{"id":978,"date":"2010-07-06T17:00:42","date_gmt":"2010-07-06T15:00:42","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.limilabs.com\/blog\/?p=978"},"modified":"2023-11-07T09:18:08","modified_gmt":"2023-11-07T07:18:08","slug":"peek-message-on-imap-server","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.limilabs.com\/blog\/peek-message-on-imap-server","title":{"rendered":"Peek message on IMAP server"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

If you are using GetMessageByUID<\/em> to download email message or GetHeadersByUID<\/em> to get email headers only, most IMAP servers will automatically mark such messages as seen. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

In other words IMAP server adds \\SEEN<\/strong> flag to the messages you have just downloaded.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

If it’s not expected behavior in your scenario, you can use one of the Peek* <\/em>methods, such as: PeekHeadersByUID<\/em>, PeekMessageByUID<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Using Peek methods<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Those methods in contrast to their Get*<\/em> equivalents (GetMessageByUID <\/em>and GetHeadersByUID<\/em>) do not set the \\SEEN flag – emails are not marked as seen automatically<\/strong>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The sample below connects to IMAP server and finds all unseen messages, then it downloads them, but does not change their unseen status. Messages are left unseen.<\/p>\n\n\n

\n\/\/ C#\n\nusing(Imap imap = new Imap())\n{\n    imap.ConnectSSL("imap.example.com");\n    imap.UseBestLogin("user", "password");\n\n    imap.SelectInbox();\n    List<long> uidList = imap.Search(Flag.Unseen);\n    foreach (long uid in uidList)\n    {\n        IMail email = new MailBuilder()\n            .CreateFromEml(imap.PeekMessageByUID(uid));\n\n        string subject = email.Subject;\n        string text = email.Text;\n    }\n    imap.Close();\n}\n<\/pre><\/div>\n\n
\n' VB.NET\n\nUsing imap As New Imap\n    imap.ConnectSSL(\"imap.example.com\")\n    imap.UseBestLogin(\"user\", \"password\")\n\n    imap.SelectInbox()\n    Dim uidList As List(Of Long) = imap.Search(Flag.Unseen)\n\n    For Each uid As Long In uidList\n        Dim email As IMail = New MailBuilder() _\n            .CreateFromEml(imap.PeekMessageByUID(uid))\n\n        Dim subject As String = email.Subject\n        Dim text As String = email.Text\n    Next\n    imap.Close()\nEnd Using\n<\/pre><\/div>\n\n\n
There are Peek<\/em> methods for downloading headers only (PeekHeadersByUID<\/em>) and even parts of the email message<\/a> (PeekTextByUID<\/em>\u00a0, PeekDataByUID<\/em>).<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Examine instead of Select<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
The second approach is to use Examine <\/em>method instead of Select<\/em>. Examine puts the folder into read-only state, so no \\SEEN flag is added to any message. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
The drawback is that you can not delete or upload any message.<\/p>\n\n\n
\n\/\/ C#\n\nusing(Imap imap = new Imap())\n{\n    imap.ConnectSSL(\"imap.example.com\");\n    imap.UseBestLogin(\"user\", \"password\");\n\n    imap.ExamineInbox(); \/\/ -or- imap.Examine(\"Inbox\");\n\n    \/\/ ...\n\n    imap.Close();\n}\n<\/pre><\/div>\n\n
\n' VB.NET\n\nUsing imap As New Imap\n    imap.ConnectSSL(\"imap.example.com\")\n    imap.UseBestLogin\"user\", \"password\")\n\n    imap.ExamineInbox() ' -or- imap.Examine(\"Inbox\")\n\n    ' ...\n\n    imap.Close()\nEnd Using\n<\/pre><\/div>\n\n\n
You can also easily mark message as seen<\/a> and unseen by using Imap.MarkMessageUnseenByUID<\/em> and Imap.MarkMessageSeenByUID<\/em> methods.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
You can download Mail.dll IMAP library for .NET here<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\nGet Mail.dll<\/a>\n
\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
If you are using GetMessageByUID to download email message or GetHeadersByUID to get email headers only, most IMAP servers will automatically mark such messages as seen. In other words IMAP server adds \\SEEN flag to the messages you have just downloaded. If it’s not expected behavior in your scenario, you can use one of the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[15,28,77,57],"class_list":["post-978","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-mail-dll","tag-c","tag-imap","tag-imap-component","tag-vb-net"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.limilabs.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/978"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.limilabs.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.limilabs.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.limilabs.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.limilabs.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=978"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/www.limilabs.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/978\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6593,"href":"https:\/\/www.limilabs.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/978\/revisions\/6593"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.limilabs.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=978"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.limilabs.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=978"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.limilabs.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=978"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}