[GLLUG] Database for a mailing list

[Chick Tower]

I searched briefly on Freshmeat and Sourceforge for mailing list 
managers, but I had little luck.  All that I found were for managing 
e-mail mailing lists.  Perhaps some of the enterprise groupware projects 
can also handle mailing lists, but I didn't investigate that.

Fortunately, almost any database would suffice, and, as you implied, the 
hard part would be setting up an interface to the mailing list database. 
   Most databases (even SQLite) have GUI front-ends available that 
someone should be able to customize for your purposes.  For the printing 
of labels, perhaps this would suffice:

    http://packages.ubuntu.com/gutsy/glabels

Then all you would need is a database and a front-end for managing the 
list, and the programmer wouldn't need to worry about printing except to 
export a list in the proper format.

If you're going to get a custom solution, you might want to consider 
other capabilities you would like in the system, such as printing labels 
for some subset of the entire list, some manner of searching for groups 
of records, whether more than one user at a time needs to access the 
list, and if you'd like the system to handle mail merge as well (to 
create personally-addressed letters).

I'm sorry to have written in such bland generalities, and offered so 
little actual help.  It's a fascinating problem, though.

                                Chick


Athanasius Pelletier wrote:
> I am a new member of the Flint Linux User Group (is the website down or 
> is it just me?).  I spoke to Clay at my first meeting about how I have 
> been wrestling with Microsoft Access and Openoffice.org Base; I 
> intensely dislike both programs. 
> 
> I am a Franciscan friar (a type of Catholic monk).  I have had the 
> computers here at the friary on Ubuntu for over two years now but there 
> are still some Microsoft programs that I must use.  Years ago somebody 
> set up our mailing list on Access and it worked well but I really want 
> to get away from that ( I accidentally encrypted the mailing list or 
> something and I have no "access" to my data).  I retyped the list for 
> Base but that is not working out at all.
> 
> All we need is a database for around 700 names, addresses & info (for 
> now - probably no more than 1,000) and a graphical way to 
> access/add/modify/delete individual records and print labels (5160).  
> Clay said that it should be a fairly easy thing to accomplish but 
> somebody needs to program the gui.
> 
> Our community is a tax exempt corporation and I am able to give a tax 
> letter to those who would be able to donate their skills to help me out 
> with this.
> 
> Br. Athanasius    
> 
> 
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