This is Just Depressing
This evening I was browsing some of the recent posts on the amsuing thedailywtf.com and was amused by a post that detailed a certain programmer’s predecessor’s trials and tribulations trying to fulfill the requirement to”programmatically send an email in .NET” and the source control log that details the programmer’s frustration of trying to send an email under windows 2003 by programmatically manipulating Microsoft Outlook.
Yes. Manipulating the UI of Microsoft Outlook to send an email. From .NET. 
But it doesn’t end there, the programmer has a difficult time getting around Outlook’s “anti-hijacking feature” that prompts the user to click yes if they want to let the program send the email. So he goes back and forth to the drawing board, struggles with a custom coded attempt to trick Outlook, then finally reveals the solution:
2004-12-07 16:22 — Install, on the server, a newly purchased program called ClickYes that automatically clicks “Yes” to those dialogs.
After I stopped laughing, I did a little google seatch and discovered, yes, there IS a program called ClickYes! And it’s at version 2.2! I really couldn’t stop grinning, especially when I saw the hundred dollar server license fee and the fact that it also has an API hints that sadly a lot of people have used this as a “solution” to their “problem” of programmatically sending an email.
If only he had spent a second to use google. 
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