How To Install The Mass Mailer

How to install the Mass Mailer by a beginner:

Please use the official documentation.

The purpose of ths post is to share my experience in working with this module in hopes that is will help anyone who is having dificulties getting this module installed. I posted some questions and frustrations in another thread that deals with this same topic http://drupal.org/node/16116 . I've had success installing most of the modules on Drupal and outside of the image module hadn't had such a difficult time. The thread listed above offers some insight and solutions but in the end nothing really worked out. By no means is anything I've listed in this thread original by any means, and I would have to thank Killes (http://drupal.org/user/227) for bringing me back to the basics. In the end I followed his advice and followed the instructions step by step and everything worked liked a charm. I think each of us have a different way of reading things and what makes sense to some of us is lost by others. Enough babble, here you go:

Drupal Version 4.6.2
MassMailer CVS (http://drupal.org/files/projects/mass_url-cvs.tar.gz)
PHPList (http://www.phplist.com/files/phplist-2.9.4.zip)

Before installing this module please read all of the instructions, they work.

Step One: Start from scratch, if you have already tried to install this module undo everything you've done. Deactivate the module and any plugins, and remove the folder and files from your server, and then drop any tables you created in your DB (I use Transmit 3 for ftp access to my site and phpmyadmin to add and remove tables from my databse). If you have never tried to install this module this step does not apply.

Step Two: Collect the files and modules you will need using the links above.

Step Three: Move the massmailer module folder to your modules directory ( www.yoursite.com/modules )

Step Four: From the phplist-2.9.4 folder copy the the 'public_html/lists/admin' directory into the massmailer module folder: ( www.yoursite.com/modules/massmailer/engines/phplist/phplist ) There should only be three things in this directory: the "admin folder", the "texts folder" and the "readme.txt file". The only folder you are copying over from the phplist-2.9.4 folder 'public_html/lists/' is the "admin" folder and nothing else.

Step Five: This might be the only real difficult step for anyone not familar with changing the access of a folder and setting new permissions. The instructions are: chmod the phplist file in phplist/bin to be world executable (0755). This file is located at www.yousite.com/modules/massmailer/engines/phplist/bin/phplist . You can do this using the filemanager located inside your cpanel for your site. Navigate to you public html folder and to the location of the file following the path above. You should then be able to select to change the permission of the file. DO NOT DO THIS UNLESS YOU KNOW WHAT YOU ARE DOING!! If you use an ftp program like Transmit you can do this simply by highlighting the file on your server and from the toolbar under Files> Get Info (Apple I for mac users). This will bring up a window that will let set the permissions.

Step Six: Enable the Phplist module first and save your settings, and then enable the massmailer module and save your settings.

Step Seven: Select and save your personal settings for the module under the massmailer module settings page: administer > settings > massmailer. Make sure under engines to use phplist. Fill out the other desired fields, the email report address is a required field. Save your settings.

Step Eight: Create a Mailing List and assign it users, I did this as a test using nine friends. Create a test message, and set the que for two minutes from your current time and hit process. It will say submitted.

Step Nine: Select the Send Messages under administration>massmailer>send messages You should see a text field and beneath an information field on your version of phplist along with some other information. Refresh that page in two minutes, it should display a report on your message, and you should check your inbox to see if you should have received the email report.

I hope this helps people. I've successfully sent several mass emails using plain text and html formats.

Cheers,

Will