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VB6 - Parse winmail.dat (TNEF)

The following vb6 codes demonstrate how to parse MAPI winmail.dat in email.

When an Outlook user composes and sends a message using either Rich Text Format or HTML Format, Outlook automagically generates a file, winmail.dat, and attaches it to the end of the email. The winmail.dat contains the rich text body and original attachments. To parse winmail.dat (TNEF stream) file, we should use ParseTNEF method.

Installation

Before you can use the following sample codes, you should download the EAGetMail Installer and install it on your machine at first. Full sample projects are included in this installer.

Add reference

To use EAGetMail POP3 & IMAP4 ActiveX Object in your project, the first step is Add reference of EAGetMail to your project. Please go to menu -> Project -> References -> and select EAGetMailObj ActiveX Object, click OK, the reference will be added to your project, and you can start to use it to retrieve email and parse email in your project.

add reference in VB6

Add reference in VBA (EXCEL/Access/Outlook)

Open VBA IDE by press Alt+F11, Please select menu -> Tools -> References -> and select EASendMailObj ActiveX Object, click OK, the reference will be added to current VBA project, and you can start to use it to retrieve email and parse email in your VBA project.

To better demonstrate how to retrieve email and parse email, let’s create a VB 6.0 Standard EXE project at first, then add a CommandButton on the Form, double-click this button. It is like this

VB 6.0 standard project

VB6 - Parse winmail.dat (TNEF) - example

The following example codes demonstrate parsing winmail.dat - TNEF stream.

In order to run it correctly, please change email server, user, password, folder, file name value to yours.

Note

To get full sample projects, please download and install EAGetMail on your machine.

Option Explicit

Const CRYPT_MACHINE_KEYSET = 32
Const CRYPT_USER_KEYSET = 4096
Const CERT_SYSTEM_STORE_CURRENT_USER = 65536
Const CERT_SYSTEM_STORE_LOCAL_MACHINE = 131072

Private Sub ParseEmail(ByVal emlFile As String)
    Dim oMail As New EAGetMailObjLib.Mail
    oMail.LicenseCode = "TryIt"

On Error GoTo ErrorHandle
    oMail.LoadFile emlFile, False

    If oMail.IsEncrypted Then
        ' This email is encrypted, we decrypt it by user default certificate.
        ' You can also use specified certificate like this
        ' Dim oCert As New EAGetMailObjLib.Certificate
        ' oCert.LoadFromFile "c:\test.pfx", "pfxpassword", CRYPT_USER_KEYSET
        ' Set oMail = oMail.Decrypt(oCert)
        Set oMail = oMail.Decrypt(Nothing)
    End If

    If oMail.IsSigned Then
        ' This email is digital signed.
        Dim oCert As EAGetMailObjLib.Certificate
        Set oCert = oMail.VerifySignature
        MsgBox "This email contains a valid digital signature."
        ' You can add the certificate to your certificate storage like this
        ' oCert.AddToStore CERT_SYSTEM_STORE_CURRENT_USER, "addressbook"
        ' Then you can use send the encrypted email back to this sender.
    End If

    ' Parse email sender
    MsgBox "From: " & oMail.From.Address

    Dim addressList As EAGetMailObjLib.AddressCollection
    Dim i As Long
    Dim addr As EAGetMailObjLib.MailAddress

    ' Parse email to recipients
    Set addressList = oMail.ToList
    For i = 0 To addressList.Count - 1
        Set addr = addressList.Item(i)
        MsgBox "To: " & addr.Address
    Next

    ' Parse email cc
    Set addressList = oMail.CcList
    For i = 0 To addressList.Count - 1
        Set addr = addressList.Item(i)
        MsgBox "Cc: " & addr.Address
    Next

    ' Parse email subject
    MsgBox "Subject: " & oMail.Subject

    ' Parse email text body
    MsgBox "Text body: " & oMail.TextBody

    ' Parse email HTML body
    MsgBox "Html body: " & oMail.HtmlBody


    ' Parse attachments
    Dim atts As EAGetMailObjLib.AttachmentCollection
    Dim att As EAGetMailObjLib.Attachment

    Set atts = oMail.AttachmentList
    For i = 0 To atts.Count - 1
        Set att = atts.Item(i)
        MsgBox "Attachment: " & att.name

