Email Routing
Using Directra you can route any email sent to your domain (or Directra subdomain) to the correct people in your Group. With just a few simple steps you can have all of your domain's email routing handled seamlessly. And once you have email routing set up in Directra you can use any program (not just Directra) for sending email to your Directra domain and routing will be taken care of.
It is important to understand the difference between a routing address and a target address. Any address for your Directra domain is a routing address, i.e. email sent to this address will be sent on to a "real" address (the target address) where it can be read by any email program. You don't receive and read email in Directra, Rather you assure that email sent to members of your Group using a Directra email address is sent to the right person(s).
Using the Directra Subdomain
Any email address using your subdomain (e.g. info@mydomain.directra.com) will come to Directra, where it will be routed to a specific target address. No external configuration is required to make sure that email sent to this subdomain will come to Directra.
Using Your Own Domain name
There are two different ways you can configure your domain so that Directra will route your email.
- Change your name server records to use Directra as described here. Be aware that this solution not only allows Directra to handle all email routing for this domain, but also makes Directra the default web site for your domain.
- To use Directra to route emails without also becoming your default web site you will need to change the MX records for your domain. See Changing the MX Records for Your Domain for details.
Creating Routing Addresses
You have several options for defining routing addresses in Directra.
- Automatic Assignment: If you enable this option, then every time you add a member to your Group and supply their email address Directra will automatically assign a Directra address which will route to the person's email address. Use the Email section of the Settings tab to enable this option and to define the formatting to be used for the routing address. If you have your own domain defined in Directra, then the routing address will use your domain name. If not, then the routing address will use your Directra subdomain name.
Example: If you add Tom Smith to your group with address tom@somedomain.com, Directra will create the routing address tom.smith@yourdomain.directra.com. Emails sent to thie routing address will end up at Tom's real address, tom@somedomain.com.
- Everyone: Directra automatically provides to every Group the ability to send email to all Group members. Emails sent to everyone@mydomain.directra.com will be sent to all Group members who have target address assigned. You don't have to use "everyone" for this address. In the Email section of the Settings tab, you can change this to "all" or any other address you want to use when sending to all Group members.
- Catch-All Address: Use the catch-all address to handle the situation where email is sent to your domain but the address used does not match any routing addresses your have defined. You can supply a target address to which all unrouted email will be sent. Or, you can leave the catch-all address blank, in which case unrouted email will be bounced back to the sender, saying that the email address is unknown. Advanced users can refer to Using the Catch-All Address for additional options.
- Tags: One of the most powerful features in Directra. You can assign a tag to a member, then associate an email address with that tag. When email is sent to tagname@yourdomain.direcgtra.com it will be routed to each person who has been assigned that tag. See Using Tags in Directra for full details.
- Assigning Email Addresses: Use this feature to assign routing addresses to one or more members of your Group. See Assigning Email Addresses for details.
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