Class

Net::IMAP implements Internet Message Access Protocol (IMAP) client functionality. The protocol is described in [IMAP].

IMAP Overview

An IMAP client connects to a server, and then authenticates itself using either authenticate() or login(). Having authenticated itself, there is a range of commands available to it. Most work with mailboxes, which may be arranged in an hierarchical namespace, and each of which contains zero or more messages. How this is implemented on the server is implementation-dependent; on a UNIX server, it will frequently be implemented as files in mailbox format within a hierarchy of directories.

To work on the messages within a mailbox, the client must first select that mailbox, using either select() or (for read-only access) examine(). Once the client has successfully selected a mailbox, they enter selected state, and that mailbox becomes the current mailbox, on which mail-item related commands implicitly operate.

Messages have two sorts of identifiers: message sequence numbers and UIDs.

Message sequence numbers number messages within a mailbox from 1 up to the number of items in the mailbox. If a new message arrives during a session, it receives a sequence number equal to the new size of the mailbox. If messages are expunged from the mailbox, remaining messages have their sequence numbers “shuffled down” to fill the gaps.

UIDs, on the other hand, are permanently guaranteed not to identify another message within the same mailbox, even if the existing message is deleted. UIDs are required to be assigned in ascending (but not necessarily sequential) order within a mailbox; this means that if a non-IMAP client rearranges the order of mailitems within a mailbox, the UIDs have to be reassigned. An IMAP client thus cannot rearrange message orders.

Examples of Usage

List sender and subject of all recent messages in the default mailbox

imap = Net::IMAP.new('mail.example.com')
imap.authenticate('LOGIN', 'joe_user', 'joes_password')
imap.examine('INBOX')
imap.search(["RECENT"]).each do |message_id|
  envelope = imap.fetch(message_id, "ENVELOPE")[0].attr["ENVELOPE"]
  puts "#{envelope.from[0].name}: \t#{envelope.subject}"
end

Move all messages from April 2003 from “Mail/sent-mail” to “Mail/sent-apr03”

imap = Net::IMAP.new('mail.example.com')
imap.authenticate('LOGIN', 'joe_user', 'joes_password')
imap.select('Mail/sent-mail')
if not imap.list('Mail/', 'sent-apr03')
  imap.create('Mail/sent-apr03')
end
imap.search(["BEFORE", "30-Apr-2003", "SINCE", "1-Apr-2003"]).each do |message_id|
  imap.copy(message_id, "Mail/sent-apr03")
  imap.store(message_id, "+FLAGS", [:Deleted])
end
imap.expunge

Thread Safety

Net::IMAP supports concurrent threads. For example,

imap = Net::IMAP.new("imap.foo.net", "imap2")
imap.authenticate("cram-md5", "bar", "password")
imap.select("inbox")
fetch_thread = Thread.start { imap.fetch(1..-1, "UID") }
search_result = imap.search(["BODY", "hello"])
fetch_result = fetch_thread.value
imap.disconnect

This script invokes the FETCH command and the SEARCH command concurrently.

Errors

An IMAP server can send three different types of responses to indicate failure:

NO

the attempted command could not be successfully completed. For instance, the username/password used for logging in are incorrect; the selected mailbox does not exist; etc.

BAD

the request from the client does not follow the server’s understanding of the IMAP protocol. This includes attempting commands from the wrong client state; for instance, attempting to perform a SEARCH command without having SELECTed a current mailbox. It can also signal an internal server failure (such as a disk crash) has occurred.

BYE

the server is saying goodbye. This can be part of a normal logout sequence, and can be used as part of a login sequence to indicate that the server is (for some reason) unwilling to accept your connection. As a response to any other command, it indicates either that the server is shutting down, or that the server is timing out the client connection due to inactivity.

These three error response are represented by the errors Net::IMAP::NoResponseError, Net::IMAP::BadResponseError, and Net::IMAP::ByeResponseError, all of which are subclasses of Net::IMAP::ResponseError. Essentially, all methods that involve sending a request to the server can generate one of these errors. Only the most pertinent instances have been documented below.

