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Added initial documentation for the new API

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José Valim and Mikel Lindsaar 2010-01-25 23:46:09 +11:00
parent 9cb3ca1d29
commit 4a6eba3232
3 changed files with 201 additions and 118 deletions

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@ -1,5 +1,7 @@
*Rails 3.0 (pending)*
* Whole new API added with tests. See base.rb for full details. Old API is deprecated.
* The Mail::Message class has helped methods for all the field types that return 'common' defaults for the common use case, so to get the subject, mail.subject will give you a string, mail.date will give you a DateTime object, mail.from will give you an array of address specs (mikel@test.lindsaar.net) etc. If you want to access the field object itself, call mail[:field_name] which will return the field object you want, which you can then chain, like mail[:from].formatted
* Mail#content_type now returns the content_type field as a string. If you want the mime type of a mail, then you call Mail#mime_type (eg, text/plain), if you want the parameters of the content type field, you call Mail#content_type_parameters which gives you a hash, eg {'format' => 'flowed', 'charset' => 'utf-8'}

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@ -5,51 +5,74 @@ are used to consolidate code for sending out forgotten passwords, welcome
wishes on signup, invoices for billing, and any other use case that requires
a written notification to either a person or another system.
Action Mailer is in essence a wrapper around Action Controller and the
Mail gem. It provides a way to make emails using templates in the same
way that Action Controller renders views using templates.
Additionally, an Action Mailer class can be used to process incoming email,
such as allowing a weblog to accept new posts from an email (which could even
have been sent from a phone).
== Sending emails
The framework works by setting up all the email details, except the body,
in methods on the service layer. Subject, recipients, sender, and timestamp
are all set up this way. An example of such a method:
The framework works by initializing any instance variables you want to be
available in the email template, followed by a call to +mail+ to deliver
the email.
This can be as simple as:
class Notifier < ActionMailer::Base
delivers_from 'system@loudthinking.com'
def welcome(recipient)
@recipient = recipient
mail(:to => recipient,
:subject => "[Signed up] Welcome #{recipient}")
end
def signed_up(recipient)
recipients recipient
subject "[Signed up] Welcome #{recipient}"
from "system@loudthinking.com"
body :recipient => recipient
end
The body of the email is created by using an Action View template (regular
ERb) that has the content of the body hash parameter available as instance variables.
ERb) that has the instance variables that are declared in the mailer action.
So the corresponding body template for the method above could look like this:
Hello there,
Mr. <%= @recipient %>
Thank you for signing up!
And if the recipient was given as "david@loudthinking.com", the email
generated would look like this:
Date: Sun, 12 Dec 2004 00:00:00 +0100
Date: Mon, 25 Jan 2010 22:48:09 +1100
From: system@loudthinking.com
To: david@loudthinking.com
Message-ID: <4b5d84f9dd6a5_7380800b81ac29578@void.loudthinking.com.mail>
Subject: [Signed up] Welcome david@loudthinking.com
Mime-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain;
charset="US-ASCII";
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit
Hello there,
Mr. david@loudthinking.com
You never actually call the instance methods like signed_up directly. Instead,
you call class methods like deliver_* and create_* that are automatically
created for each instance method. So if the signed_up method sat on
ApplicationMailer, it would look like this:
In previous version of rails you would call <tt>create_method_name</tt> and
<tt>deliver_method_name</tt>. Rails 3.0 has a much simpler interface, you
simply call the method and optionally call +deliver+ on the return value.
ApplicationMailer.create_signed_up("david@loudthinking.com") # => tmail object for testing
ApplicationMailer.deliver_signed_up("david@loudthinking.com") # sends the email
ApplicationMailer.new.signed_up("david@loudthinking.com") # won't work!
Calling the method returns a Mail Message object:
message = Notifier.welcome #=> Returns a Mail::Message object
message.deliver #=> delivers the email
Or you can just chain the methods together like:
Notifier.welcome.deliver # Creates the email and sends it immediately
== Receiving emails
@ -103,16 +126,13 @@ The Base class has the full list of configuration options. Here's an example:
Action Mailer requires that the Action Pack is either available to be required immediately
or is accessible as a GEM.
