Introduction to Mail-Listener2

Mail-Listener2 is a robust Node.js library designed to fetch and manage emails using IMAP. It’s highly configurable and provides a wide range of API methods to seamlessly integrate email functionalities into your application. Whether you want to monitor an email inbox, parse incoming emails, or perform complex operations based on email content, Mail-Listener2 makes it straightforward and efficient.

Setting Up Mail-Listener2

First, let’s start with the installation:

  npm install mail-listener2

Basic Usage

Below, we’ll look at some basic usage scenarios with code snippets.

Initialize Mail Listener

  
    const MailListener = require("mail-listener2");

    const mailListener = new MailListener({
      username: "your-email@gmail.com",
      password: "your-password",
      host: "imap.gmail.com",
      port: 993,
      tls: true,
      tlsOptions: { rejectUnauthorized: false },
      mailbox: "INBOX",
      searchFilter: ["UNSEEN"],
      markSeen: true,
      fetchUnreadOnStart: true,
      mailParserOptions: { streamAttachments: true },
      attachments: true,
      attachmentOptions: { directory: "attachments/" }
    });
  

Start Listening to Emails

  
    mailListener.start();
  

Stop Listening to Emails

  
    mailListener.stop();
  

Handle Email Events

  
    mailListener.on("server:connected", ()=> {
      console.log("Connected to IMAP server");
    });

    mailListener.on("server:disconnected", ()=> {
      console.log("Disconnected from IMAP server");
    });

    mailListener.on("error", (err)=> {
      console.error(err);
    });

    mailListener.on("mail", (mail, seqno, attributes)=> {
      console.log("New email received");
      console.log(mail);
    });

    mailListener.on("attachment", (attachment, path, seqno)=> {
      console.log("Attachment stored at: " + path);
    });
  

Advanced Features

Mail-Listener2 also provides various options and methods to handle different scenarios. For example:

Filtering Emails

  
    const options = {
      username: "your-email@gmail.com",
      password: "your-password",
      host: "imap.gmail.com",
      port: 993,
      tls: true,
      tlsOptions: { rejectUnauthorized: false },
      mailbox: "INBOX",
      searchFilter: ["UNSEEN", "FLAGGED"], 
      markSeen: false,
      fetchUnreadOnStart: false,
      mailParserOptions: { streamAttachments: true },
      attachments: true,
      attachmentOptions: { directory: "attachments/" }
    };

    const advancedMailListener = new MailListener(options);
    advancedMailListener.start();
  

Parsing Complex Emails

  
    mailListener.on("mail", (mail)=> {
      console.log("New email received:");

      // Access various parts of the mail object
      const from = mail.from[0];
      const subject = mail.subject;
      const htmlBody = mail.html;

      console.log("From: ", from.address);
      console.log("Subject: ", subject);
      console.log("HTML Body: ", htmlBody);
    });
  

Building an Email-based Application

Let’s build a simple Node.js application that uses Mail-Listener2 to monitor incoming emails and store them in a database.

Complete App Example

  
    const express = require("express");
    const mongoose = require("mongoose");
    const MailListener = require("mail-listener2");

    // Initialize Express app
    const app = express();

    // Connect to MongoDB
    mongoose.connect("mongodb://localhost:27017/emails", {
      useNewUrlParser: true,
      useUnifiedTopology: true
    });

    // Define a schema and model for storing emails
    const emailSchema = new mongoose.Schema({
      from: String,
      subject: String,
      html: String,
      receivedAt: Date
    });

    const Email = mongoose.model("Email", emailSchema);

    // Initialize MailListener
    const mailListener = new MailListener({
      username: "your-email@gmail.com",
      password: "your-password",
      host: "imap.gmail.com",
      port: 993,
      tls: true,
      tlsOptions: { rejectUnauthorized: false },
      mailbox: "INBOX",
      searchFilter: ["UNSEEN"],
      markSeen: true,
      fetchUnreadOnStart: true,
      mailParserOptions: { streamAttachments: true },
      attachments: true,
      attachmentOptions: { directory: "attachments/" }
    });

    // Event for new email
    mailListener.on("mail", (mail)=> {
      const newEmail = new Email({
        from: mail.from[0].address,
        subject: mail.subject,
        html: mail.html,
        receivedAt: new Date()
      });

      newEmail.save()
        .then(() => console.log("Email saved to database"))
        .catch(err => console.error(err));
    });

    // Start listening to emails
    mailListener.start();

    // Start the Express server
    app.listen(3000, ()=> {
      console.log("Server running on port 3000");
    });
  

With the above application, you can monitor your email inbox and store all the received emails’ details in a MongoDB database.

Conclusion

Mail-Listener2 is a powerful tool for integrating email functionalities into your Node.js applications. Whether you need to monitor incoming emails, filter them, or parse complex email contents, Mail-Listener2 provides a comprehensive set of features to handle these tasks efficiently.

Get started with Mail-Listener2 today and simplify email management in your next project.

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