Because the IMAP class uses Sockets for communication, its methods are also susceptible to the various errors that can occur when working with sockets. These are generally represented as Errno errors. For instance, any method that involves sending a request to the server and/or receiving a response from it could raise an Errno::EPIPE error if the network connection unexpectedly goes down. See the socket(7), ip(7), tcp(7), socket(2), connect(2), and associated man pages.

Finally, a Net::IMAP::DataFormatError is thrown if low-level data is found to be in an incorrect format (for instance, when converting between UTF-8 and UTF-16), and Net::IMAP::ResponseParseError is thrown if a server response is non-parseable.

References

[IMAP]
  1. Crispin, “INTERNET MESSAGE ACCESS PROTOCOL - VERSION 4rev1”,

RFC 2060, December 1996. (Note: since obsoleted by RFC 3501)

[LANGUAGE-TAGS]

Alvestrand, H., “Tags for the Identification of Languages”, RFC 1766, March 1995.

[MD5]

Myers, J., and M. Rose, “The Content-MD5 Header Field”, RFC 1864, October 1995.

[MIME-IMB]

Freed, N., and N. Borenstein, “MIME (Multipurpose Internet Mail Extensions) Part One: Format of Internet Message Bodies”, RFC 2045, November 1996.

[RFC-822]

Crocker, D., “Standard for the Format of ARPA Internet Text Messages”, STD 11, RFC 822, University of Delaware, August 1982.

[RFC-2087]

Myers, J., “IMAP4 QUOTA extension”, RFC 2087, January 1997.

[RFC-2086]

Myers, J., “IMAP4 ACL extension”, RFC 2086, January 1997.

[RFC-2195]

Klensin, J., Catoe, R., and Krumviede, P., “IMAP/POP AUTHorize Extension for Simple Challenge/Response”, RFC 2195, September 1997.

[SORT-THREAD-EXT]

Crispin, M., “INTERNET MESSAGE ACCESS PROTOCOL - SORT and THREAD Extensions”, draft-ietf-imapext-sort, May 2003.

[OSSL]

www.openssl.org

[RSSL]

savannah.gnu.org/projects/rubypki

[UTF7]

Goldsmith, D. and Davis, M., “UTF-7: A Mail-Safe Transformation Format of Unicode”, RFC 2152, May 1997.

Constants
No documentation available

Flag indicating a message has been seen.

Flag indicating a message has been answered.

Flag indicating a message has been flagged for special or urgent attention.

Flag indicating a message has been marked for deletion. This will occur when the mailbox is closed or expunged.

Flag indicating a message is only a draft or work-in-progress version.

Flag indicating that the message is “recent,” meaning that this session is the first session in which the client has been notified of this message.

Flag indicating that a mailbox context name cannot contain children.

Flag indicating that a mailbox is not selected.

Flag indicating that a mailbox has been marked “interesting” by the server; this commonly indicates that the mailbox contains new messages.

Flag indicating that the mailbox does not contains new messages.

No documentation available
No documentation available
No documentation available
No documentation available

Net::IMAP::ContinuationRequest represents command continuation requests.

The command continuation request response is indicated by a “+” token instead of a tag. This form of response indicates that the server is ready to accept the continuation of a command from the client. The remainder of this response is a line of text.

continue_req    ::= "+" SPACE (resp_text / base64)

Fields:

data

Returns the data (Net::IMAP::ResponseText).

raw_data

Returns the raw data string.

Net::IMAP::UntaggedResponse represents untagged responses.

Data transmitted by the server to the client and status responses that do not indicate command completion are prefixed with the token “*”, and are called untagged responses.

response_data   ::= "*" SPACE (resp_cond_state / resp_cond_bye /
                    mailbox_data / message_data / capability_data)

Fields:

name

Returns the name, such as “FLAGS”, “LIST”, or “FETCH”.

data

Returns the data such as an array of flag symbols, a ((<Net::IMAP::MailboxList>)) object.

raw_data

Returns the raw data string.

