Read mail using the Lotus Notes COM interface

Here you will read mail in Lotus Notes using a combination of Mark Hammond’s Python for Windows extensions and LotusScript. We first presented this screencast as part of a three-hour session on Automating Windows Applications using win32com during the 2008 Python Conference in Chicago, Illinois.

Requirements

• Lotus Notes
• Python
• Python for Windows extensions

Walkthrough

Generate type libraries

To expose the COM interface of Lotus Notes in Python, you should generate the type libraries.

from win32com.client import makepy
makepy.GenerateFromTypeLibSpec('Lotus Domino Objects')
makepy.GenerateFromTypeLibSpec('Lotus Notes Automation Classes')

Generating type libraries reveals the application’s COM objects to Python’s inspection methods and empowers IPython’s autocompletion feature.

from win32com.client import Dispatch
notesSession = Dispatch('Lotus.NotesSession')

dir(notesSession)
notesSession.         # IPython only (press period and TAB to see member variables and methods)
notesSession?         # IPython only (see arguments and documentation)
notesSession??        # IPython only (see source code)

from win32com.client import constants
dir(constants)

If you do not know the name of your application’s type library, you can run makepy manually. You can find makepy.py in the Lib\site-packages\win32com\client subdirectory of your Python installation.

C:\Python26\Lib\site-packages\win32com\client\makepy.py

Run makepy.py and select Lotus Domino Objects

Run makepy.py and select Lotus Notes Automation Classes

You can find documentation on the Lotus Notes COM interface by searching the internet for LotusScript.

Find location of Domino mailbox

To access your mail through Lotus Notes, you will need to know the name of the Domino server and the location of your Domino mailbox.

In Lotus Notes, choose File > Database > Open from the menu.

Look for the Domino server name in the Server drop down box, then click on the Domino mailbox in the directory tree. The path of your Domino mailbox should appear in the Filename input box.

Connect to Domino mailbox

Use your credentials to connect to the Domino server using win32com. For the mailPath variable, specify the path of your Domino mailbox as described in Find location of Domino mailbox.

# Import system modules
import win32com.client
import pywintypes
import getpass

# Get credentials
mailServer = raw_input('Server: ')
mailPath = raw_input('Mailbox: ')
mailPassword = getpass.getpass()
# Connect
notesSession = win32com.client.Dispatch('Lotus.NotesSession')
try:
    notesSession.Initialize(mailPassword)
    notesDatabase = notesSession.GetDatabase(mailServer, mailPath)
except pywintypes.com_error:
    raise Exception('Cannot access mail using %s on %s' % (mailPath, mailServer))

Browse folders

In Lotus Notes, the mailbox folders are a subset of the views in the database.

# Get a list of folders
for view in notesDatabase.Views:
    if view.IsFolder:
        print view.Name

You may recognize some of your mailbox folders. Standard folders have special names such as ($Inbox) and ($Trash).

Load message

The COM interface has an iterator for cycling through the messages in a folder. We’ll wrap the iterator in a generator.

def makeDocumentGenerator(folderName):
    # Get folder
    folder = notesDatabase.GetView(folderName)
    if not folder:
        raise Exception('Folder "%s" not found' % folderName)
    # Get the first document
    document = folder.GetFirstDocument()
    # If the document exists,
    while document:
        # Yield it
        yield document
        # Get the next document
        document = folder.GetNextDocument(document)

Display the subject for each message in the inbox.

for document in makeDocumentGenerator('($Inbox)'):
    print document.GetItemValue('Subject')[0].strip()

We can retrieve the other fields in a similar fashion.

# Import system modules
import datetime

# Get fields
subject = document.GetItemValue('Subject')[0].strip()
date = datetime.datetime.fromtimestamp(int(document.GetItemValue('PostedDate')[0]))
fromWhom = document.GetItemValue('From')[0].strip()
toWhoms = document.GetItemValue('SendTo')
body = document.GetItemValue('Body')[0].strip()

Load attachments

Define a function for reserving a temporary file.

# Import system modules
import os
import tempfile

def getTemporaryPath():
    temporaryIndex, temporaryPath = tempfile.mkstemp()
    os.close(temporaryIndex)
    return temporaryPath

Define a function for extracting attachments from a document.

# Given a document, return a list of attachment filenames and their contents
def extractAttachments(document):
    # Prepare
    attachmentPacks = []
    # For each item,
    for whichItem in xrange(len(document.Items)):
        # Get item
        item = document.Items[whichItem]
        # If the item is an attachment,
        if item.Name == '$FILE':
            # Prepare
            attachmentPath = getTemporaryPath()
            # Get the attachment
            fileName = item.Values[0]
            fileBase, separator, fileExtension = fileName.rpartition('.')
            attachment = document.GetAttachment(fileName)
            attachment.ExtractFile(attachmentPath)
            attachmentContent = open(attachmentPath, 'rb').read()
            os.remove(attachmentPath)
            # Append
            attachmentPacks.append((fileBase, fileExtension, attachmentContent))
    # Return
    return attachmentPacks

Run the function on a sample document.

attachmentPacks = extractAttachments(document)

Display the number of attachments for each message in the inbox.

for document in makeDocumentGenerator('($Inbox)'):
    print len(extractAttachments(document))