[RESOLVED] Creating and populating email templates

[Webskater]

I have a page that is called from loads of different pages that basically sends emails. It has text boxes for Subject, From Address etc. and a textbox like the one I am typing in now (on this site) which allows users to format a html message.

I need to develop the functionality by providing email templates for the message.

So, the template text (which will be stored and retrieved from a database) might contain:

Dear .......

Thanks for attending the meeting.

Kind regards
.......

Where the ...... are, I would want to fill in the name of the person who is going to receive the email and the name of the person sending it.

So, I'm on the page - I've retrieved the text for the message from the database - I have SendersName and ReceiversName sitting there in variables - how do I get them in the text in the right place?

I was thinking I could make the template text look like this:-

Dear [ReceiversName]

Thanks for attending the meeting.

Kind regards
[SendersName]

and then, on the page, just Replace the various 'tags'. Is this a good idea?

Thanks for any suggestions.

[avrail]

hay,
i believe this will help
http://www.aspheute.com/english/20000918.asp

[honeybee]

@Webskater, what you have proposed is actually a good idea, one that I have used in a few projects in the past.

If you want more sophistication, you could explore the XML/XSLT alternative, but it might be an overkill. For a simple template-based email app, inserting placeholders in the template and then replacing them with the actual values should work best.

.

[gep13]

Webskater,

You can find an example here:

http://dotnettricks.com/blogs/roberh.../05/12/57.aspx

Hope that helps!

Gary

[Webskater]

Thanks for all the replies. To be honest I thought it was a bit of a daft question, but it wasn't. I didn't know anything about what is shown in the link Gary provided - and that is just what I was after.

Thanks again.

[gep13]

Not a problem at all, happy to help!!

Let us know if you have any problems.

Gary