NAME

Mail::Transport - base class for message exchange

INHERITANCE

 Mail::Transport
   is a Mail::Reporter

 Mail::Transport is extended by
   Mail::Transport::Receive
   Mail::Transport::Send

SYNOPSIS

 my $message = Mail::Message->new(...);

 # Some extensions implement sending:
 $message->send;
 $message->send(via => 'sendmail');

 my $sender = Mail::Transport::SMTP->new(...);
 $sender->send($message);

 # Some extensions implement receiving:
 my $receiver = Mail::Transport::POP3->new(...);
 $message = $receiver->receive;

DESCRIPTION

Objects which extend Mail::Transport implement sending and/or receiving of messages, using various protocols.

Mail::Transport::Send extends this class, and offers general functionality for send protocols, like SMTP. Mail::Transport::Receive also extends this class, and offers receive method. Some transport protocols will implement both sending and receiving.

METHODS

Constructors

Mail::Transport->new(OPTIONS)

 Option    --Defined in     --Default
 executable                   undef
 hostname                     'localhost'
 interval                     30
 log         Mail::Reporter   'WARNINGS'
 password                     undef
 port                         undef
 proxy                        undef
 retry                        <false>
 timeout                      120
 trace       Mail::Reporter   'WARNINGS'
 username                     undef
 via                          'sendmail'

. executable => FILENAME

If you specify an executable, the module does not need to search the system directories to figure-out where the client lives. Using this decreases the flexible usage of your program: moving your program to other systems may involve changing the path to the executable, which otherwise would work auto-detect and unmodified.

. hostname => HOSTNAME|ARRAY-OF-HOSTNAMES

The host on which the server runs. Some protocols accept an array of alternatives for this option.

. interval => SECONDS

The time between tries to contact the remote server for sending or receiving a message in SECONDS. This number must be larger than 0.

. log => LEVEL

. password => STRING

Some protocols require a password to be given, usually in combination with a password.

. port => INTEGER

The port number behind which the service is hiding on the remote server.

. proxy => PATH

The name of the proxy software (the protocol handler). This must be the name (preferable the absolute path) of your mail delivery software.

. retry => NUMBER|undef

The number of retries before the sending will fail. If undef, the number of retries is unlimited.

. timeout => SECONDS

SECONDS till time-out while establishing the connection to a remote server.

. trace => LEVEL

. username => STRING

Some protocols require a user to login.

. via => CLASS|NAME

Which CLASS (extending Mail::Transport) will transport the data. Some predefined NAMEs avoid long class names: mail and mailx are handled by the Mail::Transport::Mailx module, sendmail and postfix belong to Mail::Transport::Sendmail, and smtp is implemented in Mail::Transport::SMTP. The pop or pop3 protocol implementation can be found in Mail::Transport::POP3.

Server connection

$obj->findBinary(NAME [, DIRECTORIES])

Look for a binary with the specified NAME in the directories which are defined to be safe. The list of standard directories is followed by the optional DIRECTORIES. The full pathname is returned.

You may specify new(proxy), which specifies the absolute name of the binary to be used.

$obj->remoteHost

Returns the hostname, port number, username and password to be used to establish the connection to the server for sending or receiving mail.

$obj->retry

Returns the retry interval, retry count, and timeout for the connection.

Error handling

$obj->AUTOLOAD

See Mail::Reporter/"Error handling"

$obj->addReport(OBJECT)

See Mail::Reporter/"Error handling"

$obj->defaultTrace([LEVEL]|[LOGLEVEL, TRACELEVEL]|[LEVEL, CALLBACK])

Mail::Transport->defaultTrace([LEVEL]|[LOGLEVEL, TRACELEVEL]|[LEVEL, CALLBACK])

See Mail::Reporter/"Error handling"

$obj->errors

See Mail::Reporter/"Error handling"

$obj->log([LEVEL [,STRINGS]])

Mail::Transport->log([LEVEL [,STRINGS]])

See Mail::Reporter/"Error handling"

$obj->logPriority(LEVEL)

Mail::Transport->logPriority(LEVEL)

See Mail::Reporter/"Error handling"

$obj->logSettings

See Mail::Reporter/"Error handling"

$obj->notImplemented

See Mail::Reporter/"Error handling"

$obj->report([LEVEL])

See Mail::Reporter/"Error handling"

$obj->reportAll([LEVEL])

See Mail::Reporter/"Error handling"

$obj->trace([LEVEL])

See Mail::Reporter/"Error handling"

$obj->warnings

See Mail::Reporter/"Error handling"

Cleanup

$obj->DESTROY

See Mail::Reporter/"Cleanup"

$obj->inGlobalDestruction

See Mail::Reporter/"Cleanup"

DIAGNOSTICS

Warning: Avoid program abuse: specify an absolute path for $exec.

Specifying explicit locations for executables of email transfer agents should only be done with absolute file names, to avoid various pontential security problems.

Warning: Executable $exec does not exist.

The explicitly indicated mail transfer agent does not exists. The normal settings are used to find the correct location.

Error: Package $package does not implement $method.

Fatal error: the specific package (or one of its superclasses) does not implement this method where it should. This message means that some other related classes do implement this method however the class at hand does not. Probably you should investigate this and probably inform the author of the package.

LICENSE

Copyrights 2001-2008 by Mark Overmeer. For other contributors see ChangeLog.

This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the same terms as Perl itself. See http://www.perl.com/perl/misc/Artistic.html