Email testing with ACCELQ

This article explains commands available to work with email retrieval, sending, and validation in your automation testing. You can build comprehensive logic involving Email validation from the Logic Editor using this set of commands.

ACCELQ allows you to define filters based on various criteria, to help retrieve the target email across your email repository. These filters can be used in any command that requires finding an email.

Define Connection 

Defines the connection parameters for the email server (SMTP) with a given reference name. This reference name is used in subsequent commands for retrieval or verification of emails. If your test logic requires working with multiple SMTP servers, you can create multiple connections with different reference names, and switch between them based on your requirement.

Incoming server details are required for email retrieval commands (for download and delete operations). You can either provide POP3 or IMAP server configuration for the Incoming server. If you are using POP3, only INBOX folder is supported.

Outgoing server (SMTP) details are required for sending mail through your Action logic. Be sure to provide correct port numbers depending on the type of server and encryption type such as TLS (Transport Layer Security) or SSL (Secure Sockets Layer).

session reference name

incoming server

incoming server port

incoming server type

incoming server encryption

outgoing server

outgoing server

outgoing server encryption

email id

auth type

encrypted password


azure app tenant id

azure app client id

scopes (optional)

session reference name

host for incoming server i.e IMAP/POP

port for incoming server

incoming server type i.e IMAP/POP

encryption used by incoming server

host for outgoing server i.e SMTP

port for outgoing server

encryption used by outgoing server

email id to be used to retrieve or send email (for basic authentication)

authentication type (basic/outlook (oauth)/gmail (oauth))

encrypted password, which can be left blank if you only need to send emails 
on this service connection (for basic authentication)

tenant id from azure app (for outlook oauth)

client id from azure app (for outlook oauth)

scopes (optional), if no scopes provided, defaults to provider recommended scopes
(for outlook/gmail oauth)

Note: Password (in the configuration parameters above) needs to be supplied only if you need to read emails as part of your test logic. If all you need is to send emails from your test logic, you do not need to furnish the password.

Note: Password is encrypted inline while you type in the Logic Editor, and does not show up in plain text in the statement.

Send Email

Sends an email to specified recipients on the currently active email service session. When multiple recipients, CC, and BCC recipients are present, separate the mail ids with a comma (,).

You can also specify files to be attached to the email. Multiple attachments can be separated with a comma (,). The filename can be either an absolute path available during test execution or a path relative to the agent's user files folder.

Make sure to provide outgoing mail server (SMTP) details while defining mail connection.

To emails (recipients)

CC emails

BCC emails

subject

body

attachments

comma ( , ) separated recipients

comma ( , ) separated cc emails

comma ( , ) separated bcc emails

email subject

email body

comma ( , ) separated file paths

Switch to Email Session

When you are working with multiple email server connections simultaneously, this command can be used to switch between different server sessions. Make sure the session is already defined with the specified session name.

session ref name

session name to be switched to

Retrieving mail information

Define Email Filter

A filter defines criteria to use when retrieving emails for reading/verification purposes. For example, you can set up a filter based on a Sender, Subject, dates, etc.  Once defined, this filter can be used in other Email commands. You can define multiple filters and use them while retrieving emails.

filter ref name

filter type

filter keyword

from date

to date

reference name for this filter

filter type i.e SUBJECT, FROM, TO, BODY

filter value to apply for the selected filter-type

start date for mails to filter (mm/dd/yyyy format)

end date for mails to filter (mm/dd/yyyy format)

Get Email Count

Returns mail count from given mail folder (default mail folder is "INBOX") in current email session. You can also pass the reference name of a pre-defined filter to base the count on. Returns -1 on error.

mail folder name

filter ref name

Returns

mail folder name (leave it blank to use "INBOX")

filter reference name (leave it blank to skip filter)

Mail count from given mail folder

Get Mail Information

Returns information about an email, which is identified based on specified criteria. You can specify the email folder name (default is INBOX) and/or an existing filter that you created to retrieve the list of matching emails. From the list of emails matching the criterion, you can then specify the ordinal index to indicate which specific email you are interested (the most recent email is indicated with index: 1).

mail info type

mail folder name

filter ref name

index

Returns

mail information to return. SUBJECT, BODY, FROM, TO, CC, BCC, SENT_DATE, RECEIVED_DATE

mail folder name (leave it blank for inbox)

filter reference name (leave it blank to not apply any filters)

ordinal index of the mail to retrieve (index:1 for latest email)

requested mail information

Get Email Folder Names

Returns mail folder names separated by a given delimiter. 

Delimiter

returns

Delimiter to separate folder names

Mail folder names separated by given delimiter

Get Hyperlink from Email Body

Returns the hyperlink from the email body at a specified ordinal index.

mail folder name

filter ref name

index

Link with text

Url index

returns

mail folder name

filter reference name

ordinal index of the mail to retrieve hyperlink (index:1 for latest email)

link with text (eg: click here)

Url index if the email body has multiple URLs

Hyperlink from the email body

Download Email attachments

Downloads attachments of an email. Specific email is identified by a combination of the Folder name, Filter name, and ordinal index. Email ordinal index starts from 1 and indicates the latest email.

If the download folder/directory does not exist, it is created as part of the execution of this command.

mail folder name

filter ref name

index

download folder path

mail folder name

filter reference name

index (based on date)

Path to the directory to save attachments. You may specify either an absolute or relative path.

Email data verification

Verify Email count

Verifies mail count from given mail folder (default mail folder is "INBOX") in current email session. Optionally, a filter can also be applied with a filter reference name to get the count for a specific criterion.

mail folder name

filter ref name

expected mail count

failure action

mail folder name

filter reference name

expected mail count

action to be taken if verification fails (continue or abort test case)

Verify Email information

This command can be used to verify information in an email, that includes Body, Subject, Sender, Receiver, date, etc. Target email can be identified by a combination of factors such as the email folder name (default is INBOX), pre-defined filter name, and the index of the matching email. 

mail info type

index

mail folder name

filter ref name

expected value

comparison type

match type

failure action

mail information type i.e SUBJECT, BODY, FROM, TO, CC, BCC, SENT_DATE, RECEIVED_DATE

mail number in results (first email is indexed as 1)

mail folder name (optional, default INBOX)

filter reference name (optional)

expected value

comparison option (equals, contains)

matching option (ignore case, match case, regex pattern)

action to be taken if verification fails (continue or abort test case)

Here is an example:

1. Define the connection parameters for the email server (SMTP) with a reference name.
2. Define email filter based on specified criteria with a reference name.
3. Get email information based on specified criteria and store it in local parameter,  email information 
4. Extract the information after a specified text 'verification code' from a specified string to get the  verification code and store it in a local parameter, Verification Code
5. Extract the verification code from the above local parameter, email information, at the first ordinal index and store it in a local parameter, Verification Code.