Using gmail smtp server, JavaMail and Spring IOC, we can quickly put together a simple mail sending application, without any SMTP server installation. Check this out for a detailed description of using gmail as smtp server. Thanks to Enrico for blogging smtp spring configuration.

Assuming you have used Spring before, here is a short tutorial:

1. Add mail.jar from JavaMail project to build path.
2. In spring bean configuration file add:

   <bean id="mailSender" class="org.springframework.mail.javamail.JavaMailSenderImpl">
   <property name="host" value="smtp.gmail.com"/>
   <property name="username" value="${gmail_username}"/>
   <property name="password" value="${gmail_password}"/>
   <property name="javaMailProperties">
   <props>
   <prop key="mail.smtp.auth">true</prop>
   <prop key="mail.smtp.starttls.enable">true</prop>
   </props>
   </property>
   </bean>
   
   <!-- this is a template message that we can pre-load with default state -->
   <bean id="templateMessage" class="org.springframework.mail.SimpleMailMessage">
   <!-- The from field is overwritten by gmail to your gmail ID.
   Go to Gmail Account Settings to choose default outgoing mail ID. -->
   <property name="from" value="notify@abcd-xyz.com"/>
   <property name="subject" value="Mail Notification."/>
   </bean>

3. Create a class MailNotifier where you send mails.

   import org.springframework.mail.MailException;
   import org.springframework.mail.MailSender;
   import org.springframework.mail.SimpleMailMessage;
   
   import com.abcd.beans.Member;
   
   /**
   * @author gubbi
   *
   */
   public class MailNotifier {
   private MailSender mMailSender;
   private SimpleMailMessage mTemplateMessage;
   
   public void sendNotification(Member pMember) {
   SimpleMailMessage message = new SimpleMailMessage(mTemplateMessage);
   
   message.setText("Dear " + pMember.getFirstName()
   + ",\nSending test notification.");
   message.setTo(pMember.getEmail());
   try{
   mMailSender.send(message);
   }
   catch(MailException ex) {
   ex.printStackTrace();
   }
   }
   
   /**
   * @param pMailSender the mailSender to set
   */
   public void setMailSender(MailSender pMailSender) {
   mMailSender = pMailSender;
   }
   
   /**
   * @param pTemplateMessage the templateMessage to set
   */
   public void setTemplateMessage(SimpleMailMessage pTemplateMessage) {
   mTemplateMessage = pTemplateMessage;
   }
   }

4. Add spring bean configuration for MailNotifier class:

   <bean id="mailNotifier" class="com.abcd.modules.MailNotifier">
   <property name="mailSender" ref="mailSender"/>
   <property name="templateMessage" ref="templateMessage"/>
   </bean>

5. This is it 

Check out Spring Reference for details about sending mails with attachments and using html templates for mail content. Let me know other methods of doing the same.

Tags: gmail, java, javamail, smtp, spring