Mail merge to SharePoint site group members

[Caesar3]

Has anyone here tried to create a mail merge from the list of members of a SharePoint group? I have a group with 95 members. I need to send a message to all 95 members. I can't send one message to all 95 members at once--something about a 2,083 character limit to the TO: field in Outlook. So I thought an e-mail merge would do the trick.

My immediate problem is capturing all those e-dresses. In the view of the list of members, all the records appear as links. For example:

Smith, John A Mr CIV USA TRADOC USAAC

I don't see a way to collect all those names in a list so I can put the names into an Excel file or an Access table. Any ideas?

[jscher2000]

In the view of the list of members, all the records appear as links. For example:

Smith, John A Mr CIV USA TRADOC USAAC

I don't see a way to collect all those names in a list so I can put the names into an Excel file or an Access table. Any ideas?

Are they mailto: links? In that case, this bookmarklet will harvest them and display them in a <textarea> field so you can copy and paste them into Outlook:

javascript:var l,n,h,t; var s=""; l=document.getElementsByTagName("A"); for(n=0;n<l.length;n++){h=l[n].href.toLowerCase(); if(h.indexOf("mailto:")>-1){s+="<"+h.replace("mailto:","")+">; "}} if(s!=""){t=document.createElement("textarea"); t.value=s; t.style.cssText="width:480px;height:320px;border:2px solid #000;position:absolute;top:20px;left:20px;z-index:100";document.body.appendChild(t);} void 0;

To run that, copy and paste the entire script to the address bar and press Enter. Tested in Fx3.5 and IE7. (Probably won't work in in a <frameset>, but I didn't test it.)

Any luck?

Note: not to be used by spammers!!

== Edit ==

If you want the link text rather than the email address, that would require a relatively minor change to the above code.

[Caesar3]

Thanks, Jefferson. I don't know that they're mailto: links. I do know that if I were to type something like my sample into the TO: field of an Outlook e-mail form, our server will check it and, if it matches a record in its database, a few moments later the text will acquire the underscore that marks it as an e-dress. If instead I type the conventional e-dress (fname.lname@xxx.xxxx.xxx), Outlook instantly recognizes it as an e-dress.

My immediate problem is simply how to capture the list of addresses in the SharePoint group. The only way I see to do that is to manually key all 95 into, say, Excel or Access. Got a better idea?

Thanks!

[JoeP517]

Thanks, Jefferson. I don't know that they're mailto: links. I do know that if I were to type something like my sample into the TO: field of an Outlook e-mail form, our server will check it and, if it matches a record in its database, a few moments later the text will acquire the underscore that marks it as an e-dress. If instead I type the conventional e-dress (fname.lname@xxx.xxxx.xxx), Outlook instantly recognizes it as an e-dress.

My immediate problem is simply how to capture the list of addresses in the SharePoint group. The only way I see to do that is to manually key all 95 into, say, Excel or Access. Got a better idea?

Thanks!

What version of SharePoint? Can't you create a view of the list that includes the e-mail address?

Joe

[Caesar3]

Hello, everybody--

A member of our team found a solution. Thanks for your input!

To answer your question, Joe: We use SharePoint Server 2007 with Office 2007.

[JoeP517]

Hello, everybody--

A member of our team found a solution. Thanks for your input!

To answer your question, Joe: We use SharePoint Server 2007 with Office 2007.

Can you share your solution so others may benfit?

Joe

[jscher2000]

I don't know that they're mailto: links.

I should have said "try this, it will work if they are mailto links."

[Caesar3]

Oh, yes--the solution! Thanks for the reminder, Joe! I was in a hurry with the boss lingering over my shoulder when I wrote that last message!

The solution turned out to be surprisingly simple. A member of our SharePoint support team selected about half of the names on the list and clicked "E-mail these persons" (or similar words). A new Outlook e-mail form opened with those names in the TO: field. Then he copied and pasted all those e-dresses into Notepad.

Then he went back to that list of people in the SharePoint group and selected the names he had not selected the first time and followed the same steps. When he finished, he sent me the text file containing all 95 e-dresses. I pasted them into a new e-mail form. Mission accomplished.

That sounds a bit convoluted and not at all elegant, but it got me what I needed. It turns out the problem was not a character-count limitation in Outlook, but something in the browser or the server between SharePoint and Outlook. My support guy doesn't know where the problem lies, but something would not permit me to lob all 95 e-dresses into an Outlook message in one stroke.

My thanks to Joe and Jefferson for your responses!