Mail Client without POP or IMAP - email

My university refused to allow us to access out mail via POP or IMAP etc so I want to write a GTK based C app that sits in my notifcation area and does the job of a mail client notifier. Because I can't use anything like POP or IMAP, what would be a good way to do it? I guess I could scrape the HTML and look for a tag that is only present in unread mail or something?
Any Ideas?

I know you said C/GTK but it's a piece of cake in Python/GTK with urllib2, libcookie, and BeautifulSoup. That way you don't have to deal with raw sockets, and parsing the HTML yourself. Hell if you edit your question with a link to the source I could hack this up for you in no time. But if you're doing this as a socket exercise, more power to you :P
You should note that most server admins don't take too kindly too frequent scraping of their site, and you should probably clear it with them, lest you face the repercussions.

Well yes, if the only way to access your email is through webmail then any tool you create will have to use the webmail markup to work out new messages.
Personally I'd try and find out why POP/IMAP isn't allowed. As far as I'm concerned that's a really strange policy.

In precedent job, the only access we had to email was through a webmail (squirrelmail) at the time, I had wrote a Perl script with WWW::Mechanize that went through the pages to fetch the emails, send them via smtp to an external mailbox, delete them, and expunge the trash...
It's was about 20/25 lines of code. Off course, a C version would be a bit bigger because it would not have WWW::Mechanize :-)

Related

Which library for receiving email, performing actions server side

I would like to implement an email receiving feature similar to the one found at asana.com:
http://asana.com/guide/tags-email/email-incoming
Users can send email to a designated address, and the system will perform actions based on recipient and message contents.
Any recommendations for libraries that handle this?
I see openpop.net, but i wonder if this technology would have a delay since by nature pop doesn't receive mail on its own, you must initiate the request.
Anyway, hoping to get the scoop on this technology from the experts here. Preferably, an answer would direct me to both a library and some tutorial/documentation.
If you're doing this on a Linux box, it's fairly straight-forward to set it up such that incoming emails are piped directly to a script - be it PHP, PERL, etc. See http://harrybailey.com/2009/02/send-or-pipe-an-email-to-a-php-script/ for an excellent article.

Freeware e-mail client for small companies excluding Thunderbird

I'm looking for some e-mail client with:
multi accounts,
IMAP protocol,
signatures,
e-mail addresses sync,
freeware for business use.
I don't want Thunderbird because it freezes sometimes and stops receiving new mails. Synchronisation is riddiculous... Annoying thing is search box... The results aren't clear at all.
I wonder if there's any that works fine, has all the options I want and is freeware.
Alternatively if there's some non-freeware that is noticeable, you can list it here.
Thanks in advance!
You can use OperaMail (http://www.opera.com/computer/mail), eM Client (http://www.emclient.com/) or Evolution (http://projects.gnome.org/evolution/)
I think that the best is OperaMail
I'd go for the e-mail client that is built in the Opera browser if I had a small company. You have one application for web browsing and e-mail communication with lots of features. I however have no idea whether you are able to choose you browser freely.
Other alternatives could be Pegasus Mail and Incredimail.

PEAR::Mail vs. PHP: Mail

I am creating a PHP system that will forward emails, (ie. someone#emailforprofession.com to someone#gmail.com) without using an SMTP server which is faster and more stable? PEAR::Mail or PHP: Mail? (or another one entirely)
I would be using extra headers and attachments but mainly trying to keep it looking and acting the same. (if anyone has an example for forwarding with attachments PLEASE provide it!)
And not exactly on the side but is there a way for people to be able to send email from they're someone#emailforprofession.com email address without having a complete inbox etc?
It would probably be better for me to use a real email provider but these are supposed to be free email addresses so paying by the email address is not an option, if anyone knows of a service that: charges by the month or year, has an API that email addresses can be created from and that can set up email forwards via the API that would be most appreciated.
I currently have a partial system together but would like to know which way I should go first.
Thank you all.
The PEAR class supports multiple mailer backends, which allows you to
switch whenever needed and you'll be able to perform some benchmarks
and see which backend suits you best. The native mail function on the
other hand is much less advanced and will show a clear difference in
performance, especially for that amount of mails.
I also suggest you have a look at PEAR's mail queue class:
http://pear.php.net/package/Mail_Queue
This is much more recommended for larger projects such as yours,
you'll also be able to implement a cron like feature which will send a
certain amount of mail per period you choose.
Here

Mail relays or SMTP services for use in code

I'm looking to start using an SMTP or mail relay service. I've found quite a few out there, but I'm not sure if there are advantages to one vs another. The only requirements I have are:
can send "from" more than 1 domain (possibly >20 for all the different sites I work on)
can pay for a higher limit (I may need to send as many as 15000 in 1 day, although the average is <500)
can send from PHP (although I doubt this will be a problem as most are compatible with any language)
I'm okay with an SMTP service, mail relay service or a site that uses a custom API, although an API would make the conversion more difficult.
Reasons for wanting to do this:
I don't want to host any mail services my self as they just cause head aches
I don't have to worry about being blacklisted. If they are blacklisted they will know about it and have the knowledge to get it fixed.
Reporting on if emails have gone through would be nice.
I'm not sure why you would need this. If you read the proper RFCs (822, 2822, 823, 2823), you should be able to connect to any given site directly using SMTP. You need to be a little careful with Line Endings (should always be CRLF), and should probably add mail.add_x_header = OFF to your php.ini.
However, if you need a relay, I recommend using a spam filtering provider, as then you have protection from being blacklisted due to spammers abusing email-generating forms. I would recommend Red Condor for this task, but that is only because I work there, and know that we can handle it.
I've started using Mandrill and found it to be a great, reliable service provided by MailChimp that includes enough for most sites to use for free. Easy to setup, but also has a lot more functionality available.

Is there a Perl module to monitor an email queue?

I'm working on an issue tracking system and would like the application to handle email replies. That is, I would like a script that can monitor an email queue and perform some action based on the email contents. It should then be able to delete the email, etc.
I currently use MIME::Lite to send email, and I can handle writing the script etc. (read: I'm not new to Perl). However, I have no idea what modules are good for doing this particular task. I'd like to get started on this as quickly as possible so I hope to narrow my search space for possible modules.
In case you need to know, the application will be running on a standard linux, Perl, MySQL stack with Exchange as the mail server.
Can anyone suggest a Perl module to help me out? Any tutorials or best practices related to this would also be helpful.
Thanks!
Do you have access to the Exchange server via IMAP or WebDAV?
For IMAP:
Mail::IMAPClient
IMAP::Client
Net::IMAP::Client
Email::Folder::IMAP
For WebDAV:
Email::Folder::Exchange
POP3 would also be an option if it's enabled on the server. IMAP is probably the way to go if you've got it.
I've done something similar using Mail::POP3Client
The Perl Email Project # http://emailproject.perl.org/mediawiki/index.php/Main_Page has recommendations and other information on the mail oriented modules for perl.