How can I test email generating without creating and checking 1,000 addresses?

Question

I am working on generating emails using Java. I would love to use some sort of system where I can send out mass emails and ensure that the emails were received by the intended recipient (A. My code to send the emails worked and B.The emails were not marked as spam). How can I do this without setting up (and keeping track of) a couple hundred email addresses and then checking each one individually?

Thanks!

Answer 1

Whenever I've needed to test a system like this, I simply use an override property in the code that substitutes my own email address, creating a loopback test.

I don't know how you're going to test the "not marked as spam" thing, without having at least a handful of test accounts at various providers. Every email provider uses different bayesian filters to filter out spam.

Answer 2

Jeff Atwood's latest blog post talks about several things you need to do when sending email to users:

• So You'd Like to Send Some Email (Through Code)