Develop Reference

java getDisposition returns null on emails with attachments

SO i'm making a mail client for a homework assignment and one of the requirements is to handle incoming attachments. The first thing I want to do is just show if an email even has an attachment or not. I have a bunch of AWT lists that are side by side for From, Subject, Size, Date, Attachment.
For testing purposes, if the disposition returns null, i just put an x in the attachmentList. If its inline, it puts an i and for attachments it should show the filename. However, even on emails where there are attachments and looking at the headers in gmail webmail, which shows the content disposition as attachment (all lower case), the getDisposition of the email still returns null. I don't get why its not returning ATTACHMENT or attachment or something besides null. Here is the relevant code.
for (int i = 0; i < messages.length; i++) {
Address[] froms = messages[i].getFrom();
String email = froms == null ? null : ((InternetAddress) froms[0]).getAddress();
fromList.add(email);
subjectList.add(messages[i].getSubject());
sizeList.add("" + messages[i].getSize());
dateList.add(messages[i].getReceivedDate().toString());
String disposition = messages[i].getDisposition();
System.out.println("Disposition is " + disposition + ".");
if (disposition == null) {
attachmentList.add("x");
}
else if ("INLINE".equalsIgnoreCase(disposition)) {
attachmentList.add("i");
}
else if ("ATTACHMENT".equalsIgnoreCase(disposition)) {
String fileName = messages[i].getFileName();
if (fileName != null) {
attachmentList.add("attachment " + fileName);
}
}
}
You'll notice that it prints "the disposition is..." which is another testing code and it always prints either null or INLINE. The particular email i'm looking at is about 700k and contains 2 attachments.

Look at the raw MIME text of the message and make sure the Content-Disposition header is set as you expect.
Turn on JavaMail session debugging and examine the protocol trace in the debug output.
Are you using IMAP to read the message? If so, the IMAP server parses the message and returns the "disposition" information in the IMAP protocol message. The IMAP server may not be parsing the message correctly or may not be returning the disposition information correctly.

Google app engine not sending mail despite calls appearing in Quota details

I have spent the weekend playing with Google App Engine and Google Web Toolkit and have got along pretty well and built a simple app.
The stumbling block seems to be sending e-mails. My code is:
private void sendOffenderMail( OffenceDetails offence )
{
if( offence.email == null || offence.email.equals("") )
{
return;
}
Properties props = new Properties();
Session session = Session.getDefaultInstance(props, null);
String msgBody = "You have been added to the list";
if( offence.notes != null && !offence.notes.equals( "" ) )
{
msgBody += "\n\nThe following notes were included:\n\n" + offence.notes;
}
Message msg = new MimeMessage(session);
try {
msg.setFrom( new InternetAddress(<gmail account belonging to project viewer>, "List Admin") );
msg.addRecipient(
Message.RecipientType.TO,
new InternetAddress (offence.email, offence.name )
);
msg.setSubject("You've been added to the list...");
msg.setText(msgBody);
Transport.send(msg);
} catch (UnsupportedEncodingException e) {
e.printStackTrace();
} catch (MessagingException e) {
e.printStackTrace();
}
}
When I run this on the development server logs get printed out in the console about the mail that would have been sent.
When I deploy to app engine and try there nothing happens, I don't get any mail.
If I look in to the quota details I can see mail api calls there. If I look at the logs there are no errors (but I can't see and of my logs in there...).
It seems odd that I have essentially been charged for sending this (quota used up) but no mails actually got through.
I HAVE checked my spam folder BTW.

It seems that gmail account that you use is a Project Viewer. The docs state that it should be a Developer.

In the end I just used the e-mail address of the currently logged in user - which is always an admin as you can only get to this part of the app if you're an admin.
I could not get it to work using a hardwired address belonging to one of the admins.