Net::IMAP::TaggedResponse represents tagged responses.

The server completion result response indicates the success or failure of the operation. It is tagged with the same tag as the client command which began the operation.

response_tagged ::= tag SPACE resp_cond_state CRLF

tag             ::= 1*<any ATOM_CHAR except "+">

resp_cond_state ::= ("OK" / "NO" / "BAD") SPACE resp_text

Fields:

tag

Returns the tag.

name

Returns the name, one of “OK”, “NO”, or “BAD”.

data

Returns the data. See ((<Net::IMAP::ResponseText>)).

raw_data

Returns the raw data string.

Net::IMAP::ResponseText represents texts of responses. The text may be prefixed by the response code.

resp_text       ::= ["[" resp_text_code "]" SPACE] (text_mime2 / text)
                    ;; text SHOULD NOT begin with "[" or "="

Fields:

code

Returns the response code. See ((<Net::IMAP::ResponseCode>)).

text

Returns the text.

Net::IMAP::ResponseCode represents response codes.

resp_text_code  ::= "ALERT" / "PARSE" /
                    "PERMANENTFLAGS" SPACE "(" #(flag / "\*") ")" /
                    "READ-ONLY" / "READ-WRITE" / "TRYCREATE" /
                    "UIDVALIDITY" SPACE nz_number /
                    "UNSEEN" SPACE nz_number /
                    atom [SPACE 1*<any TEXT_CHAR except "]">]

Fields:

name

Returns the name, such as “ALERT”, “PERMANENTFLAGS”, or “UIDVALIDITY”.

data

Returns the data, if it exists.

Net::IMAP::MailboxList represents contents of the LIST response.

mailbox_list    ::= "(" #("\Marked" / "\Noinferiors" /
                    "\Noselect" / "\Unmarked" / flag_extension) ")"
                    SPACE (<"> QUOTED_CHAR <"> / nil) SPACE mailbox

Fields:

attr

Returns the name attributes. Each name attribute is a symbol capitalized by String#capitalize, such as :Noselect (not :NoSelect).

delim

Returns the hierarchy delimiter.

name

Returns the mailbox name.

Net::IMAP::MailboxQuota represents contents of GETQUOTA response. This object can also be a response to GETQUOTAROOT. In the syntax specification below, the delimiter used with the “#” construct is a single space (SPACE).

quota_list      ::= "(" #quota_resource ")"

quota_resource  ::= atom SPACE number SPACE number

quota_response  ::= "QUOTA" SPACE astring SPACE quota_list

Fields:

mailbox

The mailbox with the associated quota.

usage

Current storage usage of the mailbox.

quota

Quota limit imposed on the mailbox.

Net::IMAP::MailboxQuotaRoot represents part of the GETQUOTAROOT response. (GETQUOTAROOT can also return Net::IMAP::MailboxQuota.)

quotaroot_response ::= "QUOTAROOT" SPACE astring *(SPACE astring)

Fields:

mailbox

The mailbox with the associated quota.

quotaroots

Zero or more quotaroots that affect the quota on the specified mailbox.

Net::IMAP::MailboxACLItem represents the response from GETACL.

acl_data        ::= "ACL" SPACE mailbox *(SPACE identifier SPACE rights)

identifier      ::= astring

rights          ::= astring

Fields:

user

Login name that has certain rights to the mailbox that was specified with the getacl command.

rights

The access rights the indicated user has to the mailbox.

Net::IMAP::StatusData represents the contents of the STATUS response.

Fields:

mailbox

Returns the mailbox name.

attr

Returns a hash. Each key is one of “MESSAGES”, “RECENT”, “UIDNEXT”, “UIDVALIDITY”, “UNSEEN”. Each value is a number.

Net::IMAP::FetchData represents the contents of the FETCH response.

Fields:

seqno

Returns the message sequence number. (Note: not the unique identifier, even for the UID command response.)

attr

Returns a hash. Each key is a data item name, and each value is its value.