        ' This attachment is in OUTLOOK RTF format(TNEF), decode it here.
        If LCase(att.name) = "winmail.dat" Then
            Dim tatts
            Dim x As Integer
            tatts = oMail.ParseTNEF(att.Content, True)
            For x = LBound(tatts) To UBound(tatts)
                Dim tatt As EAGetMailObjLib.Attachment
                Set tatt = tatts(x)
                MsgBox "winmail.dat: " & tatt.name
            Next
        End If
    Next

    Exit Sub
ErrorHandle:
    MsgBox Err.Description
End Sub

Private Sub Command1_Click()

    ParseEmail "c:\my folder\test.eml"

End Sub

In EAGetMail 4.5, a new method named DecodeTNEF method is introduced. It is easier to parse TNEF attachment. Please have a look at the following example codes:

Option Explicit

Const CRYPT_MACHINE_KEYSET = 32
Const CRYPT_USER_KEYSET = 4096
Const CERT_SYSTEM_STORE_CURRENT_USER = 65536
Const CERT_SYSTEM_STORE_LOCAL_MACHINE = 131072

Private Sub ParseEmail(ByVal emlFile As String)
    Dim oMail As New EAGetMailObjLib.Mail
    oMail.LicenseCode = "TryIt"

On Error GoTo ErrorHandle
    oMail.LoadFile emlFile, False

    If oMail.IsEncrypted Then
        ' This email is encrypted, we decrypt it by user default certificate.
        ' You can also use specified certificate like this
        ' Dim oCert As New EAGetMailObjLib.Certificate
        ' oCert.LoadFromFile "c:\test.pfx", "pfxpassword", CRYPT_USER_KEYSET
        ' Set oMail = oMail.Decrypt(oCert)
        Set oMail = oMail.Decrypt(Nothing)
    End If

    If oMail.IsSigned Then
        ' This email is digital signed.
        Dim oCert As EAGetMailObjLib.Certificate
        Set oCert = oMail.VerifySignature
        MsgBox "This email contains a valid digital signature."
        ' You can add the certificate to your certificate storage like this
        ' oCert.AddToStore CERT_SYSTEM_STORE_CURRENT_USER, "addressbook"
        ' Then you can use send the encrypted email back to this sender.
    End If

    ' Decode winmail.dat (TNEF) automatically'
    oMail.DecodeTNEF

    ' Parse email sender
    MsgBox "From: " & oMail.From.Address

    Dim addressList As EAGetMailObjLib.AddressCollection
    Dim i As Long
    Dim addr As EAGetMailObjLib.MailAddress

    ' Parse email to recipients
    Set addressList = oMail.ToList
    For i = 0 To addressList.Count - 1
        Set addr = addressList.Item(i)
        MsgBox "To: " & addr.Address
    Next

    ' Parse email cc
    Set addressList = oMail.CcList
    For i = 0 To addressList.Count - 1
        Set addr = addressList.Item(i)
        MsgBox "Cc: " & addr.Address
    Next

    ' Parse email subject
    MsgBox "Subject: " & oMail.Subject

    ' Parse email text body
    MsgBox "Text body: " & oMail.TextBody

    ' Parse email HTML body
    MsgBox "Html body: " & oMail.HtmlBody

    ' Parse attachments
    Dim atts As EAGetMailObjLib.AttachmentCollection
    Dim att As EAGetMailObjLib.Attachment

    Set atts = oMail.AttachmentList
    For i = 0 To atts.Count - 1
        Set att = atts.Item(i)
        MsgBox "Attachment: " & att.name
        ' Save attachment to local file.
        att.SaveAs App.Path & "\inbox\" & att.name, true
    Next

    Exit Sub
ErrorHandle:
    MsgBox Err.Description
End Sub

Private Sub Command1_Click()

    ParseEmail "c:\my folder\test.eml"

End Sub

32bit/x64 ActiveX DLL

Seperate builds of run-time dll for 32 and x64 platform

File Platform
Installation Path\Lib\native\x86\EAGetMailObj.dll 32 bit
Installation Path\Lib\native\x64\EAGetMailObj.dll 64 bit

Distribution

  • Standard EXE

    For VB6, C++, Delphi or other standard exe application, you can distribute EAGetMailObj.dll with your application to target machine without COM-registration and installer. To learn more detail, please have a look at Registration-free COM with Manifest File.

  • Script

    For ASP, VBScript, VBA, MS SQL Stored Procedure, you need to install EAGetMail on target machine by EAGetMail installer, both 32bit/x64 DLL are installed and registered.

Appendix

Comments

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See Also