javamail mark gmail message as read

Note: added after answer:
Thanks.. Yeah I had tried the Flag.SEEN to true and saveChanges.. I also had read getContent marks it read. I tried using it in the for statement that loops through the messages. But I got the messages again from the folder anyways in the next loop. I was assuming the folder was live, so grabbing the content, then grabbing the messages again from the folder with the filter to not get any seen should work, but I was still getting the same message. I could try closing the folder and reopen as a test to see if it's marked. Also if I go over to my client and click the message, then my code stops seeing it even in the loop, so I was hoping to do the same in the code.
original:
I'm using javamail to get email from a gmail account, it's working great, when I get the message I'd like to mark it as read, can anyone give me some direction? Here is my current code:
Properties props = System.getProperties();
props.setProperty("mail.store.protocol", "imaps");
try {
Session session = Session.getDefaultInstance(props, null);
Store store = session.getStore("imaps");
store.connect("imap.gmail.com", eUserName, ePassWord);
// Get folder
Folder folder = store.getFolder("INBOX");
if (folder == null || !folder.exists()) {
return null;
}
folder.open(Folder.READ_ONLY);
// Only pull unread
FlagTerm ft = new FlagTerm(new Flags(Flags.Flag.SEEN), false);
Message messages[]; // = folder.search(ft);
for(int x = 0; x < timeOutInSeconds; x++) {
log.reportMessage("looking for emails");
try {
folder.getMessages();
messages = folder.search(ft);
if (messages.length > 0) {
for (Message message : messages) {
//log.reportMessage("found message: should not see again, marking read");
// want to mark as read
}
}
Thread.sleep(1000);
}
catch(Exception ex) {
}
}
// Close connection
folder.close(false);
store.close();
return null;
}
catch (NoSuchProviderException ex) {
return null;
}
catch (MessagingException ex) {
return null;
}
}

First of all, you can't mark a message as read if you are using a POP3 server - the POP3 protocol doesn't support that. However, the IMAP v4 protocol does.
You might think the way to do this is to get the message, set the Flags.Flag.SEEN flag to true, and then call message.saveChanges(). Oddly, this is not the case.
Instead, the JavaMail API Design Specification, Chapter 4, section "The Flags Class" states that the SEEN flag is implicitly set when the contents of a message are retrieved. So, to mark a message as read, you can use the following code:
myImapFolder.open(Folder.READ_WRITE);
myImapFolder.getMessage(myMsgID).getContent();
myImapFolder.close(false);
Or another way is to use the MimeMessage copy constructor, ie:
MimeMessage source = (MimeMessage) folder.getMessage(1)
MimeMessage copy = new MimeMessage(source);
When you construct the copy, the seen flag is implicitly set for the message referred to by source.

One liner that will do it WITHOUT downloading the entire message:
single message:
folder.setFlags(new Message[] {message}, new Flags(Flags.Flag.SEEN), true);
all messages:
folder.setFlags(messages, new Flags(Flags.Flag.SEEN), true);
Other methods of calling getContent() or creating a copy with new MimeMessage(original) cause the client to download the entire message, and creates a huge performance hit.
Note that the inbox must be opened for READ_WRITE:
folder.open(Folder.READ_WRITE);

Well this post is old but the easiest solution hasn´t been posted yet.
You are accessing the Message.
message.setFlag(Flag.SEEN, true);

for (Message message : messages) {
message.setFlag(Flags.Flag.SEEN,true);
}
and change the below line
folder.open(Folder.READ_ONLY);
to this
folder.open(Folder.READ_WRITE);

You may also consider having a public static int max_message_number, and storing in it the message[i].getMessageNumber(); as soon as you read a message. Then before reading any message just check if the max_message_number < message[i].getmessageNumber(). If true then don't print this message (as it has been already read)

message.setFlag( Flag.SEEN,true ) give "cannot find symbol"
message.setFlag( Flags.Flag.SEEN,true ) seems good.

If you are using a for loop to read or check a mail one by one, the code can be as follows to mark a gmail message as read:
Message[] unreadMessages = inbox.search(new FlagTerm(new Flags(Flag.SEEN), false));
for (int q = 0; q < unreadMessages.length; q++) {
unreadMessages[q].setFlag(Flag.SEEN, true);
}
What this code does is that it makes it unread one by one.
And also folder/inbox needs to be READ_WRITE, instead of READ_ONLY:
folder.open(Folder.READ_WRITE);

You can also try
head over to the gmail settings > Forwarding and POP/IMAP
from the dropdown of When messages are accessed with POP
select mark Gmail's copy as read and save the changes

To mark the mail as read, you just have to call the mailmessage.getContent() method.
Whether you use IMAP or POP, calling that method on a specific mail mark it as Read

The easiest way to do that is set the folder to be read or written into or from. Means like this...
Folder inbox = null;
inbox.open(Folder.READ_WRITE);
the Folder class should be imported.

