Sending Emails with Ruby – DZone Internet Dev

Let’s say you’ve a working Ruby app and wish so as to add an e mail supply performance to it. This could possibly be associated to person authentication, or every other sort of transactional e mail, it makes no distinction. This tutorial is tailor-made is geared toward serving to you implement sending emails with Ruby.

Choices For Sending an Electronic mail in Ruby

Principally, you’ll be able to decide one of many three choices. 

The best one is utilizing Internet::SMTP class. It gives the performance to ship e mail by way of SMTP. The downside of this feature is that Internet::SMTP lacks features to compose emails. You’ll be able to all the time create them your self, however this takes time.

The second choice is to make use of a devoted Ruby gem like Mail, Pony, or others. These options allow you to deal with e mail actions in a easy and efficient manner. Motion Mailer is an ideal e mail resolution by the prism of Rails. And, almost certainly, this shall be your selection. 

The third choice is class Socket. Principally, this class permits you to set communication between processes or inside a course of. So, e mail sending could be applied with it as effectively. Nonetheless, the reality is that Socket doesn’t give you intensive functionalities, and also you’re unlikely to need to go together with it. 

Now, let’s attempt to ship an e mail utilizing every of the described options. 

The right way to Ship Emails in Ruby by way of Internet::SMTP

From my expertise, using that choice in a daily net app is rare. Nonetheless, sending emails by way of Internet::SMTP could possibly be a match when you use mruby (a light-weight implementation of the Ruby language) on some IoT gadgets. Additionally, it’ll do if utilized in serverless computing, for instance, AWS Lambda. Take a look at this script instance first after which we’ll undergo it intimately.

require 'internet/smtp'
message = <<END_OF_MESSAGE
From: YourRubyApp <data@yourrubyapp.com>
To: BestUserEver <your@bestuserever.com>

Topic: Any e mail topic you need

Date: Tue, 02 Jul 2019 15:00:34 +0800

Lorem Ipsum

END_OF_MESSAGE

Internet::SMTP.begin('your.smtp.server', 25) do |smtp|

  smtp.send_message message,

  'data@yourrubyapp.com',

  'your@bestuserever.com'

finish

It is a easy instance of sending a textual e mail by way of SMTP (official documentation could be discovered right here. You’ll be able to see 4 headers: From, To, Topic, and Date. Understand that you must separate them with a clean line from the e-mail physique textual content. Equally vital is to hook up with the SMTP server. 

Internet::SMTP.begin('your.smtp.server', 25) do |smtp| 

Naturally, right here will seem your information as an alternative of ‘your.smtp.server‘, and 25 is a default port quantity. If wanted, you’ll be able to specify different particulars like username, password, or authentication scheme (:plain, :login, and :cram_md5). It could look as follows:

`Internet::SMTP.begin('your.smtp.server', 25, ‘localhost’, ‘username’, ‘password’ :plain) do |smtp|`

Right here, you’ll connect with the SMTP server utilizing a username and password in plain textual content format, and the shopper’s hostname shall be recognized as localhost.

After that, you need to use the send_message technique and specify the addresses of the sender and the recipient as parameters. The block type of SMTP.begin (`Internet::SMTP.begin('your.smtp.server', 25) do |smtp|`) closes the SMTP session routinely.

Within the Ruby Cookbook, sending emails with the Internet::SMTP library is known as minimalism since you must construct the e-mail string manually. Nonetheless, it’s not as hopeless as you could assume. Let’s see how one can improve your e mail with HTML content material and even add an attachment.

Sending an HTML Electronic mail in Internet::SMTP

Take a look at this script instance that refers back to the message part.

message = <<END_OF_MESSAGE
From: YourRubyApp <data@yourrubyapp.com>
To: BestUserEver <your@bestuserever.com>
MIME-Model: 1.0
Content material-type: textual content/html

Topic: Any e mail topic you need

Date: Tue, 02 Jul 2019 15:00:34 +0800

A little bit of plain textual content.

<robust>The start of your HTML content material.</robust>

<h1>And a few headline, as effectively.</h1>

END_OF_MESSAGE

Aside from HTML tags within the message physique, we’ve received two extra headers: MIME-Model and Content material-type.  MIME refers to Multipurpose Web Mail Extensions. It’s an extension of the Web e mail protocol that permits you to mix totally different content material sorts in a single message physique. The worth  MIME-Model is often 1.0. It signifies {that a} message is MIME-formatted. 

As for the Content material-type header, every little thing is obvious. In our case, we now have two sorts – HTML and plain textual content. Additionally, ensure to separate these content material sorts utilizing defining boundaries.

 Aside from MIME-Model and Content material-type, you need to use different MIME headers:

– Content material-Disposition – specifies the presentation model (inline or attachment)

– Content material-Switch-Encoding – signifies a binary-to-text encoding scheme (7bit, quoted-printable, base64, 8bit, or binary).

