csb6 / mail.py

A bare bones email client in Python. Supports IMAP/SMTP

mail.py

A fairly basic email client written in Python supporting IMAP/SMTP. It is currently a work in progress and is not ready for use.

Requirements

• All dependencies are part of the Python standard library. On Mac/Windows platforms, no additional packages need to be installed.

• However, Tkinter (the GUI toolkit used) must be installed separately on Linux. As of right now, I have no ability to test the program on a Linux machine, but it should be fairly simple to install Python and Tk using your system's package manager. https://stackoverflow.com/questions/4783810/install-tkinter-for-python has more information on Linux installation.

Usage

• After cloning, create a file named config.json with the following structure:

{
     "host": "",
     "username": "",
     "password": ""
}

• Look up the hostname for your email provider, then fill out the JSON file.

• For Gmail addresses with 2-Step Verification, you need to create an app-specific password. Go to https://myaccount.google.com/security and create a password. Copy this password into the JSON.

• Currently, there is support for downloading your inbox, displaying the emails onscreen, adding/removing new messages since the last sync, and sending emails by clicking on the Compose button at the top of the screen. The messages are stored in a local database file, mail.db, which you can freely delete in order to rebuild your inbox.

• This program is not currently in a fully usable state, so core features like email syncing, multiple mailboxes, and drafts are not fully implemented.