The current data items are:

BODY

A form of BODYSTRUCTURE without extension data.

BODY<<origin_octet>>

A string expressing the body contents of the specified section.

BODYSTRUCTURE

An object that describes the [MIME-IMB] body structure of a message. See Net::IMAP::BodyTypeBasic, Net::IMAP::BodyTypeText, Net::IMAP::BodyTypeMessage, Net::IMAP::BodyTypeMultipart.

ENVELOPE

A Net::IMAP::Envelope object that describes the envelope structure of a message.

FLAGS

A array of flag symbols that are set for this message. Flag symbols are capitalized by String#capitalize.

INTERNALDATE

A string representing the internal date of the message.

RFC822

Equivalent to BODY[].

RFC822.HEADER

Equivalent to BODY.PEEK.

RFC822.SIZE

A number expressing the [RFC-822] size of the message.

RFC822.TEXT

Equivalent to BODY.

UID

A number expressing the unique identifier of the message.

Net::IMAP::Envelope represents envelope structures of messages.

Fields:

date

Returns a string that represents the date.

subject

Returns a string that represents the subject.

from

Returns an array of Net::IMAP::Address that represents the from.

sender

Returns an array of Net::IMAP::Address that represents the sender.

reply_to

Returns an array of Net::IMAP::Address that represents the reply-to.

to

Returns an array of Net::IMAP::Address that represents the to.

cc

Returns an array of Net::IMAP::Address that represents the cc.

bcc

Returns an array of Net::IMAP::Address that represents the bcc.

in_reply_to

Returns a string that represents the in-reply-to.

message_id

Returns a string that represents the message-id.

Net::IMAP::Address represents electronic mail addresses.

Fields:

name

Returns the phrase from [RFC-822] mailbox.

route

Returns the route from [RFC-822] route-addr.

mailbox

nil indicates end of [RFC-822] group. If non-nil and host is nil, returns [RFC-822] group name. Otherwise, returns [RFC-822] local-part.

host

nil indicates [RFC-822] group syntax. Otherwise, returns [RFC-822] domain name.

Net::IMAP::ContentDisposition represents Content-Disposition fields.

Fields:

dsp_type

Returns the disposition type.

param

Returns a hash that represents parameters of the Content-Disposition field.

Net::IMAP::ThreadMember represents a thread-node returned by Net::IMAP#thread.

Fields:

seqno

The sequence number of this message.

children

An array of Net::IMAP::ThreadMember objects for mail items that are children of this in the thread.

No documentation available
Attributes
Read

Returns an initial greeting response from the server.

Read

Returns recorded untagged responses. For example:

imap.select("inbox")
p imap.responses["EXISTS"][-1]
#=> 2
p imap.responses["UIDVALIDITY"][-1]
#=> 968263756

Returns all response handlers.

Seconds to wait until a connection is opened. If the IMAP object cannot open a connection within this time, it raises a Net::OpenTimeout exception. The default value is 30 seconds.

Read & Write

The thread to receive exceptions.

Class Methods

Adds an authenticator for Net::IMAP#authenticate. auth_type is the type of authentication this authenticator supports (for instance, “LOGIN”). The authenticator is an object which defines a process() method to handle authentication with the server. See Net::IMAP::LoginAuthenticator, Net::IMAP::CramMD5Authenticator, and Net::IMAP::DigestMD5Authenticator for examples.

If auth_type refers to an existing authenticator, it will be replaced by the new one.

Returns the debug mode.

Sets the debug mode.

Decode a string from modified UTF-7 format to UTF-8.

UTF-7 is a 7-bit encoding of Unicode [UTF7]. IMAP uses a slightly modified version of this to encode mailbox names containing non-ASCII characters; see [IMAP] section 5.1.3.

Net::IMAP does not automatically encode and decode mailbox names to and from UTF-7.

An alias for default_port

The default port for IMAP connections, port 143

The default port for IMAPS connections, port 993

Encode a string from UTF-8 format to modified UTF-7.

Formats time as an IMAP-style date.

