Authentication

• Register a new project at https://cloud.google.com/console#/project
• Navigate to APIs
  • Switch the Gmail API status to On
• Navigate to APIs & auth->Credentials
  • Create a new client ID
  • Download the Client ID JSON
• Use the downloaded JSON as input to gmail_auth()

gmail_auth('file.json')

Constructing a MIME message

Text

First we will construct a simple text only message

mime() %>%
  to("james.f.hester@gmail.com") %>%
  from("me@somewhere.com") %>%
  text_body("Gmailr is a very handy package!") -> text_msg

You can convert the message to a properly formatted MIME message using as.character().

strwrap(as.character(text_msg))

## [1] "MIME-Version: 1.0\r Date: Thu, 18 Sep 2014 15:37:48 GMT\r To:"     
## [2] "james.f.hester@gmail.com\r From: me@somewhere.com\r Content-Type:" 
## [3] "multipart/mixed; boundary=6adc9201a16d2ce2ec46225aa05c3b05\r"      
## [4] "Content-Disposition: inline\r --6adc9201a16d2ce2ec46225aa05c3b05\r"
## [5] "MIME-Version: 1.0\r Date: Thu, 18 Sep 2014 15:37:48 GMT\r"         
## [6] "Content-Type: text/plain; charset=utf-8; format=flowed\r"          
## [7] "Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable\r Content-Disposition:"
## [8] "inline\r \r Gmailr is a very handy package!\r"                     
## [9] "--6adc9201a16d2ce2ec46225aa05c3b05--\r"

HTML

You can also construct html messages. It is customary to provide a text only message along with the html message, but with modern email clients this is not strictly necessary.

mime() %>%
  to("james.f.hester@gmail.com") %>%
  from("me@somewhere.com") %>%
  html_body("<b>Gmailr</b> is a <i>very</i> handy package!") -> html_msg

Attachments

You can add attachments to your message in two ways.

1. If the data is in a file, use attach_file(). The mime type is automatically guessed by mime::guess_type, or you can specify it yourself with the type parameter.

write.csv(file='iris.csv', iris)

html_msg %>%
  subject("Here are some flowers") %>%
  attach_file('iris.csv') -> file_attachment

1. If the data are already loaded into R, you can use attach_part() to attach the binary data to your file.

html_msg %>% attach_part(body=charToRaw('attach me!'), name='please') -> simple_attachment

Uploading

Create Draft

You can upload any mime message into your gmail drafts using create_draft(). Be sure to give yourself at least compose permissions first.

create_draft(file_attachment)

Insert

This inserts the message directly into your mailbox, bypassing gmail's default scanning and classification algorithms.

insert_message(file_attachment)

Import

This imports the email as though it was a normal message, with the same scanning and classification as normal email.

insert_message(file_attachment)

Sending

Draft

send_draft() sends an email using the draft_id of an existing draft (possibly created with create_draft()).

my_drafts = drafts()

send_draft(id(my_drafts, 'draft_id')[1])

Message

You can also send an email message directly from a mime object using send_message().

send_message(file_attachment)