Javamail performance

I've been using javamail to retrieve mails from IMAP server (currently GMail). Javamail retrieves list of messages (only ids) in a particular folder from server very fast, but when I actually fetch message (only envelop not even contents) it takes around 1 to 2 seconds for each message. What are the techniques should be used for fast retrieval?
here is my code:
try {
IMAPStore store = null;
if(store!=null&&store.isConnected())return;
Properties props = System.getProperties();
Session sessionIMAP = Session.getInstance(props, null);
try {
store = (IMAPStore) sessionIMAP.getStore("imaps");
store.connect("imap.gmail.com",993,"username#gmail.com","password");
} catch (Exception e) {
e.printStackTrace();
}
IMAPFolder folder = (IMAPFolder) store.getFolder("INBOX");
folder.open(Folder.READ_ONLY);
System.out.println("start");
Message[] msgs = folder.getMessages(1,10);
long ftime = System.currentTimeMillis();
FetchProfile fp=new FetchProfile();
fp.add(FetchProfile.Item.ENVELOPE);
folder.fetch(msgs, fp);
long time = System.currentTimeMillis();
System.out.println("fetch: "+(time-ftime));
for (Message message : msgs) {
System.out.println(message.getSubject());
Address[] from = message.getFrom();
for (Address address : from) {
System.out.println(address);
}
Address[] recipients = message.getAllRecipients();
for (Address address : recipients) {
System.out.println(address);
}
}
long newTime = System.currentTimeMillis();
System.out.println("convert: "+(newTime-time));
}catch (Exception e) {
e.printStackTrace();
}
}

I believe that Gmail throttles the IMAP message reads to one every second or so. You might be able to speed it up with multiple IMAP connections.

Please set the Property mail.imap.fetchsize with the required size. the default is 16k.
In case you increase the size of this property, retrieve speed will go up.
props.put("mail.imap.fetchsize", "3000000");
Note that if you're using the "imaps" protocol to access IMAP over SSL, all the properties would be named "mail.imaps.*".
Good Luck.
Yaniv

I'm not sure if this is a Javamail issue as much as it may be a Gmail issue. I have an application that retrieves mail from a number of sources, including Gmail, and Gmail is definitely the slowest. The Javamail api is pretty straightforward, but it would be hard to make suggestions without seeing what you are currently doing.

I'm running into the same thing. After profiling, I noticed that getBody was being called every time I tried to do a message.getFrom() like you are, even though I was only accessing fields that should be covered by the Envelope flag. See https://java.net/projects/javamail/forums/forum/topics/107956-gimap-efficiency-when-only-reading-headers

Can I perform a search on mail server in Java?

I am trying to perform a search of my gmail using Java. With JavaMail I can do a message by message search like so:
Properties props = System.getProperties();
props.setProperty("mail.store.protocol", "imaps");
Session session = Session.getDefaultInstance(props, null);
Store store = session.getStore("imaps");
store.connect("imap.gmail.com", "myUsername", "myPassword");
Folder inbox = store.getFolder("Inbox");
inbox.open(Folder.READ_ONLY);
SearchTerm term = new SearchTerm() {
#Override
public boolean match(Message mess) {
try {
return mess.getContent().toString().toLowerCase().indexOf("boston") != -1;
} catch (IOException ex) {
Logger.getLogger(JavaMailTest.class.getName()).log(Level.SEVERE, null, ex);
} catch (MessagingException ex) {
Logger.getLogger(JavaMailTest.class.getName()).log(Level.SEVERE, null, ex);
}
return false;
}
};
Message[] searchResults = inbox.search(term);
for(Message m:searchResults)
System.out.println("MATCHED: " + m.getFrom()[0]);
But this requires downloading each message. Of course I can cache all the results, but this becomes a storage concern with large gmail boxes and also would be very slow (I can only imagine how long it would take to search through gigabytes of text...).
So my question is, is there a way of searching through mail on the server, a la gmail's search field? Maybe through Microsoft Exchange?
Hours of Googling has turned up nothing.

You can let the server do the search for you, with the appropriate IMAP command. The SEARCH command will only get you so far, what you probably need is the SORT command. SORT isn't implemented in JavaMail but the documentation shows how you can implement it yourself:
http://java.sun.com/products/javamail/javadocs/com/sun/mail/imap/IMAPFolder.html#doCommand(com.sun.mail.imap.IMAPFolder.ProtocolCommand)
(I couldn't figure out how to link to a URL with parentheses)

Connect to the Exchange IMAP store and use javax.mail.search.SearchTerm