Formats time as an IMAP-style date-time.

Returns the max number of flags interned to symbols.

Sets the max number of flags interned to symbols.

Creates a new Net::IMAP object and connects it to the specified host.

options is an option hash, each key of which is a symbol.

The available options are:

port

Port number (default value is 143 for imap, or 993 for imaps)

ssl

If options is true, then an attempt will be made to use SSL (now TLS) to connect to the server. For this to work OpenSSL [OSSL] and the Ruby OpenSSL [RSSL] extensions need to be installed. If options is a hash, it’s passed to OpenSSL::SSL::SSLContext#set_params as parameters.

open_timeout

Seconds to wait until a connection is opened

The most common errors are:

Errno::ECONNREFUSED

Connection refused by host or an intervening firewall.

Errno::ETIMEDOUT

Connection timed out (possibly due to packets being dropped by an intervening firewall).

Errno::ENETUNREACH

There is no route to that network.

SocketError

Hostname not known or other socket error.

Net::IMAP::ByeResponseError

The connected to the host was successful, but it immediately said goodbye.

Instance Methods

Adds a response handler. For example, to detect when the server sends a new EXISTS response (which normally indicates new messages being added to the mailbox), add the following handler after selecting the mailbox:

imap.add_response_handler { |resp|
  if resp.kind_of?(Net::IMAP::UntaggedResponse) and resp.name == "EXISTS"
    puts "Mailbox now has #{resp.data} messages"
  end
}

Sends a APPEND command to append the message to the end of the mailbox. The optional flags argument is an array of flags initially passed to the new message. The optional date_time argument specifies the creation time to assign to the new message; it defaults to the current time. For example:

imap.append("inbox", <<EOF.gsub(/\n/, "\r\n"), [:Seen], Time.now)
Subject: hello
From: shugo@ruby-lang.org
To: shugo@ruby-lang.org

hello world
EOF

A Net::IMAP::NoResponseError is raised if the mailbox does not exist (it is not created automatically), or if the flags, date_time, or message arguments contain errors.

Sends an AUTHENTICATE command to authenticate the client. The auth_type parameter is a string that represents the authentication mechanism to be used. Currently Net::IMAP supports the authentication mechanisms:

LOGIN:: login using cleartext user and password.
CRAM-MD5:: login with cleartext user and encrypted password
           (see [RFC-2195] for a full description).  This
           mechanism requires that the server have the user's
           password stored in clear-text password.

For both of these mechanisms, there should be two args: username and (cleartext) password. A server may not support one or the other of these mechanisms; check capability() for a capability of the form “AUTH=LOGIN” or “AUTH=CRAM-MD5”.

Authentication is done using the appropriate authenticator object: see @@authenticators for more information on plugging in your own authenticator.

For example:

imap.authenticate('LOGIN', user, password)

A Net::IMAP::NoResponseError is raised if authentication fails.

Sends a CAPABILITY command, and returns an array of capabilities that the server supports. Each capability is a string. See [IMAP] for a list of possible capabilities.

Note that the Net::IMAP class does not modify its behaviour according to the capabilities of the server; it is up to the user of the class to ensure that a certain capability is supported by a server before using it.

Sends a CHECK command to request a checkpoint of the currently selected mailbox. This performs implementation-specific housekeeping; for instance, reconciling the mailbox’s in-memory and on-disk state.

Sends a CLOSE command to close the currently selected mailbox. The CLOSE command permanently removes from the mailbox all messages that have the Deleted flag set.

Sends a COPY command to copy the specified message(s) to the end of the specified destination mailbox. The set parameter is a number, an array of numbers, or a Range object. The number is a message sequence number.

No documentation available

Sends a CREATE command to create a new mailbox.

A Net::IMAP::NoResponseError is raised if a mailbox with that name cannot be created.

No documentation available

Sends a DELETE command to remove the mailbox.

A Net::IMAP::NoResponseError is raised if a mailbox with that name cannot be deleted, either because it does not exist or because the client does not have permission to delete it.

