In Android development, user can send Emails within our own app by using Intent. This quick tip shows you how to launch the built-in Mail application, supply it with data, and allow the user to send an email message. You will achieve this by creating and configuring the appropriate Intent within an application’s Activity.
Before starting this sample project, you must know that we will send Email through Intent, it is carrying data from one component to another component with-in the application or outside the application.
To send an email from your application, you can use an existing email client in your device like the default Email app (provide by Android OS System), Gmail (official app written by Google), Outlook (Microsoft email client),... For this purpose, we need to write an Activity that launches an email client (user can choose one of them above), using an implicit Intent with the right action and data, after all, the email was sent by this selected email client!
DEMO VIDEO:
Creating the Intent
Intent which will be used to send email is android.content.intent.ACTION_SEND. This code below is creating this Intent instance:
Intent emailIntent = new Intent(android.content.Intent.ACTION_SEND);
Configuring Intent Object - set Data type
Uri using setType() method as follows:
emailIntent.setData(Uri.parse("mailto:"));
emailIntent.setType("text/plain");
Put Message Content through Intent
Intent.ACTION_SEND. Now, the necessary work is configures the extras, and launches the email client Activity:
emailIntent.putExtra(Intent.EXTRA_EMAIL, new String[]{getText(txtTo)});
emailIntent.putExtra(Intent.EXTRA_SUBJECT, getText(txtSubject));
emailIntent.putExtra(Intent.EXTRA_TEXT, getText(txtContent));
try {
startActivity(Intent.createChooser(emailIntent, "Send mail..."));
} catch (android.content.ActivityNotFoundException ex) {
Toast.makeText(this, "There is no email client installed.", Toast.LENGTH_SHORT).show();
}
EXTRA_EMAIL: a string array which contains all recipients.EXTRA_SUBJECT: a constant String holding the desired subject line of a message.EXTRA_TEXT: content of your email (String format).
Intent.createChooser(), Android will show a popup that contains all available apps can send the mail in your device, user can choose a suitable one:
Sample Project
Intent.ACTION_SEND will be created and invoked after click a button in options menu (locate on Action Bar of the Activity). First, declaring an Activity layout (XML) file:
activity_main.xml
Create a menu file in res/menu folder like this:
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<LinearLayout xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android"
xmlns:tools="http://schemas.android.com/tools"
android:layout_width="match_parent"
android:layout_height="match_parent"
android:orientation="vertical"
android:paddingBottom="@dimen/activity_vertical_margin"
android:paddingLeft="@dimen/activity_horizontal_margin"
android:paddingRight="@dimen/activity_horizontal_margin"
android:paddingTop="@dimen/activity_vertical_margin"
tools:context="info.devexchanges.sendingemailsample.MainActivity">
<LinearLayout
android:layout_width="match_parent"
android:layout_height="wrap_content"
android:orientation="horizontal">
<TextView
android:layout_width="0dp"
android:layout_height="wrap_content"
android:layout_weight="0.3"
android:text="@string/to" />
<EditText
android:id="@+id/email"
android:layout_width="0dp"
android:layout_height="wrap_content"
android:layout_weight="0.7"
android:inputType="textEmailAddress" />
</LinearLayout>
<LinearLayout
android:layout_width="match_parent"
android:layout_height="wrap_content"
android:orientation="horizontal">
<TextView
android:layout_width="0dp"
android:layout_height="wrap_content"
android:layout_weight="0.3"
android:text="@string/subject" />
<EditText
android:id="@+id/subject"
android:layout_width="0dp"
android:layout_height="wrap_content"
android:layout_weight="0.7"
android:inputType="text" />
</LinearLayout>
<LinearLayout
android:layout_width="match_parent"
android:layout_height="wrap_content"
android:layout_marginTop="5dp"
android:orientation="vertical">
<TextView
android:layout_width="match_parent"
android:layout_height="wrap_content"
android:text="@string/content" />
<EditText
android:id="@+id/content"
android:layout_width="match_parent"
android:layout_height="wrap_content"
android:inputType="text"/>
</LinearLayout>
</LinearLayout>
menu_main.xml
Menu preview:<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<menu xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android"
xmlns:app="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res-auto">
<item
android:id="@+id/send"
android:icon="@mipmap/ic_send"
android:title="@string/app_name"
app:showAsAction="always" />
</menu>
Activity programmatically code, locate options menu file and set data for "Email Intent" through EditTexts, check Email is valid by regular expression,...:
MainActivity.java
When running app, we will have this screen:package info.devexchanges.sendingemailsample;
import android.content.Intent;
import android.net.Uri;
import android.support.v7.app.AppCompatActivity;
import android.os.Bundle;
import android.view.Menu;
import android.view.MenuItem;
import android.widget.EditText;
import android.widget.Toast;
public class MainActivity extends AppCompatActivity {
private EditText txtTo;
private EditText txtSubject;
private EditText txtContent;
@Override
protected void onCreate(Bundle savedInstanceState) {
super.onCreate(savedInstanceState);
setContentView(R.layout.activity_main);
txtContent = (EditText) findViewById(R.id.content);
txtSubject = (EditText) findViewById(R.id.subject);
txtTo = (EditText) findViewById(R.id.email);
}
@Override
public boolean onCreateOptionsMenu(Menu menu) {
getMenuInflater().inflate(R.menu.menu_main, menu);
return true;
}
@Override
public boolean onOptionsItemSelected(MenuItem item) {
if (item.getItemId() == R.id.send) {
sendingEmail();
return true;
}
return super.onOptionsItemSelected(item);
}
private String getText(EditText textView) {
return textView.getText().toString().trim();
}
private void sendingEmail() {
if (!checkEmailAddress(getText(txtTo))) {
Toast.makeText(this, "Receiver Email is invalid!", Toast.LENGTH_SHORT).show();
} else if (getText(txtSubject).equals("")) {
Toast.makeText(this, "Please input Email Subject!", Toast.LENGTH_SHORT).show();
} else {
Intent emailIntent = new Intent(Intent.ACTION_SEND);
emailIntent.setData(Uri.parse("mailto:"));
emailIntent.setType("text/plain");
emailIntent.putExtra(Intent.EXTRA_EMAIL, new String[]{getText(txtTo)});
emailIntent.putExtra(Intent.EXTRA_SUBJECT, getText(txtSubject));
emailIntent.putExtra(Intent.EXTRA_TEXT, getText(txtContent));
try {
startActivity(Intent.createChooser(emailIntent, "Send mail..."));
} catch (android.content.ActivityNotFoundException ex) {
Toast.makeText(this, "There is no email client installed.", Toast.LENGTH_SHORT).show();
}
}
}
private boolean checkEmailAddress(String emailAddress) {
String EMAIL_REGEX = "^[_A-Za-z0-9-\\+]+(\\.[_A-Za-z0-9-]+)*@"
+ "[A-Za-z0-9-]+(\\.[A-Za-z0-9]+)*(\\.[A-Za-z]{2,})$";
Boolean b = emailAddress.matches(EMAIL_REGEX);
return b;
}
}
Conclusions
In this post, I use OptionsMenu in Android SDK, you can see my previous chapter to see details. And finally, you can get this project code on @Github.
