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| 55 | <H2><A NAME="SECTION0014240000000000000000"> |
| 56 | 12.2.4 Creating email and MIME objects from scratch</A> |
| 57 | </H2> |
| 58 | Ordinarily, you get a message object structure by passing a file or |
| 59 | some text to a parser, which parses the text and returns the root |
| 60 | message object. However you can also build a complete message |
| 61 | structure from scratch, or even individual <tt class="class">Message</tt> objects by |
| 62 | hand. In fact, you can also take an existing structure and add new |
| 63 | <tt class="class">Message</tt> objects, move them around, etc. This makes a very |
| 64 | convenient interface for slicing-and-dicing MIME messages. |
| 65 | |
| 66 | <P> |
| 67 | You can create a new object structure by creating <tt class="class">Message</tt> |
| 68 | instances, adding attachments and all the appropriate headers manually. |
| 69 | For MIME messages though, the <tt class="module">email</tt> package provides some |
| 70 | convenient subclasses to make things easier. Each of these classes |
| 71 | should be imported from a module with the same name as the class, from |
| 72 | within the <tt class="module">email</tt> package. E.g.: |
| 73 | |
| 74 | <P> |
| 75 | <div class="verbatim"><pre> |
| 76 | import email.MIMEImage.MIMEImage |
| 77 | </pre></div> |
| 78 | |
| 79 | <P> |
| 80 | or |
| 81 | |
| 82 | <P> |
| 83 | <div class="verbatim"><pre> |
| 84 | from email.MIMEText import MIMEText |
| 85 | </pre></div> |
| 86 | |
| 87 | <P> |
| 88 | Here are the classes: |
| 89 | |
| 90 | <P> |
| 91 | <dl><dt><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0"><tr valign="baseline"> |
| 92 | <td><nobr><b><span class="typelabel">class</span> <tt id='l2h-3891' xml:id='l2h-3891' class="class">MIMEBase</tt></b>(</nobr></td> |
| 93 | <td><var>_maintype, _subtype, **_params</var>)</td></tr></table></dt> |
| 94 | <dd> |
| 95 | This is the base class for all the MIME-specific subclasses of |
| 96 | <tt class="class">Message</tt>. Ordinarily you won't create instances specifically |
| 97 | of <tt class="class">MIMEBase</tt>, although you could. <tt class="class">MIMEBase</tt> is provided |
| 98 | primarily as a convenient base class for more specific MIME-aware |
| 99 | subclasses. |
| 100 | |
| 101 | <P> |
| 102 | <var>_maintype</var> is the <span class="mailheader">Content-Type:</span> major type |
| 103 | (e.g. <span class="mimetype">text</span> or <span class="mimetype">image</span>), and <var>_subtype</var> is the |
| 104 | <span class="mailheader">Content-Type:</span> minor type |
| 105 | (e.g. <span class="mimetype">plain</span> or <span class="mimetype">gif</span>). <var>_params</var> is a parameter |
| 106 | key/value dictionary and is passed directly to |
| 107 | <tt class="method">Message.add_header()</tt>. |
| 108 | |
| 109 | <P> |
| 110 | The <tt class="class">MIMEBase</tt> class always adds a <span class="mailheader">Content-Type:</span> header |
| 111 | (based on <var>_maintype</var>, <var>_subtype</var>, and <var>_params</var>), and a |
| 112 | <span class="mailheader">MIME-Version:</span> header (always set to <code>1.0</code>). |
| 113 | </dl> |
| 114 | |
| 115 | <P> |
| 116 | <dl><dt><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0"><tr valign="baseline"> |
| 117 | <td><nobr><b><span class="typelabel">class</span> <tt id='l2h-3892' xml:id='l2h-3892' class="class">MIMENonMultipart</tt></b>(</nobr></td> |
| 118 | <td><var></var>)</td></tr></table></dt> |
| 119 | <dd> |
| 120 | A subclass of <tt class="class">MIMEBase</tt>, this is an intermediate base class for |
| 121 | MIME messages that are not <span class="mimetype">multipart</span>. The primary purpose |
| 122 | of this class is to prevent the use of the <tt class="method">attach()</tt> method, |
| 123 | which only makes sense for <span class="mimetype">multipart</span> messages. If |
| 124 | <tt class="method">attach()</tt> is called, a <tt class="exception">MultipartConversionError</tt> |
| 125 | exception is raised. |
| 126 | |
| 127 | <P> |
| 128 | |
| 129 | <span class="versionnote">New in version 2.2.2.</span> |
| 130 | |
| 131 | </dl> |
| 132 | |
| 133 | <P> |
| 134 | <dl><dt><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0"><tr valign="baseline"> |
