ns_sendmail - Sending mail via SMTP
ns_sendmail is a procedure for sending email from a Tcl script through a remote SMTP server. It now supports character encoding of subject and body, message-id creation, quoted printable text, AUTH PLAIN and LOGIN mechanisms. It is backwards compatible.
The helper command ns_sendmail_config returns or logs the current configuration for ns_sendmail.
In the default configuration mail is sent to "localhost" on port 25. Usually, "localhost" resolves to the host where NaviServer is deployed and the running SMTP server accepts mail from the local machine.
In order to send mail directly to a specified SMTP server other than localhost some form of authentication may be required. The AUTH PLAIN and LOGIN mechanisms are supported as they are offered by most SMTP servers and easy to implement. Note, however, they are plaintext mechanisms and not secure. Also note that ns_sendmail does not verify if AUTH PLAIN or LOGIN are offered by the SMTP server at all. In case of an error the error code and message are returned.
-to Email address of recipient. To send a real name along with the address give the name and place the latter between "<" and ">" like "John Foo <j.foo@example.com>". This also applies to from, cc and bcc. Can be a comma-separated string with multiple recipients.
-from Email address of sender.
-subject Subject of the mail.
-body Body of the mail.
?-headers? An ns_set of key-value pairs. The set will become part of the email header. May be left empty.
?-bcc? Email address of undisclosed recipient. Can be a comma-separated string with multiple undisclosed recipients.
?-cc? Email address of additional recipient. Can be a comma-separated string with multiple recipients.
ns_sendmail_config returns the current configuration that is set up in the configuration file. Returns either an array usable by "array get" or logs to the server logfile.
Basic configuration options:
The hostname or IP of the mail server. Default is localhost. Full qualified hostname is a good choice (mail.example.com).
The port for the connection. Default is 25.
After smtptimeout seconds of inactivity (no answer from server) connection is closed.
Extended configuration options:
Note: "boolean" in NaviServer configuration means value can be one of "true", "false", "on", "off", "0" or "1".
If true no attempt to set up a connection to smtphost:smtpport is made, every part of the connection process is just logged to the server logfile. Default is false.
If true ns_sendmail creates a message_id. If a key "message_id" is user defined in the optional "headers"-set the latter is used. Default is false.
This string is used when ns_sendmail tells the server that it wants to use SMTP (HELO host.domain.tld) or ESMTP (EHLO host.domain.tld) communication. Some servers have restrictive rules and expect fully qualified domain names here. It is further used as right part of the message-id.
Message subject and body are by default sent in the default server encoding. If this is set true (a) the encoding defined in smtpencoding will be used and (b) Subject and body will be transformed to QUOTED PRINTABLE format. Default is false.
If smtpencodingmode is set true subject and body will be encoded with the encoding defined in smtpencoding, e.g. "iso8859-15".
Where mode is either PLAIN or LOGIN. If left empty but smtpauthuser and smtpauthpassword defined, PLAIN is assumed as default.
ns_sendmail supports now the simple PLAIN AUTH and LOGIN mechanisms to authenticate against a SMTP server. It should be sufficient to provide a mailbox account or email address ("smtpauthuser") and a password (see "smtpauthpassword"). It is possible to give a different authorization identifier (userid) and authentication identifier (authid/realm) by separating them with a nullbyte ("userid\0realm"). Default is empty string to not use SMTP authentication.
The password to use for PLAIN AUTHentication or LOGIN if smtpauthuser is set.
See the excellent Tcl Standard Library smtp and mime packages.
Log current configuration to server log:
% ns_sendmail_config log
smtpconfiguration:
smtphost = mail.domain.tld
smtpport = 25
smtptimeout = 60
smtplogmode = false
smtpmsgid = on
smtpmsgidhostname = host.domain.tld
smtpencodingmode = on
smtpencoding = iso8859-15
smtpauthmode = PLAIN
smtpauthuser = account--0123
smtpauthpassword = mysecret
Default use:
% ns_sendmail to@example.com from@example.com "My subject" "My body"
Separate multiple recipients with a comma (to,cc,bcc):
% ns_sendmail "to1@example.com,to2@example.com" \ from@example.com "My subject" "My body"
You may give real names along with email address:
% ns_sendmail "Jo Foo <to1@example.com>,Pete Bar <to2@example.com>" \ from@example.com "My subject" "My body"
For cc and bcc, leave header field empty, if you don't need it anyway:
% ns_sendmail "Jo Foo <to1@example.com>,Pete Bar <to2@example.com>" \ from@example.com "My subject" "My body" "" "Ben Care <bencare@example.com>"
Header field is an ns_set array:
% set SMTP_setid [ns_set create SMTPHeaders "Reply-To" "marketing@example.com"] % ns_sendmail "Jo Foo <to1@example.com>,Pete Bar <to2@example.com>" \ from@example.com "My subject" "My body" $SMTP_setid \ "Ben Care <bencare@example.com>"
Use smtplogmode to not send mail but watch transaction in server log:
% ns_sendmail "Mr. White <white@example.com>" "Mr. Black <black@example.com>" "log" "this message" Notice: S: Helo sock12 HELO devserver 60 Notice: S: Mail black@example.com sock12 MAIL FROM:<black@example.com> 60 Notice: S: Rcpt white@example.com sock12 RCPT TO:<white@example.com> 60 Notice: S: Data sock12 DATA 60 Notice: S: Data sock12 To: Mr. White <white@example.com> From: Mr. Black <black@example.com> Subject: log Date: Mon, 23 Jan 2006 09:25:22 GMT this message . 60 Notice: S: Quit sock12 QUIT 60