Disconnects from the server.

Returns true if disconnected from the server.

Sends a EXAMINE command to select a mailbox so that messages in the mailbox can be accessed. Behaves the same as select(), except that the selected mailbox is identified as read-only.

A Net::IMAP::NoResponseError is raised if the mailbox does not exist or is for some reason non-examinable.

Sends a EXPUNGE command to permanently remove from the currently selected mailbox all messages that have the Deleted flag set.

Sends a FETCH command to retrieve data associated with a message in the mailbox.

The set parameter is a number or a range between two numbers, or an array of those. The number is a message sequence number, where -1 represents a ‘*’ for use in range notation like 100..-1 being interpreted as ‘100:*’. Beware that the exclude_end? property of a Range object is ignored, and the contents of a range are independent of the order of the range endpoints as per the protocol specification, so 1…5, 5..1 and 5…1 are all equivalent to 1..5.

attr is a list of attributes to fetch; see the documentation for Net::IMAP::FetchData for a list of valid attributes.

The return value is an array of Net::IMAP::FetchData or nil (instead of an empty array) if there is no matching message.

For example:

p imap.fetch(6..8, "UID")
#=> [#<Net::IMAP::FetchData seqno=6, attr={"UID"=>98}>, \\
     #<Net::IMAP::FetchData seqno=7, attr={"UID"=>99}>, \\
     #<Net::IMAP::FetchData seqno=8, attr={"UID"=>100}>]
p imap.fetch(6, "BODY[HEADER.FIELDS (SUBJECT)]")
#=> [#<Net::IMAP::FetchData seqno=6, attr={"BODY[HEADER.FIELDS (SUBJECT)]"=>"Subject: test\r\n\r\n"}>]
data = imap.uid_fetch(98, ["RFC822.SIZE", "INTERNALDATE"])[0]
p data.seqno
#=> 6
p data.attr["RFC822.SIZE"]
#=> 611
p data.attr["INTERNALDATE"]
#=> "12-Oct-2000 22:40:59 +0900"
p data.attr["UID"]
#=> 98
No documentation available
No documentation available
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No documentation available

Send the GETACL command along with a specified mailbox. If this mailbox exists, an array containing objects of Net::IMAP::MailboxACLItem will be returned.

Sends the GETQUOTA command along with specified mailbox. If this mailbox exists, then an array containing a Net::IMAP::MailboxQuota object is returned. This command is generally only available to server admin.

Sends the GETQUOTAROOT command along with the specified mailbox. This command is generally available to both admin and user. If this mailbox exists, it returns an array containing objects of type Net::IMAP::MailboxQuotaRoot and Net::IMAP::MailboxQuota.

Sends an IDLE command that waits for notifications of new or expunged messages. Yields responses from the server during the IDLE.

Use idle_done() to leave IDLE.

If timeout is given, this method returns after timeout seconds passed. timeout can be used for keep-alive. For example, the following code checks the connection for each 60 seconds.

loop do
  imap.idle(60) do |res|
    ...
  end
end

Leaves IDLE.

Sends a LIST command, and returns a subset of names from the complete set of all names available to the client. refname provides a context (for instance, a base directory in a directory-based mailbox hierarchy). mailbox specifies a mailbox or (via wildcards) mailboxes under that context. Two wildcards may be used in mailbox: ‘*’, which matches all characters including the hierarchy delimiter (for instance, ‘/’ on a UNIX-hosted directory-based mailbox hierarchy); and ‘%’, which matches all characters except the hierarchy delimiter.

If refname is empty, mailbox is used directly to determine which mailboxes to match. If mailbox is empty, the root name of refname and the hierarchy delimiter are returned.

The return value is an array of Net::IMAP::MailboxList. For example:

imap.create("foo/bar")
imap.create("foo/baz")
p imap.list("", "foo/%")
#=> [#<Net::IMAP::MailboxList attr=[:Noselect], delim="/", name="foo/">, \\
     #<Net::IMAP::MailboxList attr=[:Noinferiors, :Marked], delim="/", name="foo/bar">, \\
     #<Net::IMAP::MailboxList attr=[:Noinferiors], delim="/", name="foo/baz">]

Sends a LOGIN command to identify the client and carries the plaintext password authenticating this user. Note that, unlike calling authenticate() with an auth_type of “LOGIN”, login() does not use the login authenticator.

