Working with a MIME entity in Java™ classes

The MIMEEntity object is used to read items of type MIME (Multipurpose Internet Mail Extensions). MIME defines techniques for handling 8-bit data, character sets, and a variety of content types. MIME also allows for structured messages, where a message can have multiple parts and relations between the parts.

A typical example is an Internet mail message routed to a mail file without conversion to rich text.

The MIME parts of a document are items of type MIME_PART. In Internet mail messages they are typically named "Body." Programmatically you can access these items as Item, RichTextItem, or MIMEEntity objects.

To access the MIME content of a Document:

  • First call Session.setConvertMIME(false) to override normal conversion of MIME items to rich text.
  • Then call Document.getMIMEEntity.
  • Or call Document.getFirstItem followed by Item.getMIMEEntity.
  • To create an item in MIME format, call Document.createMIMEEntity.
  • To close MIME processing so you can work on items directly, call Document.closeMIMEEntities.
  • Before exiting your code, call Session.setConvertMIME(true) (or restore the original setting).

You access the MIME entity properties through the following methods:

  • getBoundaryEnd returns a String value containing the boundary that follows the last child entity.
  • getBoundaryStart returns a String value containing the boundary that precedes a child entity.
  • getCharset returns a String value containing the content character set of a MIME entity.
  • getContentAsText returns a String value containing the text content of a MIME entity.
  • getContentSubType returns a String value containing the sub-type of the content type of a MIME entity.
  • getContentType returns a String value containing the content type of a MIME entity.
  • getEncoding returns the current encoding for the non-header content of a MIME entity.
  • getHeaderObjects returns a vector of MIMEHeader objects containing the headers for a MIME entity.
  • getHeaders returns a String value containing the headers; getSomeHeaders returns specified headers.
  • getPreamble returns a String value containing the preamble of a multipart entry; setPreamble writes a String value to the preamble.

The following methods access the content of a MIME entity:

  • decodeContent
  • encodeContent
  • getContentAsBytes
  • getContentAsText
  • getEntityAsText
  • setContentFromBytes
  • setContentFromText

The following methods manipulate multipart MIME entities:

  • createChildEntity
  • createParentEntity
  • getFirstChildEntity
  • getNextEntity
  • getNextSibling
  • getParentEntity
  • getPrevEntity
  • getPrevSibling

The remove method removes an entity.

The createHeader and getNthHeader methods access MIME headers as MIMEHeader objects (as well as the HeaderObjects property).

The MIMEHeader class has a getHeaderName method, a remove method, and the following methods for accessing header content:

  • addValText
  • getHeaderVal
  • getHeaderValAndParams
  • getParamVal
  • setHeaderVal
  • setHeaderValAndParams
  • setParamVal