Javamail library, tracking specific emails

Question

I am developing a Java app that reads all the emails from GMAIL and save them run time on objects of self made Class that holds some of the attributes of the email. Now I want to delete an email object and when I do that I want it to be removed from the internet as well. In order to do so I will need some information to query the GMAIL account to delete that particular email I am referring to. Is there a possible way to do that? Maybe by saving the header and then searching for that? I couldn't find a good way to do it.

Answer 1

I assume you are accessing GMAIL with IMAP. Then you could store the Message, call Message.setFlag(Flag.DELETED) then expunge the Folder, or search the Folder yourself. Or maybe you can search the Google Gmail api and find a better way. For example you can use the unique message ID

UPDATE this is a google project that can help you: java-gmail-imap. There is also a companion project for OAuth authentication (needed for run the sample)

Answer 2

It depends on the time span between when you access the message and when you want to delete it. If it's short, and the folder is still open, you can just set the DELETED flag and close the folder to expunge the message.

But I'm assuming that you need to locate the message some time later. In that case, you should learn about IMAP UIDs. See the UIDFolder interface in JavaMail and the IMAP spec for details. In essence, you need to keep track of the folder's UIDVALIDITY value and the message's UID value. When you come back to the folder, you can make sure it's the same folder by checking the UIDVALIDITY value and then look up the message based on its UID.

Answer 3

I'd recommend you to take a look on James.

The Apache James Project delivers a rich set of open source modules and libraries, written in Java, related to Internet mail communication which build into an advanced enterprise mail server.