GNU Info

(python2.1-lib.info)Message Objects

---

Next: AddressList Objects Prev: rfc822 Up: rfc822

---

Enter node , (file) or (file)node

Message Objects
---------------

A `Message' instance has the following methods:

`rewindbody()'
     Seek to the start of the message body.  This only works if the file
     object is seekable.

`isheader(line)'
     Returns a line's canonicalized fieldname (the dictionary key that
     will be used to index it) if the line is a legal RFC 822 header;
     otherwise returns None (implying that parsing should stop here and
     the line be pushed back on the input stream).  It is sometimes
     useful to override this method in a subclass.

`islast(line)'
     Return true if the given line is a delimiter on which Message
     should stop.  The delimiter line is consumed, and the file
     object's read location positioned immediately after it.  By
     default this method just checks that the line is blank, but you
     can override it in a subclass.

`iscomment(line)'
     Return true if the given line should be ignored entirely, just
     skipped.  By default this is a stub that always returns false, but
     you can override it in a subclass.

`getallmatchingheaders(name)'
     Return a list of lines consisting of all headers matching NAME, if
     any.  Each physical line, whether it is a continuation line or
     not, is a separate list item.  Return the empty list if no header
     matches NAME.

`getfirstmatchingheader(name)'
     Return a list of lines comprising the first header matching NAME,
     and its continuation line(s), if any.  Return `None' if there is
     no header matching NAME.

`getrawheader(name)'
     Return a single string consisting of the text after the colon in
     the first header matching NAME.  This includes leading whitespace,
     the trailing linefeed, and internal linefeeds and whitespace if
     there any continuation line(s) were present.  Return `None' if
     there is no header matching NAME.

`getheader(name[, default])'
     Like `getrawheader(NAME)', but strip leading and trailing
     whitespace.  Internal whitespace is not stripped.  The optional
     DEFAULT argument can be used to specify a different default to be
     returned when there is no header matching NAME.

`get(name[, default])'
     An alias for `getheader()', to make the interface more compatible
     with regular dictionaries.

`getaddr(name)'
     Return a pair `(FULL NAME, EMAIL ADDRESS)' parsed from the string
     returned by `getheader(NAME)'.  If no header matching NAME exists,
     return `(None, None)'; otherwise both the full name and the
     address are (possibly empty) strings.

     Example: If M's first `From' header contains the string
     `'jack@cwi.nl (Jack Jansen)'', then `m.getaddr('From')' will yield
     the pair `('Jack Jansen', 'jack@cwi.nl')'.  If the header contained
     `'Jack Jansen <jack@cwi.nl>'' instead, it would yield the exact
     same result.

`getaddrlist(name)'
     This is similar to `getaddr(LIST)', but parses a header containing
     a list of email addresses (e.g. a `To' header) and returns a list
     of `(FULL NAME, EMAIL ADDRESS)' pairs (even if there was only one
     address in the header).  If there is no header matching NAME,
     return an empty list.

     If multiple headers exist that match the named header (e.g. if
     there are several `Cc' headers), all are parsed for addresses.  Any
     continuation lines the named headers contain are also parsed.

`getdate(name)'
     Retrieve a header using `getheader()' and parse it into a 9-tuple
     compatible with `time.mktime()'; note that fields 6, 7, and 8 are
     not usable.  If there is no header matching NAME, or it is
     unparsable, return `None'.

     Date parsing appears to be a black art, and not all mailers adhere
     to the standard.  While it has been tested and found correct on a
     large collection of email from many sources, it is still possible
     that this function may occasionally yield an incorrect result.

`getdate_tz(name)'
     Retrieve a header using `getheader()' and parse it into a
     10-tuple; the first 9 elements will make a tuple compatible with
     `time.mktime()', and the 10th is a number giving the offset of the
     date's timezone from UTC.  Note that fields 6, 7, and 8 are not
     usable.  Similarly to `getdate()', if there is no header matching
     NAME, or it is unparsable, return `None'.

`Message' instances also support a limited mapping interface.  In
particular: `M[name]' is like `M.getheader(name)' but raises `KeyError'
if there is no matching header; and `len(M)', `M.has_key(name)',
`M.keys()', `M.values()' and `M.items()' act as expected (and
consistently).  `Message' instances also support the mapping writable
interface `M[name] = value' and `del M[name]'.  `Message' objects do
not support the `clear()', `copy()', `get()', `popitem()',
`setdefault()', or `update()' methods of the mapping interface.

Finally, `Message' instances have two public instance variables:

`headers'
     A list containing the entire set of header lines, in the order in
     which they were read (except that setitem calls may disturb this
     order). Each line contains a trailing newline.  The blank line
     terminating the headers is not contained in the list.

`fp'
     The file or file-like object passed at instantiation time.  This
     can be used to read the message content.