NAME

Mail::Transport::POP3 - receive messages via POP3

CLASS INHERITANCE

Mail::Transport::POP3 is a Mail::Transport::Receive is a Mail::Transport is a Mail::Reporter

SYNOPSIS

 my $receiver = Mail::Transport::POP3->new(...);
 my $message = $receiver->receive($id);

DESCRIPTION

Receive messages via the POP3 protocol from one remote server, as specified in rfc1939. This object hides much of the complications in the protocol and recovers broken connections automatically. Although it is part of the Mail::Box module, this object can be used separately.

METHODS

Initiation

new OPTIONS

Create a new pop3 server connection. One object can only handle one connection: for a single user to one single server. If the server could not be reached, or when the login fails, this instantiating new will return undef.

 OPTION               DEFAULT
 authenticate         'AUTO'
 hostname             'localhost'
 interval             30
 log                  'WARNINGS'
 password             undef
 port                 undef
 proxy                undef
 retry                <false>
 timeout              120
 trace                'WARNINGS'
 username             undef
 via                  'sendmail'

authenticate => 'LOGIN'|'APOP'|'AUTO'

Authenthication method. The standard defines two methods, named LOGIN and APOP. The first sends the username and password in plain text to the server to get permission, the latter encrypts this data using MD5. When AUTO is used, first APOP is tried, and then LOGIN.

hostname => HOSTNAME|ARRAY-OF-HOSTNAMES

See Mail::Transport::new(hostname)

interval => SECONDS

See Mail::Transport::new(interval)

log => LEVEL

See Mail::Reporter::new(log)

password => STRING

See Mail::Transport::new(password)

port => INTEGER

See Mail::Transport::new(port)

proxy => PATH

See Mail::Transport::new(proxy)

retry => NUMBER|undef

See Mail::Transport::new(retry)

timeout => SECONDS

See Mail::Transport::new(timeout)

trace => LEVEL

See Mail::Reporter::new(trace)

username => STRING

See Mail::Transport::new(username)

via => CLASS|NAME

See Mail::Transport::new(via)

url

Represent this pop3 connection as URL.

Server Connection

findBinary NAME [, DIRECTORIES]

See Mail::Transport::findBinary()

remoteHost

See Mail::Transport::remoteHost()

retry

See Mail::Transport::retry()

Receiving Mail

receive [UNIQUE-MESSAGE-ID]

See Mail::Transport::Receive::receive()

Exchanging Information

deleteFetched

Mark all messages that have been fetched with message() for deletion. See fetched().

deleted BOOLEAN, ID's

Either mark the specified message(s) to be deleted on the remote server or unmark them for deletion (if the first parameter is false). Deletion of messages will take place only when the connection is specifically disconnected or the last reference to the object goes out of scope.

disconnect

Break contact with the server, if that (still) exists. Returns true if successful. Please note that even if the disconnect was not successful, all knowledge of messages etc. will be removed from the object: the object basically has reverted to the state in which it was before anything was done with the mail box.

fetched

Returns a reference to a list of ID's that have been fetched using the message() method. This can be used to update a database of messages that were fetched (but maybe not yet deleted) from the mailbox.

Please note that if the POP3 server did not support the UIDL command, this method will always return undef because it is not possibly to reliably identify messages between sessions (other than looking at the contents of the messages themselves).

See also deleteFetched().

folderSize

Returns the total number of octets used by the mailbox on the remote server.

header ID, [BODYLINES]

Returns a reference to an array which contains the header of the message with the specified ID. undef is returned if something has gone wrong.

The optional integer BODYLINES specifies the number of lines from the body which should be added, by default none.

Examples:

 my $ref_lines = $pop3->header($uidl);
 print @$ref_lines;

id2n ID

Translates the unique ID of a message into a sequence number which represents the message as long a this connection to the POP3 server exists. When the message has been deleted for some reason, undef is returned.

ids

Returns a list (in list context) or a reference to a list (in scalar context) of all ID's which are known by the server on this moment.

message ID

Returns a reference to an array which contains the lines of the message with the specified ID. Returns undef if something has gone wrong.

Examples:

 my $ref_lines = $pop3->message($uidl);
 print @$ref_lines;

messageSize ID

Returns the size of the message which is indicated by the ID, in octets. If the message has been deleted on the remote server, this will return undef.

messages

Returns (in scalar context only) the number of messages that are known to exist in the mailbox.

Protocol [internals]

send SOCKET, data

Send data to the indicated socket and return the first line read from that socket. Logs an error if either writing to or reading from socket failed.

This method does not attempt to reconnect or anything: if reading or writing the socket fails, something is very definitely wrong.

sendList SOCKET, COMMAND

Sends the indicated COMMAND to the specified socket, and retrieves the response. It returns a reference to an array with all the lines that were reveived after the first +OK line and before the end-of-message delimiter (a single dot on a line). Returns undef whenever something has gone wrong.

socket

Returns a connection to the POP3 server. If there was no connection yet, it will be created transparently. If the connection with the POP3 server was lost, it will be reconnected and the assures that internal state information (STAT and UIDL) is up-to-date in the object.

If the contact to the server was still present, or could be established, an IO::Socket::INET object is returned. Else, undef is returned and no further actions should be tried on the object.

Logging and Tracing

defaultTrace [LEVEL, [LEVEL]

See Mail::Reporter::defaultTrace()

errors

See Mail::Reporter::errors()

log [LEVEL [,STRINGS]]

See Mail::Reporter::log()

report [LEVEL]

See Mail::Reporter::report()

reportAll [LEVEL]

See Mail::Reporter::reportAll()

trace [LEVEL]

See Mail::Reporter::trace()

warnings

See Mail::Reporter::warnings()

Other Methods

AUTOLOAD

See Mail::Reporter::AUTOLOAD()

DESTROY

See Mail::Reporter::DESTROY()

inGlobalDestruction

See Mail::Reporter::inGlobalDestruction()

logPriority LEVEL

See Mail::Reporter::logPriority()

logSettings

See Mail::Reporter::logSettings()

notImplemented

See Mail::Reporter::notImplemented()

SEE ALSO

A good start to read is Mail::Box-Overview. More documentation and a mailinglist are available from the project's website at http://perl.overmeer.net/mailbox/.

AUTHOR

Written by Liz Mattijsen (liz@dijkmat.nl) and Mark Overmeer (mark@overmeer.net) with the help of many. See the ChangeLog for details.

VERSION

This code is beta, version 2.027.

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