Send Mail via SMTP is a feature added in v10 of FileMaker Pro, that enables sending email directly without requiring a user’s email client application. The Send via SMTP option is also available to the Send Mail script step for FileMaker Pro, and is enabled for FileMaker Server. This adds the ability to automate sending via server-side scripts, whereas prior versions required a FileMaker Pro client to send email.

As usual, with power comes responsibility. In this case, it means knowing your SMTP configuration details and correctly formatting email elements. Failure here is easy, often resulting in the general (and least informative) error, 1506: “Email(s) could not be sent successfully”. (See below for a common but unexpected condition that triggers this error.)

We’ve created a file that should help streamline the process of finding SMTP settings that work… Read more… »