Introduction

This tutorial focuses on using deadCL to send & receive emails. Here we've chosen to use the same Library for object processing as our Parcel chat-bot however our inputs & outputs are performed using CHAD instead of Arnold.

The Library & Conversation used are linked below, for both comparison and ease of execution.


Everything shown in blue must be substituted with your own values.

This tutorial will not deal with the initial establishment of DeadLetter or your web server/web presence.

NOTE: before proceeding you'll need to read our Arnold chat-bot tutorial as well.

What you'll learn

-	How to use CHAD (Parcel) to 'send' & 'receive' emails
-	How to use CHAD (Parcel) for inputs & outputs
-	To parse different object data depending on origin.

What you'll need

-	A CloudMailin: you'll need a method to convert inbound emails to JSON. Luckily for us cloudmailin.com has done this for us. You can of-course substitute any other service.
-	html POST endpoint Somewhere to receive output from Parcel, this needs to be on a web-server with PHP
-	Author Key: it goes without saying you'll need an Author Key - setup with a Parcel endpoint

Receiving Messages

The first step is setting our input (you'll need to an exisiting Parcel endpoint configured for CHAD)

In this example we've set our input as lSCW3t you'll need to ensure your Arnold endpoint is configured with this value.

You can learn how here.

         
 
  RECEIVE-WEBHOOK;
	PARCEL-
		A	jSCW3t
 

  

Sending Messages

Next we need to define our remote endpoint (the URI to send responses to).

As a placeholder we've used api.domain.com/chat-bot you'll need to change this to where deadCL is POST responses, or format your Author Key to handle the domain redirect.

You can learn how here.

         
 
  SEND-WEBHOOK;
	PARCEL-
		X-WWW	api.domain.com/chat-bot
 

  

Handling parameters (in)

To receive emails as JSON from cloudmailin we'll need to configure our Parcel endpoint to capture the relevant data.

Here we've set our parameters to be actionable with two KC using Parcel to handle the three values we care about;
We've intentionally separated the address to avoid the need to modify the PARCEL_CHAT Library.

         
 
  MESSAGE-FROM;
	PARCEL-	
		B	JSON		RV_to 
		
  MESSAGE;
	PARCEL-
		B	JSON		RV_subject
		B	JSON		RV_message	
 

  

Handling parameters (out)

Now lets take a look at 'sending' messages back. For the method used in this tutorial we won't be using JSON.

Here we've set our parameters to be actionable with one KC using Parcel to handle the three values we care about;

         
 
  SEND;
		X-WWW	XW_to 
		X-WWW	XW_subject	
		X-WWW	XW_message	
 

  

Handling parameters Values (in)

Setting up the parameter values is much easier than one would think. Here we only need to define the body parameter and how we'd like Parcel to treat it.

For example html VAL_ $_message tells Parcel we'd like to 'take' the value html & assign it to $_message.

We've also inserted a rule to remove 'reply' references from the subject; this prevents Parcel from inserting "Re:" with each reply.

         
 
  RV_to;
	PARCEL-
		from VAL_ $_user
		
  RV_subject;
	PARCEL-
		subject VAL_ $_subject
		{REMOVE, 'RE:,Re:,re:' if found}
		
  RV_message;
	PARCEL-
		html VAL_ $_message
 

  

Handling parameters Values (out)

Creating the payload for the remote endpoint is done in much the same way. with one slightly different substitution values.

Here we're using x-www-form-urlencoded instead of JSON a requirement for our 'simple' email send method.

         
 
 XW_to;
	PARCEL-
		to VAL_ $_user

 XW_subject;
	PARCEL-
		subject VAL_ $_subject

 XW_message;
	PARCEL-
		message VAL_ $_reply
 

  

Step Three - Upload some PHP

Okay so now you've got a way of sending emails into deadCL using Parcel, but no method to send a reply (as an email)

To solve this you'll need to upload a small PHP script, designed to send the payload from Parcel as an email.

It's dirty code - designed as a proof of concept and not a final revision as every email sent will be likely be sent straight to spam.

PHPMailer would be more suitable for post-development applications than PHP mail ( )

For the sake of testing we've chosen to use PHP mail ( )

 


 
  $to = $_POST['recipient'];
  $subject = $_POST['subject'];
  $message = $_POST['message'];
  $header = "From:[email protected] \r\n";
  $header .= "MIME-Version: 1.0\r\n";
  $header .= "Content-type: text/html\r\n";

  $retval = mail ($to,$subject,$message,$header);

  if( $retval == true ) {
	echo "Message sent successfully...";
  }else {
	echo "Message could not be sent...";
  }

You're Done!

By now you should have a basic understanding of using CHAD to create a chat-bot with DeadLetter (deadCL) that communicates using traditional emails.

NOTE: This is not intended as a production ready Conversation, simply an example of deadCL.

This code can easily be modified to automate customer support or organise personal emails to name a few possibilities.