Action Required Contents

Overview

Preferences

Usage

Acknowledgments & Distribution Rights


AR Overview
Action Required allows you to post single line reminder messages to yourself (or anyone else) via electronic mail.  It sends a simple mail message with a subject line containing text you provide to any user you designate, via an SMTP server.  You can specify a number of options to customize Action Required for your needs.

Action Required is a Win32 program which has been tested on Windows NT 3.51 and Windows95.  It also runs on Win16 with Win32s, if there is a TCP/IP stack that works with WinSock.  Action Required was written in Microsoft Visual C++, V4.0.

The latest version of Action Required may be found at: http://www.teleport.com/~rbk/software/


AR Preference Settings

SMTP Server:

This field should be filled with the internet address of your SMTP server.

To User:

This field should be filled with the Email address of the user to receive the AR messages.  The address need not be local to the SMTP server (i.e., it can specify any Internet Email address).

From User:

This field should be filled with the Email address of the user you want the messages to appear to come from.  This should be chosen such that a reply could be sent to this address.  The field can take the form eMailAddr (User Name), for example rbk@teleport.com (Bob Beck); most mail clients display User Name as the person who sent the message.

Subject Prefix:

This field is pre-pended to the message subject, and to the title bar text of the main dialog.  This string can be empty or any other string you choose (spaces are significant).  Default: AR:

After Send:

This decides what to do after sending a message.  You can pick one of the following: Do Nothing does just that, Minimize causes the dialog window to minimize, and Exit causes the program to exit.  Exit is useful if Action Required is executed via a Windows 95 shortcut.  Default: Minimize.

Auto Send:

If checked, when the entry field for the message subject text looses focus (e.g., by tabbing out of it), the message is sent.  Default: off.

Always On Top:

If checked, the main dialog stays on top of other windows.  Default: off.

Save Position:

If checked, when the main dialog is closed, its last position is saved.  The next time Action Required is run, the dialog will be in the same position on the screen.  Note: the dialog will never be placed such that any part of it is off the screen.  Default: off.

The OK button causes the preference settings to be saved (in the Windows registry), and take effect immediately in the program.  The Cancel button causes any changes made to be ignored.  The Help button lands you in this help page ;-)


How to Use AR
This section explains how to use Action Required (it could hardly be easier).

Help and the preferences dialog are available from the system menu.

To send an Action Required message, type whatever text you like in the subject of the Email message, and hit the Send button.  If there is a problem sending the mail, a dialog notifier will inform you.  Otherwise, the After Send action happens.  If the Auto Send option is selected, simply tabbing out of the entry field causes the message to be sent.

The text from the entry field is pre-pended with the Subject Prefix (if any), and becomes the subject of the Email message.  The Email message has no content other than the subject.

A message is only sent if the subject isn’t empty and it differs from the last message sent.

Action Required also acts as a file drag&drop target.  If you drag file names from explorer or file manager and drop on the AR dialog, the file names will appear in the entry field (this allowing editing before sending).

Any command line arguments passed to Action Required are sent as the subject of a message, using the current program settings. Action Required exits after this (no dialog is displayed).  This allows drag&drop of file names to an Action Required shortcut on the Win95 desktop: any file names dragged to the shortcut are sent as the subject of a message.  A similar usage is available if a shortcut to Action Required is placed in the SendTo menu.


Acknowledgments and Distribution Rights

Action Required Acknowledgments

and Distribution Rights

Action Required was written by Bob Beck (rbk@teleport.com, RDBeck@aol.com, 71674.106@compuserve.com).  The binary of the program has been placed in the public domain.  Please distribute it as widely as you like, as long as this acknowledgment section and the ReadMe.txt file are sent with it, and I retain credit for its creation.

The SMTP client code in Action Required is based (with modification) on the public domain source code in blat11.zip.  Thanks to blat authors Mark Neal (mjn@aber.ac.uk) and Pedro Mendes (prm@aber.ac.uk) for making this code available.

Please send comments, complaints, requests for new features, etc. to the author.

The latest copy of Action Required may be found at:

http://www.teleport.com/~rbk/software/


An SMTP Server implements the Intenet Simple Mail Transfer Protocol for sending electronic mail.


The internet address of your favorite SMTP server.


The Email address of the user to receive the AR messages.


The Email address of the user you want the messages to appear to come from.


This field is pre-pended to the message subject and the title bar; spaces are significant.


What to do after sending a message:  Do Nothing, Minimize, or Exit.


If checked, when the entry field for the message subject text looses focus (e.g., by tabbing out of it), the message is sent.


Saves the preference settings (in the Windows registry).  Changes take effect immediately in the program.


Ignore changes made to preference settings.


Attempt to priovide help ;-)


Preferences dialog, help, and about box available from the system menu.


The subject for the Action Required message goes here.


Send the message.


The current subject prefix is indicated in the title bar.


If checked, the dialog stays on top of other windows.


If checked, the next time AR is run, the dialog is positioned where it was the last time.