Eureka! Finally a Yahoo! Pipe - of my own manufacture - that can send emails using the Web Service module.
I'm so excited because I searched and searched the web without success for such a pipe before rolling up one myself. (Not sure if nobody was able to crank up this functionality or nobody cared to share). It has been made possible by SendGrid's mail servers - accessible via REST or Web API .
Wait, it WILL NOT WORK OUT-OF-THE-BOX: You will have to fill in a few blanks (beyond the visible user inputs) before you can put it to any use. They are the three Private String modules:
1. SendGrid-BaseURL (value for 'Base' field of the URL Builder module)
2. SendGrid-UserName (value for the 'api_user' query parameter)
3. SendGrid-Password (value for the 'api_key' query parameter)
Item 2 & 3 here are self-explanatory - you need authenticated access to an mail relay server to send email, and SendGrid.com allow you to sign up for a free account for up to 200 email a day. (This should suffice for testing and/or personal use. If you need more volume going forward, you can always move to a paid plan.)
For item 1, I used: 'https://sendgrid.com'. Combined with the two path elements that follow in the URL Builder, the service URL becomes 'https://sendgrid.com/api/mail.send.json'. Please note that these path elements are service specific - other service providers are unlikely to have the same path to their JSON API. Also, before you can make a service call to the SendGrid URL, you will have to sign up.
Some people may want to know if this pipe will work with other mail servers. Honestly, I don't know - I'm not a programmer - and I have not tested it with any other service. It was thanks chiefly to SendGrid's excellent support and documentation that I was able to roll this up in the first place - I have tested it with their servers, and it's a go.
Happy Piping, and please use the technique demonstrated in this Pipe responsibility - not least because SendGrid are very tough on anything they consider spam.
