Sending emails using Java Mail and Google Mail account

Requirements:

• installed Java (description here)
• installed and configured Eclipse (description here)
• valid Google Mail account

You will learn:

• how to send e-mails from Java application using Java Mail and Google Mail account.

Sometimes You need to send an email from Your Java application. In order to do this You have to use valid e-mail account, and You have to know the address of SMTP server for this account. And of course You have to write some code which will connect to the SMTP server (using Your account credentials) and then create and send email. A Google Mail account will be used as an example.

Step 1: create clean Java Eclipse Project

Step 2: download  JavaMail API 1.4.4 (javamail_1_4_4.zip) from here.

After downloading JavaMail, extract it and go into its /lib folder. Copy all .jar files from that directory into Your project and add them to the build path.

Step 3: write a simple code for sending email using Google Mail. You can use TLS or SSL connection to Google SMTP server.

a) using TLS connection to SMTP server:

// ...
import java.util.Properties;
import javax.mail.Message;
import javax.mail.Session;
import javax.mail.Transport;
import javax.mail.internet.InternetAddress;
import javax.mail.internet.MimeMessage;
// ...
Properties propsTLS = new Properties();
propsTLS.put("mail.transport.protocol", "smtp");
propsTLS.put("mail.smtp.host", "smtp.gmail.com");
propsTLS.put("mail.smtp.auth", "true");
propsTLS.put("mail.smtp.starttls.enable", "true"); // GMail requires STARTTLS

Session sessionTLS = Session.getInstance(propsTLS);
sessionTLS.setDebug(true);

Message messageTLS = new MimeMessage(sessionTLS);
messageTLS.setFrom(new InternetAddress("random_sender_4568744122@gmail.com", "John Smith"));
messageTLS.setRecipients(Message.RecipientType.TO, InternetAddress.parse("random_recipient_4568744122@gmail.com")); // real recipient
messageTLS.setSubject("Test mail using TLS");
messageTLS.setText("This is test email sent to Your account using TLS.");

Transport transportTLS = sessionTLS.getTransport();
transportTLS.connect("smtp.gmail.com", 587, "random_sender_4568744122@gmail.com", "sender_account_pass"); // account used
transportTLS.sendMessage(messageTLS, messageTLS.getAllRecipients());
transportTLS.close();

b) using SSL connection to SMTP server:

// ...
import java.util.Properties;
import javax.mail.Message;
import javax.mail.Session;
import javax.mail.Transport;
import javax.mail.internet.InternetAddress;
import javax.mail.internet.MimeMessage;
// ...
Properties propsSSL = new Properties();
propsSSL.put("mail.transport.protocol", "smtps");
propsSSL.put("mail.smtps.host", "smtp.gmail.com");
propsSSL.put("mail.smtps.auth", "true");

Session sessionSSL = Session.getInstance(propsSSL);
sessionSSL.setDebug(true);

Message messageSSL = new MimeMessage(sessionSSL);
messageSSL.setFrom(new InternetAddress("random_sender_4568744122@gmail.com", "John Smith"));
messageSSL.setRecipients(Message.RecipientType.TO, InternetAddress.parse("random_recipient_4568744122@gmail.com")); // real recipient
messageSSL.setSubject("Test mail using SSL");
messageSSL.setText("This is test email sent to Your account using SSL.");

Transport transportSSL = sessionSSL.getTransport();
transportSSL.connect("smtp.gmail.com", 465, "random_sender_4568744122@gmail.com", "sender_account_pass"); // account used
transportSSL.sendMessage(messageSSL, messageSSL.getAllRecipients());
transportSSL.close();

Note: in both cases You for the connect() method, You have to pass a real login and password of the Google Mail account used. The main differences between those two methods are: different protocol (smtp for TLS and smtps for SSL), different ports (587 for TLS and 465 for SSL). In addition TLS requires STARTTLS.

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Download source files:

Note: make sure that Java and Eclipse are properly installed and configured for running the project (additional configuration may be required if different directories are used).


Eclipse complete sample project is here (with all required libraries).