[FEATURE REQUEST] - WYSIWYG for Mass Mail Tool

[Hyperactive Inc]

A few notes regarding this feature, its implications and why it is needed.


Reasons for Inclusion of this Feature:

1. a good percentage of your Joomla users are using this as a development platform for their own customers who do not know the first line of HTML code. They are using it as a tool to allow their customers to manage and create and edit their own websites. It has done this job wonderfully and we are extremely thankful for the work done by the Joomla development staff.

2. The means for introducing this functionality is already in place. You can currently use the WYSIWYG editor for all content in the administration backend except for the mass mail tool. I am not sure why the WYSIWYG editor was excluded from the mass mail tool, but it should be there in my opinion.

3. If a WYSIWYG editor was not going to be used, why include the "html format" checkbox for mass mail? this requires that the end user know HTML code. Since most end users do not know HTML code a WYSIWYG editor is a required tool in our opinion.


Cons for Not Including this Feature:

We cannot think of a single Con!


Methods for Including this Feature:

We think one of the following scenarios should suffice nicely.

1.a. Include the WYSIWYG editor at the top of the edit mass mail text box. This would be grey'd out until the "HTML Format" checkbox was checked. Once the "HTML Format" checkbox was checked the buttons would become usable.

1.b. Leave the mass mail tool initially as is, and only display the WYSIWYG editor once the "HTML Format" checkbox was activated. This could be done using a simple page refresh on checkbox activation.

2. Since the current text area for editing the content of a mass mail sends in text mode, you could remove the "HTML Format" checkbox, and include a second editing area which was in HTML format already, with an included WYSIWYG editor in place. This would allow Joomla to send BOTH a true html copy and a text copy if the admin added content to both text areas.


In closing, since there are a significant portion of end users who cannot get html formatted email, the ability to send BOTH a text AND an HTML email would be preferable so that all users received something. For this reason we think #2 above is the best solution.

Either way, the ability for Joomla users who do not know HTML to send imbedded images, formatted text and the like is highly needed and we would appreciate its inclusion as a feature, as im sure our clients would as well.


sincerely,

[Sparky0118]

Hey,

I really wanted this too, so I made some changes to admin.massmail.html.php

I added the following to the top of the function "messageForm" at line 26

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<?php $editor = &JFactory::getEditor();	?>

Then I removed the original input box that is on line 125

Remove

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<textarea rows="20" cols="150" name="mm_message" id="mm_message" class="inputbox"></textarea>

and replaced it with the WYSIWYG editor code

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<?php // parameters : areaname, content, width, height, cols, rows
			echo $editor->display( 'mm_message',  $row->text , '100%', '550', '75', '20' ) ;?>

Then on line 38 I removed the line in the validation that checks for a value in the message box.
(I could not get the validation to work with the WYSIWYG editor)

Remove

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else if (form.mm_message.value == ""){
					alert( "<?php echo JText::_( 'Please fillin the message', true ); ?>" );
				}

Finally make the HTML text box on line 70 default to "checked" by adding checked to the code like this

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<input type="checkbox" name="mm_mode" id="mm_mode" value="1" checked />

Now the WYSIWYG editor will work to send mass mail.
Even if you enter the text in the WYSIWYG editor and then uncheck the "Send in HTML" button no code from the WYSIWYG editor gets sent in the email.

Hope this helps someone, please reply if there is something I didn't think about or any improvements.

I have included the admin.massmail.html.php file that belongs in
administrator/components/com_massmail/
so if you want to download it and override your exsisting file you can
also all original code has been left in tact so if you have any troubles
you can revert to the old way.

Thanks,

Daniel Spark

[R4W5ONE]

Thank You.

[AmyStephen]

Daniel -

This is a good change, IMO. I would encourage you to consider submitting a Feature Patch for Joomla! 1.6

1. Review the Guidelines for Feature Patches.

2. Download the Joomla! 1.6 nightly or access via the SVN.

3. Submit to the Joomla! 1.6 Feature Patch Repository.

4. Post an email describing the change and the location for the patch to the Joomla! 1.6 Developer CMS List.

I believe we are about 2 weeks out from Beta, so, it would be important to do this rather quickly, if you decide to do so. Also, it might not be accepted, so, don't be disappointed if it's not. We all have feature patches that were turned down and we lived to tell about it! ;-)

Thanks for considering.
Amy

[Sparky0118]

Sounds good,

I'll give it a go, no harm in trying.
It would be nice to be able to contribute to something that has helped so much,
not to mention seeing something you have done go out in an official version.

Thanks for the pointers.

Daniel Spark

[Sparky0118]

After some testing, I'd like to provide some information about the issues with this hack.

Your settings in TinyMCE or other editor need to use absolute links.

In TinyMCE you can choose relative or absolute.
If TinyMCE is set to relative and you enter an absolute URL it will change to a relative link.

Also I have the validation working since my last post, (I will upload the new file in the next day or so) unfortunately an issue with Joomla causes a fault with the validation if you toggle the editor. This issue is said to be fixed in Joomla 1.5.15

Things that would be nice to see added to this hack are:

> A preview button
> A send test email button

I don't have the knowledge to add these things but if anyone else would like to have a go, it would have more of a chance of being accepted as a part of Joomla.

I personally like this hack as the people I get to use Joomla don't understand HTML so it is beyond them.

Thanks,

Daniel Spark

[kona_pete]

Hey Guys,

I find the easiest way to deal with this until Joomla builds it into Mass Mail is just paste your formated text into an html editor like dreamweaver and then just copy all the code and paste it into the Mass Mail message box. Works great!

KP