Programming Tutorials

Sending emails and Receiving emails using Ruby On rails

By: David Heinemeier Hansson in Ruby Tutorials on 2009-03-03  

Ruby on Rails has built-in Action Mailer library that can be used to send emails from a Rails application. Here are the steps to set up email sending and receiving in Ruby on Rails:

Sending emails:

1. Configure the email settings in config/application.rb file. For example:

   config.action_mailer.delivery_method = :smtp
   config.action_mailer.smtp_settings = {
     address:              'smtp.gmail.com',
     port:                 587,
     user_name:            '[email protected]',
     password:             'your_password',
     authentication:       'plain',
     enable_starttls_auto: true
   }
   

2. This example configures email delivery using Gmail's SMTP server. Create a mailer class that inherits from ActionMailer::Base:

   class ExampleMailer < ActionMailer::Base
     default from: '[email protected]'
   
     def sample_email(user)
       @user = user
       @url  = 'http://example.com/login'
       mail(to: @user.email, subject: 'Sample Email')
     end
   end
   

3. This example defines a mailer class that contains a sample_email method that sends an email to a user. Create a view for the email in app/views/example_mailer/sample_email.html.erb:

   <h1>Sample Email</h1>
   <p>Hello <%= @user.name %>,</p>
   <p>This is a sample email.</p>
   <p><%= link_to 'Login', @url %></p>

4. Call the mailer method from a controller or another part of the application:

   ExampleMailer.sample_email(@user).deliver_now
   

   This example calls the sample_email method of the ExampleMailer class and sends the email to a user.

Receiving emails:

1. Configure the email settings in config/application.rb file. For example:

   config.action_mailbox.receivers = {
     'example.com' => {
       'user1' => { 
         'password' => 'secret', 
         'delivery_options' => {
           'folder' => 'inbox'
         }
       }
     }
   }
   

2. This example configures an email receiver that listens for emails sent to [email protected] and delivers them to the inbox folder. Create a mailbox class that inherits from ActionMailbox::Base:

   class ExampleMailbox < ActionMailbox::Base
     def receive(mail)
       # Process the email here
     end
   end
   

3. This example defines a mailbox class that contains a receive method that processes incoming emails. Create an email processor class that inherits from ActionMailbox::Base:

   class ExampleProcessor < ActionMailbox::Base
     def process
       # Process the email here
     end
   end
   

4. This example defines an email processor class that contains a process method that processes the email payload. Configure the mailbox routing in config/routes.rb file:

   Rails.application.routes.draw do
     post 'rails/action_mailbox/example' => 'action_mailbox/ingresses/exmaple#create'
   end
   

5. This example configures the mailbox routing to the ExampleMailbox class. Start the email server to listen for incoming emails:

   rails action_mailbox:ingress:exmaple
   

   This example starts the email server to listen for incoming emails and routes them to the ExampleMailbox