Mail::Internet(3)

NAME
Mail::Internet - manipulate Internet format (RFC 822) mail messages

SYNOPSIS
    use Mail::Internet;

DESCRIPTION
This package provides a class object which can be used for reading, creating, manipulating and writing a message with RFC822 compliant headers.

CONSTRUCTOR

new ( [ ARG ], [ OPTIONS ] )
    "ARG" is optiona and may be either a file descriptor (reference to a GLOB) or a reference to an array. If given the new object will be initialized with headers and body either from the array of read from the file descriptor.

    "OPTIONS" is a list of options given in the form of key-value pairs, just like a hash table. Valid options are

    Header
        The value of this option should be a "Mail::Header" object. If given then "Mail::Internet" will not attempt to read a mail header from "ARG", if it was specified.

    Body
        The value of this option should be a reference to an array which contains the lines for the body of the message. Each line should be terminated with "\n" (LF). If Body is given then "Mail::Internet" will not attempt to read the body from "ARG" (even if it is specified).

    The Mail::Header options "Modify", "MailFrom" and "FoldLength" may also be given.

METHODS

body ()
    Returns the body of the message. This is a reference to an array. Each entry in the array represents a single line in the message.

print_header ( [ FILEHANDLE ] )
print_body ( [ FILEHANDLE ] )
print ( [ FILEHANDLE ] )
    Print the header, body or whole message to file descriptor FILEHANDLE. $fd should be a reference to a GLOB. If FILEHANDLE is not given the output will be sent to STDOUT.

        $mail->print( \*STDOUT );  # Print message to STDOUT

as_string ()
    Returns the message as a single string.

as_mbox_string ( [ ALREADY_ESCAPED ] )
    Returns the message as a string in mbox format. "ALREADY_ESCAPED", if given and true, indicates that ->escape_from has already been called on this object.

head ()
    Returns the "Mail::Header" object which holds the headers for the current message

UTILITY METHODS
The following methods are more a utility type than a manipulation type of method.

remove_sig ( [ NLINES ] )
    Attempts to remove a users signature from the body of a message. It does this by looking for a line equal to '-- ' within the last "NLINES" of the message. If found then that line and all lines after it will be removed. If "NLINES" is not given a default value of 10 will be used. This would be of most use in auto-reply scripts.

tidy_body ()
    Removes all leading and trailing lines from the body that only contain white spaces.

reply ()
    Create a new object with header initialised for a reply to the current object. And the body will be a copy of the current message indented.

add_signature ( [ FILE ] )
    Append a signature to the message. "FILE" is a file which contains the signature, if not given then the file "$ENV{HOME}/.signature" will be checked for.

send ( [ type [ args.. ]] )
    Send a Mail::Internet message using Mail::Mailer. Type and args are passed on to "Mail::Mailer"

smtpsend ( [ OPTIONS ] )
    Send a Mail::Internet message via SMTP, requires Net::SMTP

    The return value will be a list of email addresses that the message was sent to. If the message was not sent the list will be empty.

    Options are passed as key-value pairs. Current options are

    Host
        Name of the SMTP server to connect to, or a Net::SMTP object to use

        If "Host" is not given then the SMTP host is found by attempting connections first to hosts specified in $ENV{SMTPHOSTS}, a colon separated list, then "mailhost" and "localhost".

    To
    Cc
    Bcc Send the email to the given addresses, each can be either a string or a reference to a list of email addresses. If none of "To", <Cc> or "Bcc" are given then the addresses are extracted from the message being sent.

    Hello
        Send a HELO (or EHLO) command to the server with the given name.

    Port
        Port number to connect to on remote host

    Debug
        Debug value to pass to Net::SMPT, see <Net::SMTP>

nntppost ( [ OPTIONS ] )
    Post an article via NNTP, requires Net::NNTP.

    Options are passed as key-value pairs. Current options are

    Host
        Name of NNTP server to connect to, or a Net::NNTP object to use.

    Port
        Port number to connect to on remote host

    Debug
        Debug value to pass to Net::NNTP, see <Net::NNTP>

escape_from ()
    It can cause problems with some applications if a message contains a line starting with `From ', in particular when attempting to split a folder. This method inserts a leading "`"'> on anyline that matches the regular expression "/^"*From/>

unescape_from ()
    This method will remove the escaping added by escape_from

SEE ALSO
Mail::Header Mail::Address

AUTHOR
Graham Barr <gbarr@pobox.com>

COPYRIGHT
Copyright (c) 1995-7 Graham Barr. All rights reserved. This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the same terms as Perl itself.