(Swift 3,4,5...) Download and Save Email Attachments (POP3)

See more POP3 Examples

Downloads emails from a POP3 mailbox and saves all attachments.

Chilkat Downloads for the Swift Programming Language MAC OS X (Cocoa) Objective-C/Swift Libs iOS Objective-C/Swift Libs

func chilkatTest() {
    // 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.
    let mailman = CkoMailMan()!

    // Set the POP3 server's hostname
    mailman.mailHost = "pop.yourserver.com"

    // Set the POP3 login/password.
    mailman.popUsername = "***"
    mailman.popPassword = "***"

    // Copy the all email from the user's POP3 mailbox 
    // into a bundle object.  The email remains on the server.
    // CopyMail 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..
    var bundle: CkoEmailBundle? = mailman.copyMail()
    if mailman.lastMethodSuccess != true {
        print("\(mailman.lastErrorText!)")
        return
    }

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

    var success: Bool
    var bundleIndex: Int = 0
    var numMessages: Int = bundle!.messageCount.intValue
    var email: CkoEmail?
    while (bundleIndex < numMessages) {
        email = bundle!.getEmail(bundleIndex)

        // Save all attachments to the specified directory.
        // The directory is automatically created if it does not yet exist.
        success = email!.saveAllAttachments(dirPath)
        if success != true {
            print("\(email!.lastErrorText!)")
            return
        }

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

        // Setting OverwriteExisting = false 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.overwriteExisting = false
        success = email!.saveAllAttachments(dirPath)
        if success != true {
            print("\(email!.lastErrorText!)")
            return
        }

        var numAttachments: Int = email!.numAttachments.intValue
        var attachIndex: Int = 0
        while (attachIndex < numAttachments) {
            // If the attachment filename was changed to prevent overwriting,
            // GetAttachmentFilename will return the new filename.
            print("\(email!.getAttachmentFilename(attachIndex)!)")
            attachIndex = attachIndex + 1
        }

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

            print("Original Filename: \(email!.getAttachmentFilename(attachIndex)!)")
            success = email!.saveAttachedFile(attachIndex, directory: dirPath)
            if success != true {
                print("\(email!.lastErrorText!)")
                return
            }

            // If OverwriteExisting = true, 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)!)")
            attachIndex = attachIndex + 1
        }

        email = nil

        bundleIndex = bundleIndex + 1
    }

    bundle = nil

}