Scott Motte

Contact email form with Ruby on Rails and GMail (plus, reply-to error)

UPDATE AUGUST 6TH, 2008: Gmail’s reply-to was failing with the rails action-mailer. It would show the reply-to email as the email from gmail rather than the email address entered by the user. I did the following, and it fixed the reply-to, but now the @from does not work. At least the reply-to works!

sources: rails-send-email-tutorial and Action-mailer reply-to header

def contact_email(email_params, sent_at = Time.now)
    # You only need to customize @recipients.
    @recipients = "scott@scottmotte.com"
    @from = 'Does not work'
    @headers['Reply-To'] = "'#{email_params[:name]}' <#{email_params[:email_address]}>"
    @subject    = 'Contact Form'
    @sent_on    = sent_at
    @body["email_email_address"] = email_params[:email_address]
    @body["email_message"] = email_params[:message]
    @body["email_name"] = email_params[:name]
  end

–
This assumes you already have a rails app

Create emailer model

script/generate model emailer

Edit app/model/emailer.rb

class Emailer < ActionMailer::Base
    def contact_email(email_params, sent_at = Time.now)
        # You only need to customize @recipients.
        @recipients = "contact@website.com"
        @from = email_params[:name] + " <" + email_params[:address] + ">"
        @subject = email_params[:subject]
        @sent_on = sent_at
        @body["email_body"] = email_params[:body]
        @body["email_name"] = email_params[:name]
    end
end

Create a file called lib/smtp_tls.rb and paste this code into it.

Create config/initializers/mail.rb & put the following in there:

#from http://www.prestonlee.com/archives/63
require "smtp_tls"
# from http://www.avnetlabs.com/rails/restful-authentication-with-rails-2
ActionMailer::Base.delivery_method = :smtp
ActionMailer::Base.smtp_settings = {
    :address => "smtp.gmail.com",
    :port => 587,
    :domain => "gmail.com",
    :authentication => :plain,
    :user_name => "username",
    :password => "password"
}

In controller for your contact form add

def send_mail
    Emailer::deliver_contact_email(params[:email])
end

Create file app/views/emailer/contact_email.html.erb

Name:

<%= @email_name %>

Message:

<%= @email_body %>

Create form

<% form_tag :action => "send_mail" do %>

Name: <%= text_field "email", "name", :size => 30 %>

Email: <%= text_field "email", "address", :size => 30 %>

Subject: <%= text_field "email", "subject", :size => 30 %>

Body: <%= text_area "email", "body", :rows => 8, :cols => 30 %>


<% end %>

Resources:
- useful but out of date