Additionally, Action Mailer requires the Mail gem, http://github.com/mikel/mail
== Bundled software
* tmail 0.10.8 by Minero Aoki released under LGPL
Read more on http://i.loveruby.net/en/prog/tmail.html
* Text::Format 0.63 by Austin Ziegler released under OpenSource
Read more on http://www.halostatue.ca/ruby/Text__Format.html
== Download
The latest version of Action Mailer can be found at

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@ -16,46 +16,57 @@ module ActionMailer #:nodoc:
#
# $ script/generate mailer Notifier
#
# The generated model inherits from ActionMailer::Base. Emails are defined by creating methods within the model which are then
# used to set variables to be used in the mail template, to change options on the mail, or
# to add attachments.
# The generated model inherits from ActionMailer::Base. Emails are defined by creating methods
# within the model which are then used to set variables to be used in the mail template, to
# change options on the mail, or to add attachments.
#
# Examples:
#
# class Notifier < ActionMailer::Base
# def signup_notification(recipient)
# recipients recipient.email_address_with_name
# bcc ["bcc@example.com", "Order Watcher <watcher@example.com>"]
# from "system@example.com"
# subject "New account information"
# body :account => recipient
# delivers_from 'system@example.com'
#
# def welcome(recipient)
# @account = recipient
# mail { :to => recipient.email_address_with_name,
# :bcc => ["bcc@example.com", "Order Watcher <watcher@example.com>"],
# :subject => "New account information" }
# end
# end
#
# Mailer methods have the following configuration methods available.
# Within the mailer method, you have access to the following methods:
#
# * <tt>recipients</tt> - Takes one or more email addresses. These addresses are where your email will be delivered to. Sets the <tt>To:</tt> header.
# * <tt>subject</tt> - The subject of your email. Sets the <tt>Subject:</tt> header.
# * <tt>from</tt> - Who the email you are sending is from. Sets the <tt>From:</tt> header.
# * <tt>cc</tt> - Takes one or more email addresses. These addresses will receive a carbon copy of your email. Sets the <tt>Cc:</tt> header.
# * <tt>bcc</tt> - Takes one or more email addresses. These addresses will receive a blind carbon copy of your email. Sets the <tt>Bcc:</tt> header.
# * <tt>reply_to</tt> - Takes one or more email addresses. These addresses will be listed as the default recipients when replying to your email. Sets the <tt>Reply-To:</tt> header.
# * <tt>sent_on</tt> - The date on which the message was sent. If not set, the header will be set by the delivery agent.
# * <tt>content_type</tt> - Specify the content type of the message. Defaults to <tt>text/plain</tt>.
# * <tt>headers</tt> - Specify additional headers to be set for the message, e.g. <tt>headers 'X-Mail-Count' => 107370</tt>.
