I got a couple of recommendations of better groups to post to, but
since some people have kindly replied here with suggestions and tips,
I thought I'd reply with my findings.
I found an example of a way to send an e-mail in both HTML and Plain
formats which allows the mail client to decide which one to use.
It's in PHP, which is what I use, but I'm certain the same thing can
easily be done in ASP:
<?php
$to="Recipient Name <somebody@example.com>";
$from="Sender Name <jdoe@example.com>";
$subject="My first HTML E-mail";
$mime_boundary="==Multipart_Boundary_x".md5(mt_ran d())."x";
$headers = "From: $from\r\n" .
"MIME-Version: 1.0\r\n" .
"Content-Type:multipart/alternative;\n" .
" boundary=\"{$mime_boundary}\r\n\"";
$headers.= "From: $from\r\n";
$message = "This is a multi-part message in MIME format.\n\n" .
"--{$mime_boundary}\n" .
"Content-Type: text/plain; charset=\"iso-8859-1\"\n" .
"Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit\n\n" .
"HTML E-mail\n\nThis is the text portion of an HTML e-mail\n" .
"--{$mime_boundary}\n" .
"Content-Type: text/html; charset=\"iso-8859-1\"\n" .
"Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit\n\n" .
"<h1>HTML E-mail</h1>" .
"<p>This is an <b>HTML</b> e-mail.</p>";
if (mail($to, $subject, $message, $headers))
echo "Message Sent!";
else
echo "Failed to send message.";
?>
It indeed does involve MIME as one person suggested, although I don't
know if RFC is involved...or even what that is. =)
And in reply to one poster, I agree that HTML e-mail in general has
questionable use since most of it is generally spam, but it really is
a good way to send newsletters, and in our case, a series of "how to
use your new account" instructions including screenshots of what our
clients will see.
Lockergnome.com is one in which uses regular HTML newsletters
mailings. But, it's all personal preference. =)
Thanks all who replied, especially when all you had to do was say "use
newsgroup x.y.z newbie!" =)
Liam