A Net::IMAP::NoResponseError is raised if authentication fails.

Sends a LOGOUT command to inform the server that the client is done with the connection.

Sends a LSUB command, and returns a subset of names from the set of names that the user has declared as being “active” or “subscribed.” refname and mailbox are interpreted as for list(). The return value is an array of Net::IMAP::MailboxList.

Sends a MOVE command to move the specified message(s) to the end of the specified destination mailbox. The set parameter is a number, an array of numbers, or a Range object. The number is a message sequence number. The IMAP MOVE extension is described in [RFC-6851].

Sends a NOOP command to the server. It does nothing.

No documentation available
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Removes the response handler.

Sends a RENAME command to change the name of the mailbox to newname.

A Net::IMAP::NoResponseError is raised if a mailbox with the name mailbox cannot be renamed to newname for whatever reason; for instance, because mailbox does not exist, or because there is already a mailbox with the name newname.

Sends a SEARCH command to search the mailbox for messages that match the given searching criteria, and returns message sequence numbers. keys can either be a string holding the entire search string, or a single-dimension array of search keywords and arguments. The following are some common search criteria; see [IMAP] section 6.4.4 for a full list.

<message set>

a set of message sequence numbers. ‘,’ indicates an interval, ‘:’ indicates a range. For instance, ‘2,10:12,15’ means “2,10,11,12,15”.

BEFORE <date>

messages with an internal date strictly before <date>. The date argument has a format similar to 8-Aug-2002.

BODY <string>

messages that contain <string> within their body.

CC <string>

messages containing <string> in their CC field.

FROM <string>

messages that contain <string> in their FROM field.

NEW

messages with the Recent, but not the Seen, flag set.

NOT <search-key>

negate the following search key.

OR <search-key> <search-key>

“or” two search keys together.

ON <date>

messages with an internal date exactly equal to <date>, which has a format similar to 8-Aug-2002.

SINCE <date>

messages with an internal date on or after <date>.

SUBJECT <string>

messages with <string> in their subject.

TO <string>

messages with <string> in their TO field.

For example:

p imap.search(["SUBJECT", "hello", "NOT", "NEW"])
#=> [1, 6, 7, 8]
No documentation available

Sends a SELECT command to select a mailbox so that messages in the mailbox can be accessed.

After you have selected a mailbox, you may retrieve the number of items in that mailbox from @responses[-1], and the number of recent messages from @responses[-1]. Note that these values can change if new messages arrive during a session; see add_response_handler() for a way of detecting this event.

A Net::IMAP::NoResponseError is raised if the mailbox does not exist or is for some reason non-selectable.

No documentation available
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Sends the SETACL command along with mailbox, user and the rights that user is to have on that mailbox. If rights is nil, then that user will be stripped of any rights to that mailbox. The IMAP ACL commands are described in [RFC-2086].

Sends a SETQUOTA command along with the specified mailbox and quota. If quota is nil, then quota will be unset for that mailbox. Typically one needs to be logged in as a server admin for this to work. The IMAP quota commands are described in [RFC-2087].

Sends a SORT command to sort messages in the mailbox. Returns an array of message sequence numbers. For example:

p imap.sort(["FROM"], ["ALL"], "US-ASCII")
#=> [1, 2, 3, 5, 6, 7, 8, 4, 9]
p imap.sort(["DATE"], ["SUBJECT", "hello"], "US-ASCII")
#=> [6, 7, 8, 1]

See [SORT-THREAD-EXT] for more details.

No documentation available
No documentation available

Sends a STARTTLS command to start TLS session.

