Unable to save emails in DRAFT folder using Python GMAIL IMAP-CodePudding

I am trying to save multiple emails in my drafts folder so I could review and press the SEND button in my web browser but I seem to be running into multiple issues.

I spent about half a day checking google and stackoverflow but didnt get much luck:

Here are a few examples that seemed relevant but didnt work

How do I create a draft in Gmail using IMAP using Python

Programmatically Save Draft in Gmail drafts folder

Creating a Draft message in Gmail using the imaplib in Python

Programmatically Save Draft in Gmail drafts folder

Below is my code, which executes and completes with a 0 code but nothing is saved to my drafts folder. Can anyone please help ?

import imaplib
import ssl
import email.message
import email.charset
import time


class DraftMailDemo:
    def send(self):

        tls_context = ssl.create_default_context()
        server = imaplib.IMAP4_SSL('imap.gmail.com')
        #server.starttls(ssl_context=tls_context)
        server.login('[email protected]', 'pass123')

        # Select mailbox
        server.select("INBOX.Drafts")

        # Create message
        new_message = email.message.Message()
        new_message["From"] = "[email protected]"
        new_message["To"] = "Jimmy <[email protected]>"
        new_message["Subject"] = "Your subject"
        new_message.set_payload("""
        This is your message.
        It can have multiple lines and
        contain special characters: äöü.
        """)

        # Fix special characters by setting the same encoding we'll use later to encode the message
        new_message.set_charset(email.charset.Charset("utf-8"))
        encoded_message = str(new_message).encode("utf-8")
        print(encoded_message)
        server.append('INBOX.Drafts', '', imaplib.Time2Internaldate(time.time()), encoded_message)

        # Cleanup
        #server.close()
        server.logout()


if __name__ == '__main__':
    mail = DraftMailDemo()
    mail.send()

Output of the program:

/Library/Frameworks/Python.framework/Versions/3.10/bin/python3 /Users/prashanth/PycharmProjects/pythonTools/DraftMailDemo.py
b'From: [email protected]\nTo: Jimmy <[email protected]>\nSubject: Your subject\nMIME-Version: 1.0\nContent-Type: text/plain; charset="utf-8"\nContent-Transfer-Encoding: base64\n\nCiAgICAgICAgVGhpcyBpcyB5b3VyIG1lc3NhZ2UuCiAgICAgICAgSXQgY2FuIGhhdmUgbXVsdGlw\nbGUgbGluZXMgYW5kCiAgICAgICAgY29udGFpbiBzcGVjaWFsIGNoYXJhY3RlcnM6IMOkw7bDvC4K\nICAgICAgICA=\n'

Process finished with exit code 0

I even tried this following code and it executes with a 0 exit code but still doesnt save anything to the Drafts folder.

import imaplib
import time
import email


def createdraft():
    conn = imaplib.IMAP4_SSL('imap.gmail.com', port=993)
    conn.login('[email protected]', 'pass123')
    conn.select('[Gmail]/Drafts')
    conn.append("[Gmail]/Drafts", '', imaplib.Time2Internaldate(time.time()), str(email.message_from_string('TEST')).encode('UTF-8'))



class SecondTryDraft:
    pass


if __name__ == '__main__':
    mail = SecondTryDraft()
    createdraft()

My Environment:
Python : 3.10
OS : Mac OS Big Sur 11.6.5

CodePudding user response：

All mail servers known to me added letters to INBOX.

It probably depends on the server settings.

You can try moving them after adding.

CodePudding user response：

Ok, I finally figured this out after multiple tries and tweaking the other examples. I was able to create a MultiMime message that I can save to the Drafts folder and it works, hurray !!

It doesnt seem very efficient though (execution takes around 3-5 secs - I could use some suggestions on making it more efficient.

import imaplib
import time
from email.message import EmailMessage
from email.headerregistry import Address


def createdraft(lead_name, lead_email):
    msg = EmailMessage()
    msg['Subject'] = "My Introduction"
    msg['From'] = Address("Jane Doe", "Jane.Doe", "gmail.com")
    msg['To'] = Address(lead_name, lead_email.split("@")[0], lead_email.split("@")[1])
    msg.set_type('text/html')
    html_msg = f"""
        <div  style="color:rgb(0,0,255)"><font size="2">Hello {lead_name.split(" ")[0]},</font></div>
        <div  style="color:rgb(0,0,255)"><font size="2"><br></font></div>
        <div  style="color:rgb(0,0,255)"><font size="2">My name is John and I would like to connect with you.
        <div  style="color:rgb(0,0,255)"><font size="2">Look forward to hearing from you.<br></font></div>
        <div  style="color:rgb(0,0,255)"><font size="2"><br clear="all"></font></div>
        <div><font size="2"><b><span style="color:rgb(0,0,255)">Jane</span></b></font></div>
        <div><font size="2"><b><span style="color:rgb(0,0,255)">Mobile : 111-222-3333</span></b></font></div>
        <div><font size="2"><b><span style="color:rgb(0,0,255)">Email : <a href="mailto:[email protected]" target="_blank">Jane.Doe@gmail.<wbr>com</a></span></b></font></div>
        """
    msg.add_alternative(html_msg, subtype="html")

    conn = imaplib.IMAP4_SSL('imap.gmail.com', port=993)
    conn.login('[email protected]', 'pass123')
    conn.select('[Gmail]/Drafts')
    conn.append("[Gmail]/Drafts", '', imaplib.Time2Internaldate(time.time()), str(msg).encode('UTF-8'))


class CreateDraftMultiMimeText:
    pass


if __name__ == '__main__':
    mail = CreateDraftMultiMimeText()
    createdraft('John Doe', '[email protected]')

Environment :
Python : 3.10
OS : Mac OS Big Sur 11.6.5