| 135 | <td><nobr><b><span class="typelabel">class</span> <tt id='l2h-3893' xml:id='l2h-3893' class="class">MIMEMultipart</tt></b>(</nobr></td> |
| 136 | <td><var></var><big>[</big><var>subtype</var><big>[</big><var>, |
| 137 | boundary</var><big>[</big><var>, _subparts</var><big>[</big><var>, _params</var><big>]</big><var></var><big>]</big><var></var><big>]</big><var></var><big>]</big><var></var>)</td></tr></table></dt> |
| 138 | <dd> |
| 139 | |
| 140 | <P> |
| 141 | A subclass of <tt class="class">MIMEBase</tt>, this is an intermediate base class for |
| 142 | MIME messages that are <span class="mimetype">multipart</span>. Optional <var>_subtype</var> |
| 143 | defaults to <span class="mimetype">mixed</span>, but can be used to specify the subtype |
| 144 | of the message. A <span class="mailheader">Content-Type:</span> header of |
| 145 | <span class="mimetype">multipart/</span><var>_subtype</var> will be added to the message |
| 146 | object. A <span class="mailheader">MIME-Version:</span> header will also be added. |
| 147 | |
| 148 | <P> |
| 149 | Optional <var>boundary</var> is the multipart boundary string. When |
| 150 | <code>None</code> (the default), the boundary is calculated when needed. |
| 151 | |
| 152 | <P> |
| 153 | <var>_subparts</var> is a sequence of initial subparts for the payload. It |
| 154 | must be possible to convert this sequence to a list. You can always |
| 155 | attach new subparts to the message by using the |
| 156 | <tt class="method">Message.attach()</tt> method. |
| 157 | |
| 158 | <P> |
| 159 | Additional parameters for the <span class="mailheader">Content-Type:</span> header are |
| 160 | taken from the keyword arguments, or passed into the <var>_params</var> |
| 161 | argument, which is a keyword dictionary. |
| 162 | |
| 163 | <P> |
| 164 | |
| 165 | <span class="versionnote">New in version 2.2.2.</span> |
| 166 | |
| 167 | </dl> |
| 168 | |
| 169 | <P> |
| 170 | <dl><dt><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0"><tr valign="baseline"> |
| 171 | <td><nobr><b><span class="typelabel">class</span> <tt id='l2h-3894' xml:id='l2h-3894' class="class">MIMEAudio</tt></b>(</nobr></td> |
| 172 | <td><var>_audiodata</var><big>[</big><var>, _subtype</var><big>[</big><var>, |
| 173 | _encoder</var><big>[</big><var>, **_params</var><big>]</big><var></var><big>]</big><var></var><big>]</big><var></var>)</td></tr></table></dt> |
| 174 | <dd> |
| 175 | |
| 176 | <P> |
| 177 | A subclass of <tt class="class">MIMENonMultipart</tt>, the <tt class="class">MIMEAudio</tt> class |
| 178 | is used to create MIME message objects of major type <span class="mimetype">audio</span>. |
| 179 | <var>_audiodata</var> is a string containing the raw audio data. If this |
| 180 | data can be decoded by the standard Python module <tt class="module"><a href="module-sndhdr.html">sndhdr</a></tt>, |
| 181 | then the subtype will be automatically included in the |
| 182 | <span class="mailheader">Content-Type:</span> header. Otherwise you can explicitly specify the |
| 183 | audio subtype via the <var>_subtype</var> parameter. If the minor type could |
| 184 | not be guessed and <var>_subtype</var> was not given, then <tt class="exception">TypeError</tt> |
| 185 | is raised. |
| 186 | |
| 187 | <P> |
| 188 | Optional <var>_encoder</var> is a callable (i.e. function) which will |
| 189 | perform the actual encoding of the audio data for transport. This |
| 190 | callable takes one argument, which is the <tt class="class">MIMEAudio</tt> instance. |
| 191 | It should use <tt class="method">get_payload()</tt> and <tt class="method">set_payload()</tt> to |
| 192 | change the payload to encoded form. It should also add any |
| 193 | <span class="mailheader">Content-Transfer-Encoding:</span> or other headers to the message |
| 194 | object as necessary. The default encoding is base64. See the |
| 195 | <tt class="module"><a href="module-email.Encoders.html">email.Encoders</a></tt> module for a list of the built-in encoders. |
| 196 | |
| 197 | <P> |
| 198 | <var>_params</var> are passed straight through to the base class constructor. |
| 199 | </dl> |
| 200 | |
| 201 | <P> |
| 202 | <dl><dt><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0"><tr valign="baseline"> |
| 203 | <td><nobr><b><span class="typelabel">class</span> <tt id='l2h-3895' xml:id='l2h-3895' class="class">MIMEImage</tt></b>(</nobr></td> |