# * <tt>attachments[]=</tt> - Allows you to add attachments to your email in an intuitive
# manner; <tt>attachments['filename.png'] = File.read('path/to/filename.png')</tt>
# * <tt>headers[]=</tt> - Allows you to specify non standard headers in your email such
# as <tt>headers['X-No-Spam'] = 'True'</tt>
# * <tt>mail</tt> - Allows you to specify your email to send.
#
# When a <tt>headers 'return-path'</tt> is specified, that value will be used as the 'envelope from'
# address. Setting this is useful when you want delivery notifications sent to a different address than
# the one in <tt>from</tt>.
# The hash passed to the mail method allows you to specify the most used headers in an email
# message, such as <tt>Subject</tt>, <tt>To</tt>, <tt>From</tt>, <tt>Cc</tt>, <tt>Bcc</tt>,
# <tt>Reply-To</tt> and <tt>Date</tt>. See the <tt>ActionMailer#mail</tt> method for more details.
#
# If you need other headers not listed above, use the <tt>headers['name'] = value</tt> method.
#
# The mail method, if not passed a block, will inspect your views and send all the views with
# the same name as the method, so the above action would send the +welcome.plain.erb+ view file
# as well as the +welcome.html.erb+ view file in a +multipart/alternate+ email.
#
# If you want to explicitly render only certain templates, pass a block:
#
# mail(:to => user.emai) do |format|
# format.text
# format.enriched, {:content_type => 'text/rtf'}
# format.html
# end
#
# = Mailer views
#
# Like Action Controller, each mailer class has a corresponding view directory
# in which each method of the class looks for a template with its name.
# To define a template to be used with a mailing, create an <tt>.erb</tt> file with the same name as the method
# in your mailer model. For example, in the mailer defined above, the template at
# <tt>app/views/notifier/signup_notification.erb</tt> would be used to generate the email.
# Like Action Controller, each mailer class has a corresponding view directory in which each
# method of the class looks for a template with its name.
#
# To define a template to be used with a mailing, create an <tt>.erb</tt> file with the same
# name as the method in your mailer model. For example, in the mailer defined above, the template at
# <tt>app/views/notifier/signup_notification.text.erb</tt> would be used to generate the email.
#
# Variables defined in the model are accessible as instance variables in the view.
#
@ -111,54 +122,13 @@ module ActionMailer #:nodoc:
# Once a mailer action and template are defined, you can deliver your message or create it and save it
# for delivery later:
#
# Notifier.deliver_signup_notification(david) # sends the email
# mail = Notifier.create_signup_notification(david) # => a tmail object
# Notifier.deliver(mail)
# Notifier.welcome(david).deliver # sends the email
# mail = Notifier.welcome(david) # => a Mail::Message object
# mail.deliver # sends the email
#
# You never instantiate your mailer class. Rather, your delivery instance
# methods are automatically wrapped in class methods that start with the word
# <tt>deliver_</tt> followed by the name of the mailer method that you would
# like to deliver. The <tt>signup_notification</tt> method defined above is
# delivered by invoking <tt>Notifier.deliver_signup_notification</tt>.
# You never instantiate your mailer class. Rather, you just call the method on the class itself.
#
#
# = HTML email
#
# To send mail as HTML, make sure your view (the <tt>.erb</tt> file) generates HTML and
# set the content type to html.
#
# class MyMailer < ActionMailer::Base
# def signup_notification(recipient)
# recipients recipient.email_address_with_name
# subject "New account information"
# from "system@example.com"
# body :account => recipient
# content_type "text/html"
# end
# end
#
#
# = Multipart email
#
# You can explicitly specify multipart messages:
#
# class ApplicationMailer < ActionMailer::Base
# def signup_notification(recipient)
# recipients recipient.email_address_with_name
# subject "New account information"
# from "system@example.com"
# content_type "multipart/alternative"
# body :account => recipient
#
# part :content_type => "text/html",
# :data => render_message("signup-as-html")
#
# part "text/plain" do |p|
# p.body = render_message("signup-as-plain")
# p.content_transfer_encoding = "base64"
# end
# end
# end
# = Multipart Emails
#
# Multipart messages can also be used implicitly because Action Mailer will automatically
# detect and use multipart templates, where each template is named after the name of the action, followed
@ -170,11 +140,10 @@ module ActionMailer #:nodoc:
# * signup_notification.text.xml.builder
# * signup_notification.text.x-yaml.erb
#
# Each would be rendered and added as a separate part to the message,
# with the corresponding content type. The content type for the entire
# message is automatically set to <tt>multipart/alternative</tt>, which indicates
# that the email contains multiple different representations of the same email
# body. The same body hash is passed to each template.
# Each would be rendered and added as a separate part to the message, with the corresponding content
# type. The content type for the entire message is automatically set to <tt>multipart/alternative</tt>,
# which indicates that the email contains multiple different representations of the same email
# body. The same instance variables defined in the action are passed to all email templates.
#
# Implicit template rendering is not performed if any attachments or parts have been added to the email.
# This means that you'll have to manually add each part to the email and set the content type of the email
@ -182,31 +151,31 @@ module ActionMailer #:nodoc:
