If you've had to send email with regular ASP, you've probably used CDONTS. In .NET, this functionality has been rolled into the Framework, and is part of the System.Web.Mail namespace. Using the classes in this namespace, you can easily construct and send email, with attachments if you wish, using the SMTP service built into Windows.
System.Web.Mail Namespace
The System.Web.Mail namespace is composed of three classes and three enumerations.
Classes:
| MailAttachment | Represents the attachments of an email. |
| MailMessage | Represents the email itself. |
| SmtpMail | Responsible for sending MailMessages via SMTP. |
Enumerations:
| MailEncoding | Specifies the Encoding of the message: Base64 or UUEncode |
| MailFormat | Specifies the Format of the message: Html or Text |
| MailPriority | Specifies the Priority of the message: High, Medium, or Low. |
Constructing the MailMessage
The MailMessage object represents an email. You start by instantiating a MailMessage object, and then set the properties with the details of the email. The following properties are the ones you are most likely to use in your application:
| Attachments | the list of attachments (represented by MailAttachment objects) that are transmitted with the email |
| Bcc | a semicolon-delimited list of email addresses that receive a Blind Carbon Copy (BCC) copy of the email message |
| Body | the body of the email |
| BodyFormat | specifies the MailFormat of the email |
| Cc | a semicolon-delimited list of email addresses that receive a Carbon Copy (CC) of the email message |
| From | the email address of the sender |
| Priority | specifies the MailPriority of the email |
| Subject | the subject of the email |
| To | the email address of the recipient |
| UrlContentBase | the URL base of all relative URL's used in an Html Body |
| UrlContentLocation | Specifies the Priority of the message: High, Medium, or Low. |
Sending with SmtpMail
Once you have constructed your MailMessage object, you use another object, SmtpMail, to actually send it. The most important method on the SmtpMail object is a static method, Send. This method has two variants. One allows you to send a MailMessage object:
SmtpMail.Send(myEmailObject);
Another variant allows you to specify the sender, recipient, subject and the body of an email, and have it sent right away.
SmtpMail.Send(strFrom, strTo, strSubject, strBody);
Example
Now let's look at an example that pulls this all together. We'll start by creating a MailMessage object, setting a few properties, and finally sending the email with the SmtpMail object.
<%@ Page Language="C#"%>
<scriptlanguage="C#"runat="server">
void Page_Load()
{
System.Web.Mail.MailMessage myEmail=new System.Web.Mail.MailMessage();
myEmail.From ="agent@mypersonalshoppers.com";
myEmail.To ="john@johnsmith.com";
myEmail.Subject ="Product Availability Notice";
myEmail.BodyFormat = System.Web.Mail.MailFormat.Html;
myEmail.Body ="The sunglasses you expressed interest in are now in stock.";
System.Web.Mail.SmtpMail.Send(myEmail);
lblMailStatus.Text ="Mail successfully sent.";
}
</script>
<html>
<body>
<asp:Label id="lblMailStatus"runat="server"/>
</body>
</html> <%@ PageLanguage="VB"%>
<scriptlanguage="VB"runat="server">
SubPage_Load()
DimmyEmailasSystem.Web.Mail.MailMessage=newSystem.Web.Mail.MailMessage()
myEmail.From="agent@mypersonalshoppers.com"
myEmail.To="john@johnsmith.com"
myEmail.Subject="Product Availability Notice"
myEmail.BodyFormat=System.Web.Mail.MailFormat.Html
myEmail.Body="The sunglasses you expressed interest in are now in stock."
System.Web.Mail.SmtpMail.Send(myEmail)
lblMailStatus.Text="Mail successfully sent."
EndSub
</script>
<html>
<body>
<asp:Labelid="lblMailStatus"runat="server"/>
</body>
</html>
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