Sending Email with Nodemailer and node-mailer-templates

1. Add Nodemailer and node-mailer-templates to your

   package.json file:

   package.json

      "email-templates": "0.0.5",
      "nodemailer": "0.3.x",
   

2. Updated your dependencies

    npm install
   

3. Create config settings for nodemailer in your config.js file

   config.js

    'use strict';
   
    module.exports = {
      db: {
        production: "mongodb://user:pass@example.com:1234/stroeski-prod",
        development: "mongodb://localhost/storeski-dev",
        test: "mongodb://localhost/storeski-test",
      },
      mailer: {
        auth: {
          user: 'test@example.com',
          pass: 'secret',
        },
        defaultFromAddress: 'First Last <test@examle.com>'
      }
    };
   

4. Create a wrapper around the nodemailer module

   mailer/models.js

    'use strict';
   
    var config = require('../config');
    var nodemailer = require('nodemailer');
    var path = require('path');
    var templatesDir = path.resolve(__dirname, '..', 'views/mailer');
    var emailTemplates = require('email-templates');
   
    var EmailAddressRequiredError = new Error('email address required');
   
    // create a defaultTransport using gmail and authentication that are
    // stored in the `config.js` file.
    var defaultTransport = nodemailer.createTransport('SMTP', {
      service: 'Gmail',
      auth: {
        user: config.mailer.auth.user,
        pass: config.mailer.auth.pass
      }
    });
   
    exports.sendOne = function (templateName, locals, fn) {
      // make sure that we have an user email
      if (!locals.email) {
        return fn(EmailAddressRequiredError);
      }
      // make sure that we have a message
      if (!locals.subject) {
        return fn(EmailAddressRequiredError);
      }
      emailTemplates(templatesDir, function (err, template) {
        if (err) {
          //console.log(err);
          return fn(err);
        }
        // Send a single email
        template(templateName, locals, function (err, html, text) {
          if (err) {
            //console.log(err);
            return fn(err);
          }
          // if we are testing don't send out an email instead return
          // success and the html and txt strings for inspection
          if (process.env.NODE_ENV === 'test') {
            return fn(null, '250 2.0.0 OK 1350452502 s5sm19782310obo.10', html, text);
          }
          var transport = defaultTransport;
          transport.sendMail({
            from: config.mailer.defaultFromAddress,
            to: locals.email,
            subject: locals.subject,
            html: html,
            // generateTextFromHTML: true,
            text: text
          }, function (err, responseStatus) {
            if (err) {
              return fn(err);
            }
            return fn(null, responseStatus.message, html, text);
          });
        });
      });
    }
   

5. Write a test to test sending an password reset email

   test/mailer/models.js

    'use strict';
   
    // import the mongoose helper utilities
    var utils = require('../utils');
    var should = require('should');
    var mailer = require('../../mailer/models');
   
    describe('mailer: models', function () {
   
      describe('#sendOne()', function (done) {
   
        it('should render the password reset templates correctly', function (done) {
          var locals = {
            email: 'one@example.com',
            subject: 'Password reset',
            name: 'Forgetful User',
            resetUrl: 'http;//localhost:3000/password_rest/000000000001|afdaevdae353'
          };
          mailer.sendOne('password_reset', locals, function (err, responseStatus, html, text) {
            should.not.exist(err);
            responseStatus.should.include("OK");
            text.should.include("Please follow this link to reset your password " + locals.resetUrl);
            html.should.include("Please follow this link to reset your password <a href=\"" + locals.resetUrl + "\">" + locals.resetUrl + "</a>");
            done();
          });
        });
      });
   
    });
   

6. Create the templates:

   views/mailer/password_reset/text.ejs

    Please follow this link to reset your password <%= resetUrl %>
   

   views/mailer/password_reset/html.ejs

    Please follow this link to reset your password <a href="<%= resetUrl %>"><%= resetUrl %></a>
   

   Test are now passing:

    ✔ 15 tests complete (395 ms)
   

Resources

• Nodemailer - Nodemailer is an easy to use module to send e-mails with Node.JS (using SMTP or sendmail or Amazon SES) and is unicode friendly - You can use any characters you like ✔
• node-mailer-templates - Node.js module for rendering beautiful emails with ejs templates and email-friendly inline CSS using juice.