#
# = Attachments
#
# Attachments can be added by using the +attachment+ method.
#
# Example:
# You can see above how to make a multipart HTML / Text email, to send attachments is just
# as easy:
#
# class ApplicationMailer < ActionMailer::Base
# # attachments
# def signup_notification(recipient)
# recipients recipient.email_address_with_name
# subject "New account information"
# from "system@example.com"
# def welcome(recipient)
# attachments['free_book.pdf'] = { :data => File.read('path/to/file.pdf') }
# mail(:to => recipient, :subject => "New account information")
# end
# end
#
# attachment :content_type => "image/jpeg",
# :body => File.read("an-image.jpg")
#
# attachment "application/pdf" do |a|
# a.body = generate_your_pdf_here()
# end
# end
# end
# Which will (if it had both a <tt>.text.erb</tt> and <tt>.html.erb</tt> tempalte in the view
# directory), send a complete <tt>multipart/mixed</tt> email with two parts, the first part being
# a <tt>multipart/alternate</tt> with the text and HTML email parts inside, and the second being
# a <tt>application/pdf</tt> with a Base64 encoded copy of the file.pdf book with the filename
# +free_book.pdf+.
#
#
# = Configuration options
#
# These options are specified on the class level, like <tt>ActionMailer::Base.template_root = "/my/templates"</tt>
#
# * <tt>delivers_from</tt> - Pass this the address that then defaults as the +from+ address on all the
# emails sent. Can be overridden on a per mail basis by passing <tt>:from => 'another@address'</tt> in
# the +mail+ method.
#
# * <tt>template_root</tt> - Determines the base from which template references will be made.
#
# * <tt>logger</tt> - the logger is used for generating information on the mailing run if available.
@ -326,6 +295,9 @@ module ActionMailer #:nodoc:
end
end
# Delivers a mail object. This is actually called by the <tt>Mail::Message</tt> object
# itself through a call back when you call <tt>:deliver</tt> on the Mail::Message,
# calling +deliver_mail+ directly and passing an Mail::Message will do nothing.
def deliver_mail(mail) #:nodoc:
ActiveSupport::Notifications.instrument("action_mailer.deliver") do |payload|
self.set_payload_for_mail(payload, mail)
@ -374,6 +346,14 @@ module ActionMailer #:nodoc:
process(method_name, *args) if method_name
end
# Allows you to pass random and unusual headers to the new +Mail::Message+ object
# which will add them to itself.
#
# headers['X-Special-Domain-Specific-Header'] = "SecretValue"
#
# The resulting Mail::Message will have the following in it's header:
#
# X-Special-Domain-Specific-Header: SecretValue
def headers(args=nil)
if args
ActiveSupport::Deprecation.warn "headers(Hash) is deprecated, please do headers[key] = value instead", caller[0,2]
@ -383,10 +363,91 @@ module ActionMailer #:nodoc:
end
end
# Allows you to add attachments to an email, like so:
#
# mail.attachments['filename.jpg'] = File.read('/path/to/filename.jpg')
#
# If you do this, then Mail will take the file name and work out the mime type
# set the Content-Type, Content-Disposition, Content-Transfer-Encoding and
# base64 encode the contents of the attachment all for you.
#
# You can also specify overrides if you want by passing a hash instead of a string:
#
# mail.attachments['filename.jpg'] = {:mime_type => 'application/x-gzip',
# :content => File.read('/path/to/filename.jpg')}
#
# If you want to use a different encoding than Base64, you can pass an encoding in,
# but then it is up to you to pass in the content pre-encoded, and don't expect
# Mail to know how to decode this data:
#
# file_content = SpecialEncode(File.read('/path/to/filename.jpg'))
# mail.attachments['filename.jpg'] = {:mime_type => 'application/x-gzip',
# :encoding => 'SpecialEncoding',
# :content => file_content }
#
# You can also search for specific attachments:
#
# # By Filename
# mail.attachments['filename.jpg'] #=> Mail::Part object or nil
#
# # or by index
# mail.attachments[0] #=> Mail::Part (first attachment)
#
def attachments
@_message.attachments
end
# The main method that creates the message and renders the email templates. There are
# two ways to call this method, with a block, or without a block.
#
# Both methods accept a headers hash. This hash allows you to specify the most used headers
# in an email message, these are:
#
# * <tt>:subject</tt> - The subject of the message, if this is omitted, ActionMailer will
# ask the Rails I18n class for a translated <tt>:subject</tt> in the scope of
# <tt>[:actionmailer, mailer_scope, action_name]</tt> or if this is missing, will translate the
# humanized version of the <tt>action_name</tt>
# * <tt>:to</tt> - Who the message is destined for, can be a string of addresses, or an array
# of addresses.
# * <tt>:from</tt> - Who the message is from, if missing, will use the <tt>:delivers_from</tt>
# value in the class (if it exists)
# * <tt>:cc</tt> - Who you would like to Carbon-Copy on this email, can be a string of addresses,
# or an array of addresses.
# * <tt>:bcc</tt> - Who you would like to Blind-Carbon-Copy on this email, can be a string of
# addresses, or an array of addresses.
# * <tt>:reply_to</tt> - Who to set the Reply-To header of the email to.
# * <tt>:date</tt> - The date to say the email was sent on.
#
# If you need other headers not listed above, use the <tt>headers['name'] = value</tt> method.
#
# When a <tt>:return_path</tt> is specified, that value will be used as the 'envelope from'
# address for the Mail message. Setting this is useful when you want delivery notifications
# sent to a different address than the one in <tt>:from</tt>. Mail will actually use the
# <tt>:return_path</tt> in preference to the <tt>:sender</tt> in preference to the <tt>:from</tt>
# field for the 'envelope from' value.
#
# If you do not pass a block to the +mail+ method, it will find all templates in the
# template path that match the method name that it is being called from, it will then
# create parts for each of these templates intelligently, making educated guesses
# on correct content type and sequence, and return a fully prepared Mail::Message
# ready to call <tt>:deliver</tt> on to send.
#
# If you do pass a block, you can render specific templates of your choice:
#
# mail(:to => 'mikel@test.lindsaar.net') do |format|
# format.text
# format.html
# end
#
# You can even render text directly without using a template:
#
# mail(:to => 'mikel@test.lindsaar.net') do |format|
# format.text { render :text => "Hello Mikel!" }
# format.html { render :text => "<h1>Hello Mikel!</h1>" }
# end
#
# Which will render a <tt>multipart/alternate</tt> email with <tt>text/plain</tt> and
# <tt>text/html</tt> parts.
def mail(headers={}, &block)
# Guard flag to prevent both the old and the new API from firing
# Should be removed when old API is removed