Microsoft Access Email FAQ - SendObject

Last updated 09/27/2010

Use DoCmd.SendObject which will call the default MAPI-compliant mailer (such as Outlook, Exchange, Eudora, ...) which is currently installed on your system. This is the simplest way, but also the most restrictive. See the Access online help for more info.

Using SendObject to E-Mail Data Screen shots and detailed description suitable for VBA novices.  Data in this case means the results of a query.

SendObject's twenty limitations

1) Limited message length (255 characters, I believe.)
2) Cannot attach multiple file attachments.
3) Cannot send attachments that are not Access objects. You will note that if you want to E-mail an Access report, the RTF export does not preserve the formatting, especially if subreports are present. There are alternatives mentioned at the Emailing reports as attachments page..
4) May not work with MSMail32.EXE. One of our customers (a SendObject convert) reported "I want to report success via IDSMail in dealing with the Microsoft bug in MSMail32.EXE. You have saved us further headaches and shortened the time required to make our software NT compatible". We have not confirmed this MSMail bug at IDS.
5) Cannot automatically ZIP the file attachments.
6) Cannot select MIME or UUENCODE encoding method for Internet mail. You are at the mercy of the profile settings (if Outlook/Exchange) or your mail gateway to determine which to use. Unfortunately, there are still sites in the world that can only accept one or the other.
7) Does not work with Lotus cc:Mail, Lotus Notes, or other VIM clients.
8) Does not work with BeyondMail, Shark!Mail, or other Banyan mail clients.
9) Does not work with DaVinci Mail, Pegasus, or other MHS mail clients.
10) Cannot add custom headers to the message to facilitate automatic tracking and synchronization with your table key fields.
11) Cannot specify to have the receiver generate a return receipt when the mail is received.
12) Cannot tell a Microsoft Mail or Exchange client operating remotely to immediately connect to the post office and send the mail. You must rely on the user to do this before your message is actually transmitted.
13) Provides no access to the Address Book to validate recipients (programmatically), or allow your Access application to look them up.
14) Does not support non-IPM messages under MAPI
15) Provides no ability to specify the X-Mailer field in an Internet mail message. 16) Cannot add generic X-headers to an Internet mail message.
17) Cannot send asynchronously (in the background) which is especially nice when you have large attachments and a slow modem connection.
18) Provides no ability to sense the installed E-mail system and process the commands automatically no matter what that system is.
19) Wanted a nice round number of reasons. <grin>
20) And finally, if you're looking to distribute software, you're completely at the mercy of the users settings. Talk about support problems and being a time waster.

Note that these limitations were identified in Access 2.0, are believed to still be valid for new versions of Access, but that testing has not been done.

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