send_email.py

Send a plaintext email message with an optional attachment to a list of email recipients.

• send_email.py
  • edit this and run
• email_recipients.txt
  • your list of recipients
• message.txt
  • write your message in here in plaintext
• send_log.txt
  • keep a log of each sent message

List your email addresses one per line on email_recipients.txt:

email1@example.com
email2@example.com
email3@example.com

You will also need to install keyring using pip and put your credentials there.

$ pip3 install keyring
$ keyring set system email_username
Password for 'email_username' in 'system': 
$ keyring set system email_password
Password for 'email_password' in 'system': 

These credentials will be called for the smtp authentication over tls.

Delay Until

You can delay the sending of your email by entering the date and time in the code. Python will sleep until the time you specify.

# send later by setting the time to delay until
#                               YYYY, MM, DD, HH, MM, SS
delay_until = datetime.datetime(2019, 8, 26, 13, 40, 0)

Attaching a file

Put your file in the same directory and specify the filename in the script.

# specify a file to attach in the same directory
filename = 'your_handout.pdf'

When you are all setup, run the script:

$ python3 send_email.py

This is handy if you have regular template emails you send out to groups.

Testing and Alternate Recipient Lists

You can specify an email list as a command line argument:

$ send_email.py test_list.txt

This will send to the test_list.txt instead of email_recipients.txt. This is useful to send yourself a test run to check the message prior to sending to the entire list.