| 204 | <td><var>_imagedata</var><big>[</big><var>, _subtype</var><big>[</big><var>, |
| 205 | _encoder</var><big>[</big><var>, **_params</var><big>]</big><var></var><big>]</big><var></var><big>]</big><var></var>)</td></tr></table></dt> |
| 206 | <dd> |
| 207 | |
| 208 | <P> |
| 209 | A subclass of <tt class="class">MIMENonMultipart</tt>, the <tt class="class">MIMEImage</tt> class is |
| 210 | used to create MIME message objects of major type <span class="mimetype">image</span>. |
| 211 | <var>_imagedata</var> is a string containing the raw image data. If this |
| 212 | data can be decoded by the standard Python module <tt class="module"><a href="module-imghdr.html">imghdr</a></tt>, |
| 213 | then the subtype will be automatically included in the |
| 214 | <span class="mailheader">Content-Type:</span> header. Otherwise you can explicitly specify the |
| 215 | image subtype via the <var>_subtype</var> parameter. If the minor type could |
| 216 | not be guessed and <var>_subtype</var> was not given, then <tt class="exception">TypeError</tt> |
| 217 | is raised. |
| 218 | |
| 219 | <P> |
| 220 | Optional <var>_encoder</var> is a callable (i.e. function) which will |
| 221 | perform the actual encoding of the image data for transport. This |
| 222 | callable takes one argument, which is the <tt class="class">MIMEImage</tt> instance. |
| 223 | It should use <tt class="method">get_payload()</tt> and <tt class="method">set_payload()</tt> to |
| 224 | change the payload to encoded form. It should also add any |
| 225 | <span class="mailheader">Content-Transfer-Encoding:</span> or other headers to the message |
| 226 | object as necessary. The default encoding is base64. See the |
| 227 | <tt class="module"><a href="module-email.Encoders.html">email.Encoders</a></tt> module for a list of the built-in encoders. |
| 228 | |
| 229 | <P> |
| 230 | <var>_params</var> are passed straight through to the <tt class="class">MIMEBase</tt> |
| 231 | constructor. |
| 232 | </dl> |
| 233 | |
| 234 | <P> |
| 235 | <dl><dt><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0"><tr valign="baseline"> |
| 236 | <td><nobr><b><span class="typelabel">class</span> <tt id='l2h-3896' xml:id='l2h-3896' class="class">MIMEMessage</tt></b>(</nobr></td> |
| 237 | <td><var>_msg</var><big>[</big><var>, _subtype</var><big>]</big><var></var>)</td></tr></table></dt> |
| 238 | <dd> |
| 239 | A subclass of <tt class="class">MIMENonMultipart</tt>, the <tt class="class">MIMEMessage</tt> class |
| 240 | is used to create MIME objects of main type <span class="mimetype">message</span>. |
| 241 | <var>_msg</var> is used as the payload, and must be an instance of class |
| 242 | <tt class="class">Message</tt> (or a subclass thereof), otherwise a |
| 243 | <tt class="exception">TypeError</tt> is raised. |
| 244 | |
| 245 | <P> |
| 246 | Optional <var>_subtype</var> sets the subtype of the message; it defaults |
| 247 | to <span class="mimetype">rfc822</span>. |
| 248 | </dl> |
| 249 | |
| 250 | <P> |
| 251 | <dl><dt><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0"><tr valign="baseline"> |
| 252 | <td><nobr><b><span class="typelabel">class</span> <tt id='l2h-3897' xml:id='l2h-3897' class="class">MIMEText</tt></b>(</nobr></td> |
| 253 | <td><var>_text</var><big>[</big><var>, _subtype</var><big>[</big><var>, _charset</var><big>]</big><var></var><big>]</big><var></var>)</td></tr></table></dt> |
| 254 | <dd> |
| 255 | A subclass of <tt class="class">MIMENonMultipart</tt>, the <tt class="class">MIMEText</tt> class is |
| 256 | used to create MIME objects of major type <span class="mimetype">text</span>. |
| 257 | <var>_text</var> is the string for the payload. <var>_subtype</var> is the |
| 258 | minor type and defaults to <span class="mimetype">plain</span>. <var>_charset</var> is the |
| 259 | character set of the text and is passed as a parameter to the |
| 260 | <tt class="class">MIMENonMultipart</tt> constructor; it defaults to <code>us-ascii</code>. No |
| 261 | guessing or encoding is performed on the text data. |
| 262 | |
| 263 | <P> |
| 264 | |
| 265 | <span class="versionnote">Changed in version 2.4: |
| 266 | The previously deprecated <var>_encoding</var> argument has |
| 267 | been removed. Encoding happens implicitly based on the <var>_charset</var> |
| 268 | argument.</span> |
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