Sending an Electronic mail with an Attachment in Internet::SMTP

Let’s add an attachment, similar to a PDF file. On this case, we have to replace Content material-type to multipart/blended. Additionally, use the pack("m") operate to encode the hooked up file with base64 encoding.

require 'internet/smtp'
filename = "/tmp/Attachment.pdf"
file_content = File.learn(filename)
encoded_content = [file_content].pack("m")   # base64
marker = "AUNIQUEMARKER"

After that, you could outline three components of your e mail.

Half 1 – Essential Headers

part1 = <<END_OF_MESSAGE
From: YourRubyApp <data@yourrubyapp.com>
To: BestUserEver <your@bestuserever.com>
Topic: Including attachment to e mail
MIME-Model: 1.0
Content material-Kind: multipart/blended; boundary = #{marker}
--#{marker}
END_OF_MESSAGE

Half 2 – Message Motion

part2 = <<END_OF_MESSAGE
Content material-Kind: textual content/html
Content material-Switch-Encoding:8bit
A little bit of plain textual content.
<robust>The start of your HTML content material.</robust>
<h1>And a few headline, as effectively.</h1>
--#{marker}
END_OF_MESSAGE

Half 3 – Attachment

part3 = <<END_OF_MESSAGE
Content material-Kind: multipart/blended; title = "#{filename}"
Content material-Switch-Encoding:base64
Content material-Disposition: attachment; filename = "#{filename}"
#{encoded_content}
--#{marker}--
END_OF_MESSAGE

Now, we will put all of the components collectively and finalize the script. That’s the way it will look:

require 'internet/smtp'
filename = "/tmp/Attachment.pdf"
file_content = File.learn(filename)
encoded_content = [file_content].pack("m")   # base64
marker = "AUNIQUEMARKER"
part1 = <<END_OF_MESSAGE
From: YourRubyApp <data@yourrubyapp.com>
To: BestUserEver <your@bestuserever.com>
Topic: Including attachment to e mail
MIME-Model: 1.0
Content material-Kind: multipart/blended; boundary = #{marker}
--#{marker}
END_OF_MESSAGE

part2 = <<END_OF_MESSAGE
Content material-Kind: textual content/html
Content material-Switch-Encoding:8bit
A little bit of plain textual content.

<robust>The start of your HTML content material.</robust>
<h1>And a few headline, as effectively.</h1>
--#{marker}
END_OF_MESSAGE

part3 = <<END_OF_MESSAGE
Content material-Kind: multipart/blended; title = "#{filename}"
Content material-Switch-Encoding:base64
Content material-Disposition: attachment; filename = "#{filename}"
#{encoded_content}
--#{marker}--
END_OF_MESSAGE

message = part1 + part2 + part3
start
  Internet::SMTP.begin('your.smtp.server', 25) do |smtp|
    smtp.send_message message,
    'data@yourrubyapp.com',
    'your@bestuserever.com'
  finish

Can I Ship an Electronic mail to A number of Recipients in Internet::SMTP?

Undoubtedly, you’ll be able to. send_messageexpects second and subsequent arguments to include recipients’ emails. For instance, this:

Internet::SMTP.begin('your.smtp.server', 25) do |smtp|
  smtp.send_message message,
  'data@yourrubyapp.com',
  'your@bestuserever1.com',
  ‘your@bestuserever2.com’,
  ‘your@bestuserever3.com
finish

Greatest Ruby Gems for Sending Emails

Within the Ruby ecosystem, you could find particular e mail gems that may enhance your e mail sending expertise.

Ruby Mail

This library is geared toward giving a single level of entry to handle all email-related actions together with sending and receiving emails.

Pony

You might need heard a fairy story about sending an e mail in a single command. Maintain on to your hats, ‘trigger it’s actual and supplied by Pony gem. 

ActionMailer

That is the preferred gem for sending emails on Rails. In case your app is written on prime of it, ActionMailer will definitely come up. It helps you to ship emails utilizing mailer courses and views. 

Utilizing Mailtrap to Check Electronic mail Sending with Internet::SMTP

The setup may be very easy. When you’re in your demo inbox, copy the SMTP credentials on the SMTP Settings tab and insert them into your code. Or you will get a ready-to-use template of a easy message within the Integrations part. Simply select a programming language or framework your app is constructed with. 

require 'internet/smtp'
message = <<END_OF_MESSAGE
From: YourRubyApp <data@yourrubyapp.com>
To: BestUserEver <your@bestuserever.com>
Topic: Any e mail topic you need
Date: Tue, 02 Jul 2019 15:00:34 +0800
Lorem Ipsum
END_OF_MESSAGE

Internet::SMTP.begin('smtp.mailtrap.io', 587, '<username>', '<password>', :cram_md5) do |smtp|
  smtp.send_message message,
  'data@yourrubyapp.com',
  'your@bestuserever.com'
finish

If every little thing is alright, you’ll see your message within the Mailtrap Demo inbox. Additionally, you’ll be able to attempt to test your e mail with HTML content material and an attachment. 

You could have simply learn the complete tutorial on how one can check and ship emails in Ruby. Hope you loved it!