Perl Requires Chilkat v11.0.0+

Download and Save Email Attachments (POP3)

See more POP3 Examples

Downloads emails from a POP3 mailbox and saves all attachments. Perl

use chilkat();

$success = 0;

#  This example assumes the Chilkat API to have been previously unlocked.
#  See Global Unlock Sample for sample code.

#  The mailman object is used for receiving (POP3) 
#  and sending (SMTP) email.
$mailman = chilkat::CkMailMan->new();

#  Set the POP3 server's hostname
$mailman->put_MailHost("pop.yourserver.com");

#  Set the POP3 login/password.
$mailman->put_PopUsername("***");
$mailman->put_PopPassword("***");

#  Copy the all email from the user's POP3 mailbox 
#  into a bundle object.  The email remains on the server.
#  FetchAll is a reasonable choice for POP3 maildrops that don't have too many
#  emails. For larger mail drops, one might download emails one at a time..
$bundle = chilkat::CkEmailBundle->new();
$keepOnServer = 1;
$headersOnly = 0;
#  Irrelevent because we are NOT downloading headers-only
$numBodyLines = 0;
$success = $mailman->FetchAll($keepOnServer,$headersOnly,$numBodyLines,$bundle);
if ($success == 0) {
    print $mailman->lastErrorText() . "\r\n";
    exit;
}

#  The directory path can be relative or absolute.
#  This shows a Windows style directory path.  On other operating systems, the path
#  would be different..
$dirPath = "c:/myAttachments";

$email = chilkat::CkEmail->new();
$bundleIndex = 0;
$numMessages = $bundle->get_MessageCount();

while (($bundleIndex < $numMessages)) {
    $bundle->EmailAt($bundleIndex,$email);

    #  Save all attachments to the specified directory.
    #  The directory is automatically created if it does not yet exist.
    $success = $email->SaveAllAttachments($dirPath);
    if ($success == 0) {
        print $email->lastErrorText() . "\r\n";
        exit;
    }

    #  The OverwriteExisting property controls whether already-existing files
    #  are automatically overwritten.  By default, it is set to 1 so that existing
    #  files will be overwritten.

    #  Setting OverwriteExisting = 0 will cause the attachment-saving methods to generate
    #  unique filenames if a file with the same name already exists.  The actual filename(s)
    #  saved will be present by calling GetAttachmentFilename for each attachment *after*
    #  saving.
    #  For example...
    $email->put_OverwriteExisting(0);
    $success = $email->SaveAllAttachments($dirPath);
    if ($success == 0) {
        print $email->lastErrorText() . "\r\n";
        exit;
    }

    $numAttachments = $email->get_NumAttachments();
    $attachIndex = 0;
    while (($attachIndex < $numAttachments)) {
        #  If the attachment filename was changed to prevent overwriting,
        #  GetAttachmentFilename will return the new filename.
        print $email->getAttachmentFilename($attachIndex) . "\r\n";
        $attachIndex = $attachIndex + 1;
    }

    #  Attachments can also be saved individually.
    $attachIndex = 0;
    while (($attachIndex < $numAttachments)) {

        print "Original Filename: " . $email->getAttachmentFilename($attachIndex) . "\r\n";
        $success = $email->SaveAttachedFile($attachIndex,$dirPath);
        if ($success == 0) {
            print $email->lastErrorText() . "\r\n";
            exit;
        }

        #  If OverwriteExisting = 1, the saved filename will always equal the original filename,
        #  unless there are characters present in the filename that are not allowed by Windows,
        #  such as * ? < > | etc.  In those cases the illegal characters are either removed or replaced
        #  with underscore characters to allow the file to be saved.
        print "Saved Filename: " . $email->getAttachmentFilename($attachIndex) . "\r\n";
        $attachIndex = $attachIndex + 1;
    }

    $bundleIndex = $bundleIndex + 1;
}