Inbox

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This source collects inbox emails, retrieves attachments, and stores relevant email data. It uses the imaplib library for IMAP interactions and the dlt library for data processing.

This Inbox dlt verified source and pipeline example load data using the “Inbox” verified source to the destination of your choice.

Sources and resources that can be loaded using this verified source are:

Name	Type	Description
inbox_source	source	Gathers inbox emails and saves attachments locally
get_messages_uids	resource	Retrieves messages UUIDs from the mailbox
get_messages	resource-transformer	Retrieves emails from the mailbox using given UIDs
get_attachments	resource-transformer	Downloads attachments from emails using given UIDs

Setup guide

Grab credentials

1. For verified source configuration, you need:

   • "host": IMAP server hostname (e.g., Gmail: imap.gmail.com, Outlook: imap-mail.outlook.com).
   • "email_account": Associated email account name (e.g., dlthub@dlthub.com).
   • "password": APP password (for third-party clients) from the email provider.

2. Host addresses and APP password procedures vary by provider and can be found via a quick Google search. For Google Mail's app password, read here.

3. However, this guide covers Gmail inbox configuration; similar steps apply to other providers.

Accessing Gmail inbox

1. SMTP server DNS: 'imap.gmail.com' for Gmail.
2. Port: 993 (for internet messaging access protocol over TLS/SSL).

Grab app password for Gmail

1. An app password is a 16-digit code allowing less secure apps/devices to access your Google Account, available only with 2-Step Verification activated.

Steps to create and use app passwords:

1. Visit your Google Account > Security.
2. Under "How you sign in to Google", enable 2-Step Verification.
3. Choose App passwords at the bottom.
4. Name the device for reference.
5. Click Generate.
6. Input the generated 16-character app password as prompted.
7. Click Done.

Read more in this article or Google official documentation.

Initialize the verified source

To get started with your data pipeline, follow these steps:

1. Enter the following command:

   dlt init inbox duckdb

   This command will initialize the pipeline example with Inbox as the source and duckdb as the destination.

2. If you'd like to use a different destination, simply replace duckdb with the name of your preferred destination.

3. After running this command, a new directory will be created with the necessary files and configuration settings to get started.

For more information, read the Walkthrough: Add a verified source.

Add credential

1. Inside the .dlt folder, you'll find a file called secrets.toml, which is where you can securely store your access tokens and other sensitive information. It's important to handle this file with care and keep it safe. Here's what the file looks like:

   # put your secret values and credentials here
   # do not share this file and do not push it to GitHub
   [sources.inbox]
   host = "Please set me up!" # The host address of the email service provider.
   email_account = "Please set me up!" # Email account associated with the service.
   password = "Please set me up!" # APP Password for the above email account.

2. Replace the host, email, and password value with the previously copied one to ensure secure access to your Inbox resources.

   When adding the App Password, remove any spaces. For instance, "abcd efgh ijkl mnop" should be "abcdefghijklmnop".

3. Next, follow the destination documentation instructions to add credentials for your chosen destination, ensuring proper routing of your data to the final destination.

Run the pipeline

1. Before running the pipeline, ensure that you have installed all the necessary dependencies by running the command:

   pip install -r requirements.txt

   Prerequisites for fetching messages differ by provider.

   For Gmail:

   • pip install google-api-python-client>=2.86.0
   • pip install google-auth-oauthlib>=1.0.0
   • pip install google-auth-httplib2>=0.1.0

   For pdf parsing:

   • PyPDF2: pip install PyPDF2

2. Once the pipeline has finished running, you can verify that everything loaded correctly by using the following command:

   dlt pipeline <pipeline_name> show

   For example, the pipeline_name for the above pipeline example is standard_inbox, you may also use any custom name instead.

For more information, read the Walkthrough: Run a pipeline.

Sources and resources

dlt works on the principle of sources and resources.

Source inbox_source

This function fetches inbox emails, saves attachments locally, and returns uids, messages, and attachments as resources.

