Moodle plugins directory: Quickmail

Sounds great, Chad.
Our institution is currently on 3.1 and we're using a custom responsive theme based on evolve-D.

When will it be upgraded for Moodle 3.2 and later?

Hi, Just to confirm the issue I reported earlier about the Potential Recipients box is a set height and rather large. It is much bigger than the box for Recipients only happens in the Edge browser when using Windows 10. Seems fine in Chrome with Windows 10 and fine in IE and Chrome on Win7 so not so bad as first thought.

Hello Stabsstelle, I'm going to put through a small patch today that will address Moodle 3.3 compatibility. I installed Quickmail on a fresh install of 3.3 today and I did see an error in regards to a deprecated "pix_url()" function. I've got that taken care of. Will do a little further testing to make sure I've got it handled. Wanted to ask if you are aware of anything else that stands in the way of Quickmail being compatible with 3.3?

Hey Yvonne, thanks for this great feedback! I have to admit that I rarely (well, never) test in Edge. I'll be sure to do so today and take a look at that sizing issue in hopes of including any styling fixes on today's small patch.

Chad

Hello, Chad,
We use Moodle 3.3.1 (Build: 20170710). We have put at ./moodle/admin/settings.php?section=outgoingmailconfig "allowedemaildomains", Quickmail does not take these data and so outgoing e-mails are sent with the common noreplyaddress instead of the personal sender's adress. Would be fine if you can do it ...
Greetings from Salzburg, Austria
Robert

Yvonne, first, I didn't mean any offense in my comments about Edge! I'm just on a Mac now and have never had the opportunity of using it. With that said, I just got it set up on my machine and it looks quite nice, in fact way faster than my favorite, Chrome! But anyway... I found that on 3.3, a Quickmail install straight of the box (Dev-30 branch, what is available through this Moodle site) looked nearly identical to what I see on Chrome. I also checked it out on our production site which runs 3.1 and the essential theme and get very similar results. I've got screenshots I can share but, for the sake of discussion, I can say that it's (potential) about ~1.5" larger on the screen (than selected). Is this what you're experiencing? I will fix this but I want to make sure I'm not missing something here.

Hey Robert, and greetings to you from Louisiana. I see your problem there. That "allowedemaildomains" config option was added in to Moodle core since 3.1 which is why it wasn't handled by our development thus far. With that said, I don't believe this is something we would allow here at LSU for security reasons (potential spoofing, etc) but I could be wrong. I will discuss further with our team and find out what we can do. But out of curiosity, if you set up the configuration in Moodle to allow whitelist subdomains, and to NOT use the default noreply, wouldn't the email go out as you want it - with whatever that user's email address is? If not, what kind of errors are you receiving?

By the way, I committed that one small change (3.3 compatibility) yesterday to our dev-30 branch on github. I will go ahead and run through it the Moodle plugins system today as well.

Chad

Hi Chad! Love QuickMail. Is there away we can add just the first name of the students we send to, onto the letter?? Also, I noticed when sending messages out, the name 'Quickmail' is associated with the 'no-reply' email address. Any way we can mod this?? We do use the 'no-reply' email address for students to actually reply to our letters generated by QuickMail.

Hey Marvin, thanks for the message. To answer your questions: In regards to the "no-reply" outbound email, yes, we'll make that configurable. In regards to injecting custom data like names, no. LSU is focused on pedagogical features when it comes to Moodle. Our opinion is that data even as simple as a user's first name doesn't support pedagogical purpose. We see that as more of a "marketing" feature if you will.

Thanks Chad! Interesting views on names being non-pedagogical. I will let that spin around in my head for a little while. lol

Hi Chad, we love Quickmail. We were disappointed to see that the messages were going out from the no-reply email address. It through a few of our faculty members through a loop. We're happy to here that you're going to make it configurable. We're looking forward to that update.

Hi Ryan, just to note... you can actually change the 'no-reply' email address to an email address that students actually can reply to. I did. It's just that it says 'Quickmail' as the name associated with the email address, versus something configurable to like 'Student Services' instead.

Hi Marvin, can you help us find the place where we can change the 'no-reply' email address to an email address students can reply to? I don't see the option. Thanks!

HI Ryan, although the options says 'No-Reply", you just simply type in an email address that the student CAN reply to replace the current 'noreply@yourcollege.com'. Do be sure to use a reply email address with the domain that is the same as the one Moodle is on. Most hosting services will reject any other domains to prevent SPAM abuse. (if that made any sense)

Hi Chad,
First - great plugin and very useful!
Re your comment: Our opinion is that data even as simple as a user's first name doesn't support pedagogical purpose. We see that as more of a "marketing" feature if you will.
Adding a first name makes is more personal, and when things get personal students are more motivated to study. Please reconsider

Hi Chad. I would have to say that I agree with Gil S. Adding just a first name gives the student assurance that they are not just a number or a "Dear Valued Student". Adding a name is very professional. But then again, I am not the programmer.