Post #7,516
9/2/01 8:47:00 PM
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Help on faxing?
As I slide further and further into
the slime, I've hit the next lower
lever.
Fax blasts.
1st I do paper junk mail. I can live with
that. Trees are a renewable resource.
Then I do email spam. Only to people
who request it (WHAT WERE THEY THINKING?),
but it is still slimey.
Now fax blasts to current clients who have
given us their fax number. Ewwwwwww.
So, anybody got any advice for me?
I'll be doing it out a of fax modem from Linux
box. The faxes will be 2 pages. A dynamic cover
with "To:" information, and a static advertising
blurb as the 2nd sheet. I seem to recall that
the fax wants 'tiff' files, which means I'll have
to generate them after personalising each cover.
Jeez, this seems like real work.
The cover is currently an MS Word doc, which
I can save as anything to work on.
The static page is PDF, which I can convert via
Gimp (right?)
I can hack up the cover via some Perl and Image Magic
(maybe). I'd like to keep the company logo in it
if possible, but I accept just plain text if
it takes longer than a day.
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Post #7,518
9/2/01 9:38:10 PM
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I have a client doing this with OS/2
It's easy and it works slick. The names and addresses are in a csd (comma separated data) file. A cover page file is made up that the fax program automagically fills in with the address data for each transmission.
At my suggestion (to keep transmission fast and the customers happy) the advertising data (a list of recent arrivals (exotic metals)) is the cover page, so it's a one page transmission.
The software we use, Keller Group's PM/Fax is also available for Linux. Keller has recently sold the product line to CDS which will continue development and marketing. The product page is at [link|http://www.kellergroup.com/prodinfo/pmfaxlinux.html|CDS/Keller]. This is a great program and also acts as the office fax server with sales people faxing from the desktop all day long through a single modem.
The client originally used WinFax Pro, but PMFax can get out at least three times as many faxes per night, and WinFax uses a proprietary data format for the addresses which made it a lot harder to use.
Some customers called up asking to be taken off the fax list, but the transmission has been well received by most and has generated a lot of business. [link|http://www.aaxnet.com/product/cli_hightemp.html|Company description here].
[link|http://www.aaxnet.com|AAx]
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Post #7,521
9/2/01 10:10:41 PM
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check multitech
they had pretty gvood fax software on sco and if they are still alive if might be portable to linux, if not dont blame me I was just a tester.:)
thanx,
bill
Our bureaucracy and our laws have turned the world into a clean, safe work camp. We are raising a nation of slaves.
Chuck Palahniuk
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Post #7,526
9/2/01 11:03:25 PM
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Aww, C'mon guys
I have to have this up by Monday afternoon on
current hardware with current software.
So far I've gotten the MS-Word .doc cover letter
"printed" as a post script doc. I've converted
that with ps2pdf to a pdf.
I've downloaded Text-PDF-API-0.701.4.tar.gz which
is a Perl PDF manipulation library. I should be able
to use that to overlay the "To:" data into the
current PDF cover.
All RH Linux installs since 6.0 have efax installed,
which works fine with my US Robotics fax/modem.
Should be ready by noon tomorrow.
I hope.
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Post #7,528
9/2/01 11:17:35 PM
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Reality sucks
Under TODO:
> function to populate a Text::PDF::API object from an
> existing pdf-file ?
Hmm. Well, I still should be able to convert the current
cover to a PBM and then use Image::Magick to overlay the
text that way.
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Post #7,543
9/3/01 12:52:04 AM
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Done
#!/usr/bin/perl -w
use strict;
use Image::Magick;
my $file = shift;
my $out = shift;
my $name = shift;
my $company = shift;
my $fax_num = shift;
my $phone_num = shift;
my $image = Image::Magick->new(magick=>'TIFF');
open(DATA, $file) or die "Can't open file - $file - $!";
$image->Read(file=>'DATA');
close(DATA);
my $line_offset_inc = 40;
my $y = 350;
$image->Annotate(text=>$name, y=>$y, fill=>'black',
\t\tpointsize=>20, x=>180);
$y+= $line_offset_inc;
$image->Annotate(text=>$company, y=>$y,fill=>'black',
\t\tpointsize=>20,x=>180);
$y+= $line_offset_inc;
$image->Annotate(text=>$fax_num, y=>$y,fill=>'black',
\t\tpointsize=>20,x=>180);
$y+= $line_offset_inc;
$image->Annotate(text=>$phone_num, y=>$y,fill=>'black',
\t\tpointsize=>20,x=>180);
$image->Write($out);
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Post #7,577
9/3/01 4:52:38 PM
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Advice?
Don't look in a mirror.
You don't want to know whether you still respect yourself after this slide into the abyss...
/duck
Ben
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Post #7,591
9/3/01 8:32:23 PM
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Nah
We've had those deeply personal conversations
where I've hinted at my darker side.
This doesn't come close to the depths of
depravity that I'm capable of.
It's just not as fun.
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Post #7,593
9/3/01 8:58:44 PM
9/4/01 1:20:30 AM
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Hmmm...
The concept of an evil sysadmin raises some interesting possibilities...
- Your database has how many credit cards?
- What is their current market value?
- Do you think you can run fast enough?
Should you choose to single-handedly do your part to restore consumer confidence, please warn me first. I want to know which banks to short, and which companies to buy options in. Oh right, and I am sure that if in the random shipping of equipment from companies A to random people B paid for by random credit cards C, B happened to be a set that included most of us and A happened to be a good selection of computer companies, none of us would think to mention it so long as our credit cards weren't in group C... Cheers, Ben PS My sincere apologies for putting names in the original version of this. While people typically have a sense of humor, automated computer programs do not.
Edited by ben_tilly
Sept. 4, 2001, 01:20:30 AM EDT
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Post #7,614
9/4/01 1:04:51 AM
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Hey, admin
While I'm sure we all appreciate Ben's littly funny, I request
that the above joke be erased. Since this forum gets spidered
by Google and others, I'd really not want a future employer
to stumble across my full name associated with a monstrous
bank scam.
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