@dlt.source
def inbox_source(
    host: str = dlt.secrets.value,
    email_account: str = dlt.secrets.value,
    password: str = dlt.secrets.value,
    folder: str = "INBOX",
    gmail_group: Optional[str] = GMAIL_GROUP,
    start_date: pendulum.DateTime = START_DATE,
    filter_emails: Sequence[str] = None,
    filter_by_mime_type: Sequence[str] = None,
    chunksize: int = CHUNK_SIZE,
) -> Sequence[DltResource]:
   ...

host : IMAP server hostname. Default: 'dlt.secrets.value'.

email_account: Email login. Default: 'dlt.secrets.value'.

password: Email App password. Default: 'dlt.secrets.value'.

folder: Mailbox folder for collecting emails. Default: 'INBOX'.

gmail_group: Google Group email for filtering. Default: /inbox/settings.py 'GMAIL_GROUP'.

start_date: Start date to collect emails. Default: /inbox/settings.py 'START_DATE'.

filter_emails: Email addresses for 'FROM' filtering. Default: /inbox/settings.py 'FILTER_EMAILS'.

filter_by_mime_type: MIME types for attachment filtering. Default: None.

chunksize: UIDs collected per batch. Default: /inbox/settings.py 'CHUNK_SIZE'.

Resource get_messages_uids

This resource collects email message UIDs (Unique IDs) from the mailbox.

@dlt.resource(name="uids")
def get_messages_uids(
    initial_message_num: Optional[
        dlt.sources.incremental[int]
    ] = dlt.sources.incremental("message_uid", initial_value=1),
) -> TDataItem:
   ...

initial_message_num: provides incremental loading on UID.

Resource get_messages

This resource retrieves emails by UID (Unique IDs), yielding a dictionary with metadata like UID, ID, sender, subject, dates, content type, and body.

@dlt.transformer(name="messages", primary_key="message_uid")
def get_messages(
    items: TDataItems,
    include_body: bool = True,
) -> TDataItem:
   ...

items: An iterable containing dictionaries with 'message_uid' representing the email message UIDs.

include_body: Includes the email body if True. Default: True.

Resource get_attachments_by_uid

Similar to the previous resources, resource get_attachments extracts email attachments by UID from the IMAP server. It yields file items with attachments in the file_content field and the original email in the message field.

@dlt.transformer(
    name="attachments",
    primary_key="file_hash",
)
def get_attachments(
    items: TDataItems,
) -> Iterable[List[FileItem]]:
   ...

items: An iterable containing dictionaries with 'message_uid' representing the email message UIDs.

We use the document hash as a primary key to avoid duplicating them in tables.

Customization

Create your own pipeline

If you wish to create your own pipelines, you can leverage source and resource methods from this verified source.

1. Configure the pipeline by specifying the pipeline name, destination, and dataset as follows:

   pipeline = dlt.pipeline(
       pipeline_name="standard_inbox",  # Use a custom name if desired
       destination="duckdb",  # Choose the appropriate destination (e.g., duckdb, redshift, post)
       dataset_name="standard_inbox_data"  # Use a custom name if desired
   )

   To read more about pipeline configuration, please refer to our documentation.

2. To load messages from "mycreditcard@bank.com" starting "2023-10-1":

   • Set START_DATE = pendulum.DateTime(2023, 10, 1) in ./inbox/settings.py.
   • Use the following code:

     # Retrieve messages from the specified email address.
     messages = inbox_source(filter_emails=("mycreditcard@bank.com",)).messages
     # Configure messages to exclude body and name the result "my_inbox".
     messages = messages(include_body=False).with_name("my_inbox")
     # Execute the pipeline and load messages to the "my_inbox" table.
     load_info = pipeline.run(messages)
     # Print the loading details.
     print(load_info)

     Please refer to the inbox_source() docstring for email filtering options by sender, date, or mime type.

3. To load messages from multiple emails, including "community@dlthub.com":

   messages = inbox_source(
        filter_emails=("mycreditcard@bank.com", "community@dlthub.com.")
   ).messages

4. In inbox_pipeline.py, the pdf_to_text transformer extracts text from PDFs, treating each page as a separate data item. Using the pdf_to_text function to load parsed PDFs from mail to the database:

   filter_emails = ["mycreditcard@bank.com", "community@dlthub.com."] # Email senders
   attachments = inbox_source(
        filter_emails=filter_emails, filter_by_mime_type=["application/pdf"]
   ).attachments
   
   # Process attachments through PDF parser and save to 'my_pages' table.
   load_info = pipeline.run((attachments | pdf_to_text).with_name("my_pages"))
   # Display loaded data details.
   print(load_info)