the_path implements a simple textual DSL for bulk mailers for those who would prefer local markup files to a visual editor in the browser.
As a developer/marketer, you write files in a local directory for creating series of email interactions, rather like how a static site generator like Jekyll or Middleman generates a blog.
It's an experiment, not a full-featured production library.
I'm building it on MailChimp. It has a great API, it has a permanent free usage tier, it's what I've personally usually used -- for those same reasons. You could do write a gem like this based on transactional email (e.g. MailGun or SendGrid) but you'd have to run a server to trigger the emails. MailChimp seems to be the obvious mail software in the "sweet spot" here.
NOTE: Create Campaign doc page in PHP: https://isabelcastillo.com/create-send-mailchimp-campaign-api-3
You can install the gem manually or add it to your Gemfile.
$ gem install the_path
You'll also need a MailChimp API key in MAILCHIMP_API_KEY (see below.)
The_path requires MailChimp. Set up your MailChimp API key in an environment variable:
export MAILCHIMP_API_KEY=ffffffffeeeeeeffffffccccccccdddd-us2
You can find your API key here after logging into your MailChimp account: http://admin.mailchimp.com/account/api
After checking out the repo, run bin/setup to install dependencies. Then, run rake test to run the tests. You can also run bin/console for an interactive prompt that will allow you to experiment.
To install this gem onto your local machine, run bundle exec rake install. To release a new version, update the version number in version.rb, and then run bundle exec rake release, which will create a git tag for the version, push git commits and tags, and push the .gem file to rubygems.org.
Bug reports and pull requests are welcome on GitHub at https://github.com/[USERNAME]/the_path. This project is intended to be a safe, welcoming space for collaboration, and contributors are expected to adhere to the Contributor Covenant code of conduct.
The gem is available as open source under the terms of the MIT License.
Everyone interacting in the ThePath project’s codebases, issue trackers, chat rooms and mailing lists is expected to follow the code of conduct.