Sends a STATUS command, and returns the status of the indicated mailbox. attr is a list of one or more attributes whose statuses are to be requested. Supported attributes include:

MESSAGES:: the number of messages in the mailbox.
RECENT:: the number of recent messages in the mailbox.
UNSEEN:: the number of unseen messages in the mailbox.

The return value is a hash of attributes. For example:

p imap.status("inbox", ["MESSAGES", "RECENT"])
#=> {"RECENT"=>0, "MESSAGES"=>44}

A Net::IMAP::NoResponseError is raised if status values for mailbox cannot be returned; for instance, because it does not exist.

Sends a STORE command to alter data associated with messages in the mailbox, in particular their flags. The set parameter is a number, an array of numbers, or a Range object. Each number is a message sequence number. attr is the name of a data item to store: ‘FLAGS’ will replace the message’s flag list with the provided one, ‘+FLAGS’ will add the provided flags, and ‘-FLAGS’ will remove them. flags is a list of flags.

The return value is an array of Net::IMAP::FetchData. For example:

p imap.store(6..8, "+FLAGS", [:Deleted])
#=> [#<Net::IMAP::FetchData seqno=6, attr={"FLAGS"=>[:Seen, :Deleted]}>, \\
     #<Net::IMAP::FetchData seqno=7, attr={"FLAGS"=>[:Seen, :Deleted]}>, \\
     #<Net::IMAP::FetchData seqno=8, attr={"FLAGS"=>[:Seen, :Deleted]}>]
No documentation available

Sends a SUBSCRIBE command to add the specified mailbox name to the server’s set of “active” or “subscribed” mailboxes as returned by lsub().

A Net::IMAP::NoResponseError is raised if mailbox cannot be subscribed to; for instance, because it does not exist.

No documentation available

Similar to search(), but returns message sequence numbers in threaded format, as a Net::IMAP::ThreadMember tree. The supported algorithms are:

ORDEREDSUBJECT

split into single-level threads according to subject, ordered by date.

REFERENCES

split into threads by parent/child relationships determined by which message is a reply to which.

Unlike search(), charset is a required argument. US-ASCII and UTF-8 are sample values.

See [SORT-THREAD-EXT] for more details.

No documentation available

Similar to copy(), but set contains unique identifiers.

Similar to fetch(), but set contains unique identifiers.

Similar to move(), but set contains unique identifiers.

Similar to search(), but returns unique identifiers.

Similar to sort(), but returns an array of unique identifiers.

Similar to store(), but set contains unique identifiers.

Similar to thread(), but returns unique identifiers instead of message sequence numbers.

Sends a UNSUBSCRIBE command to remove the specified mailbox name from the server’s set of “active” or “subscribed” mailboxes.

A Net::IMAP::NoResponseError is raised if mailbox cannot be unsubscribed from; for instance, because the client is not currently subscribed to it.

No documentation available

Sends a XLIST command, and returns a subset of names from the complete set of all names available to the client. refname provides a context (for instance, a base directory in a directory-based mailbox hierarchy). mailbox specifies a mailbox or (via wildcards) mailboxes under that context. Two wildcards may be used in mailbox: ‘*’, which matches all characters including the hierarchy delimiter (for instance, ‘/’ on a UNIX-hosted directory-based mailbox hierarchy); and ‘%’, which matches all characters except the hierarchy delimiter.

If refname is empty, mailbox is used directly to determine which mailboxes to match. If mailbox is empty, the root name of refname and the hierarchy delimiter are returned.

The XLIST command is like the LIST command except that the flags returned refer to the function of the folder/mailbox, e.g. :Sent

The return value is an array of Net::IMAP::MailboxList. For example:

imap.create("foo/bar")
imap.create("foo/baz")
p imap.xlist("", "foo/%")
#=> [#<Net::IMAP::MailboxList attr=[:Noselect], delim="/", name="foo/">, \\
     #<Net::IMAP::MailboxList attr=[:Noinferiors, :Marked], delim="/", name="foo/bar">, \\
     #<Net::IMAP::MailboxList attr=[:Noinferiors], delim="/", name="foo/baz">]