NAME

Mail::Message::Body::Multipart - body of a message with attachments

CLASS HIERARCHY

Mail::Message::Body::Multipart
is a Mail::Message::Body + ::Construct + ::Encode
is a Mail::Reporter

SYNOPSIS

See Mail::Message::Body, plus

if($body->isMultipart) {
   my @attachments = $body->parts;
   my $attachment3 = $body->part(2);
   my $before      = $body->preamble;
   my $after       = $body->epiloque;
   $body->part(1)->delete;
}

DESCRIPTION

READ Mail::Message::Body FIRST. This manual-page only describes the extentions to the default body functionality.

The body (content) of a message can be stored in various ways. In this manual-page you find the description of extra functionality you have when a message contains attachments (parts).

METHOD INDEX

Methods prefixed with an abbreviation are described in Mail::Reporter (MR), Mail::Message::Body (MMB), Mail::Message::Body::Construct (MMBC), Mail::Message::Body::Encode (MMBE).

The general methods for Mail::Message::Body::Multipart objects:

     attach MESSAGES|BODIES           MMB lines
     boundary [STRING]                 MR log [LEVEL [,STRINGS]]
 MMB charset                          MMB message [MESSAGE]
MMBE check                            MMB mimeType
 MMB checked [BOOLEAN]                MMB modified [BOOL]
MMBC concatenate COMPONENTS               new OPTIONS
 MMB decoded OPTIONS                  MMB nrLines
 MMB disposition [STRING|FIELD]           part INDEX
MMBE encode OPTIONS                       parts ['ALL'|'ACTIVE'|'DELE...
MMBE encoded                              preamble
 MMB eol ['CR'|'LF'|'CRLF'|'NATI...   MMB print [FILE]
     epilogue                         MMB reply OPTIONS
  MR errors                            MR report [LEVEL]
 MMB file                              MR reportAll [LEVEL]
     foreachComponent CODE            MMB size
MMBC foreachLine CODE                 MMB string
MMBE isBinary                             stripSignature OPTIONS
 MMB isDelayed                         MR trace [LEVEL]
 MMB isMultipart                      MMB transferEncoding [STRING|FI...
 MMB isNested                         MMB type
MMBE isText                            MR warnings

The extra methods for extension writers:

  MR AUTOLOAD                         MMB load
  MR DESTROY                           MR logPriority LEVEL
MMBE addTransferEncHandler NAME,...    MR logSettings
 MMB clone                            MMB moveLocation [DISTANCE]
 MMB fileLocation [BEGIN,END]          MR notImplemented
MMBE getTransferEncHandler TYPE       MMB read PARSER, HEAD, BODYTYPE...
  MR inGlobalDestruction             MMBE unify BODY

METHODS

new OPTIONS

OPTION      DESCRIBED IN                   DEFAULT
based_on    Mail::Message::Body            undef
boundary    Mail::Message::Body::Multipart undef
charset     Mail::Message::Body            'us-ascii'
data        Mail::Message::Body            undef
disposition Mail::Message::Body            undef
epilogue    Mail::Message::Body::Multipart undef
log         Mail::Reporter                 'WARNINGS'
message     Mail::Message::Body            undef
mime_type   Mail::Message::Body            'multipart/mixed'
modified    Mail::Message::Body            0
parts       Mail::Message::Body::Multipart undef
preamble    Mail::Message::Body::Multipart undef
trace       Mail::Reporter                 'WARNINGS'
transfer_encoding Mail::Message::Body      'NONE'

• boundary => STRING

  Seperatory to be used between parts of the message. This seperator must be unique in case the message contains nested multiparts (which are not unusual). If <undef>, a nice unique boundary will be generated.

• epilogue => BODY

  The text which is included in the main body after the final boundary. This is usually empty, and has no meaning.

• parts => ARRAY-OF-(MESSAGES|BODIES)

  Specifies an initial list of parts in this body. These may be full MESSAGES, or BODIES which transformed into messages before use. Each message is coerced into a Mail::Message::Part object.

  MIME::Entity and Mail::Internet objects are acceptable in the list, because they are coerceable into Mail::Message::Part's. Values of undef will be skipped silently.

• preamble => BODY

  The text which is included in the body before the first part. It is common use to include a text to warn the user that the message is a multipart. However, this was useful in earlier days: most mail agents are very capable in warning the user themselves.

Example:

my $intro = Mail::Message::Body->new(data => ['part one']);
my $pgp   = Mail::Message::Body->new(data => ['part three']);

my $body  = Mail::Message::Body::Multipart->new
  ( boundary => time . '--it-s-mine'
  , parts    => [ $intro, $folder->message(3)->decoded, $pgp ]
  );

foreachComponent CODE

Execute the CODE for each component of the message: the preamble, the epilogue, and each of the parts.

Each component is a body and is passed as second argument to the CODE. The first argument is a reference to this multi-parted body. The CODE returns a body object. When any of the returned bodies differs from the body which was passed, then a new multi-part body will be returned. Reference to the not-changed bodies and the changed bodies will be included in that new multi-part.

Example:

my $checked = $multi->foreachComponent(sub {$_[1]->check});

preamble

Returns the preamble (the text before the first message part --attachment), The preamble is stored in a BODY object, and its encoding is derived from the multipart header.

epilogue

Returns the epilogue (the text after the last message part --attachment), The preamble is stored in a BODY object, and its encoding is derived from the multipart header.

parts ['ALL'|'ACTIVE'|'DELETED'|'RECURSE'|FILTER]

Return all parts by default, or when ALL is specified. ACTIVE returns the parts which are not flagged for deletion, as opposite to DELETED. RECURSE descents into all nested multiparts to collect all parts.

You may also specify a code reference which is called for each nested part. The first argument will be the message part. When the code returns true, the part is incorporated in the return list.

Examples:

print "Number of attachments: ",
    scalar $message->body->parts('ACTIVE');

foreach my $part ($message->body->parts) {
    print "Type: ", $part->get('Content-Type');
}

part INDEX

Returns only the part with the specified INDEX. You may use a negative value here, which counts from the back in the list. Parts which are flagged to be deleted are included in the count.

Example:

$message->body->part(2)->print;
$body->part(1)->delete;

boundary [STRING]

Returns the boundary which is used to separate the parts in this body. If none was read from file, then one will be assigned. With STRING you explicitly set the boundary to be used.

attach MESSAGES|BODIES

Attach a list of MESSAGES to this multipart. A new body is returned. When you specify BODIES, they will first be translated into real messages. MIME::Entity and Mail::Internet objects may be specified too. In any case, the parts will be coerced into Mail::Message::Part's.

stripSignature OPTIONS

Removes all parts which contains data usually defined as being signature. The MIME::Type module provides this knowledge. A new multipart is returned, containing the remaining parts. No OPTIONS are defined yet, although some may be specified, because this method overrules the stripSignature method for normal bodies.

METHODS for extension writers

SEE ALSO

Mail::Box-Overview

For support and additional documentation, see http://perl.overmeer.net/mailbox/

AUTHOR

Mark Overmeer (mailbox@overmeer.net). All rights reserved. This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the same terms as Perl itself.

VERSION

This code is beta, version 2.017.

Copyright (c) 2001-2002 Mark Overmeer. All rights reserved. This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the same terms as Perl itself.