MIME Code Example: Recursive decoding

Many times, a MIME message that you obtain will be nested. That the MIME message consists of multiple parts, and one of those parts may itself be another entire MIME entity. In order to effectively handle these types of message you can create a function to recursively decode the message. For example:

C# private void MimeDecode(string EntityHeaders, string Entity) { Mime mime1 = new Mime(); mime1.MessageHeadersString = EntityHeaders; mime1.Message = Entity; mime1.DecodeFromString(); for (int i = 0; i <= mime1.Parts.Count - 1; i++) { //If the Content-Type is "Multipart/????", then that part is an encoded entity if (mime1.Parts[i].ContentType.ToLower().StartsWith("multipart")) { MimeDecode(mime1.Parts[i].Headers, mime1.Parts[i].DecodedString); } //If the part is plain text if (mime1.Parts[i].Filename == "" && mime1.Parts[i].ContentType.ToString() == "text/plain") { //At this point we could check the ContentTypeAttr field for the charset //and use the charset (if set) when displaying the text. //For simplicity we will skip checking the charset in this example. Console.WriteLine("Plain text: " + mime1.Parts[i].DecodedString); } //If the part has an associated Filename, it is an attachment if (!mime1.Parts[i].Filename.Equals("")) { Console.WriteLine("Attachment: " + mime1.Parts[i].Filename); } } }

VB6 Private Function MimeDecode(EntityHeaders As String, Entity As String) Dim mime1 As New MIME Dim i As Integer mime1.MessageHeadersString = EntityHeaders mime1.Message = Entity mime1.DecodeFromString For i = 0 To mime1.PartCount - 1 If (InStr(LCase(mime1.PartContentType(i)), "multipart") > 0) Then MimeDecode mime1.PartHeaders(i), mime1.PartDecodedString(i) ElseIf (mime1.PartFilename(i) = "" And mime1.PartContentType(i) = "text/plain") Then Debug.Print "Plain text: " & mime1.PartDecodedString(i) ElseIf (mime1.PartFilename(i) <> "") Then Debug.Print "Attachment: " & mime1.PartFilename(i) End If Next i End Function This can of course be expanded to check for other ContentTypes or conditions. This should provide you with a basic idea of how to approach decoding nested MIME entities recursively.

Note: The above code examples use the API of IPWorks Version 8. This code will need to be modified slightly if you are using an older version of IPWorks