | settings to modify | contact settings | | how Mass Contact | | | operates. There | | | are three sub | | | pages under this | | | one. | ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ /mass_contact | Mass Contact | The main Mass | send mass | | Contact form for | contact e-mails | | sending messages. | ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ /node/add/ | Mass Contact | The form for | create mass_contact | | adding a Mass | mass_contact | | Contact content | content | | item. | An easier to view table can be found here: http://drupal.org/node/760548#comment-2912412 TROUBLESHOOTING AND MISCELLANEOUS: * There is something the site administrator and/or the sender needs to keep in mind when breaking up a large recipient list into smaller chunks and sending the message as BCC (hiding the recipients from each other), and that is that the sender will receive a copy of the message for every group of recipients the list is broken up into. That is normal behavior and cannot be changed. * If your category permissions are not showing up correctly, check your category name and make sure you don't have any stray characters or any characters that Drupal doesn't allow. * If you experience "return-path" errors when sending e-mail, you can try the Return-Path module (http://drupal.org/project/returnpath) to see if that solves your problem.