IMAP Data Connector

The IMAP Data Connector enables federated SQL query across emails stored in an IMAP email server.

datasets:
  - from: imap:[email protected]
    name: emails
    params:
      imap_password: ${secrets:IMAP_PASSWORD}

Schema

Field Name	Data Type	Nullable	Description
date	Date64	No	The date and time when the email was sent.
subject	Utf8	Yes	The subject line of the email.
from	List<Utf8>	Yes	The sender(s) of the email.
to	List<Utf8>	Yes	The primary recipient(s) of the email.
cc	List<Utf8>	Yes	The carbon copy recipient(s) of the email.
bcc	List<Utf8>	Yes	The blind carbon copy recipient(s) of the email.
reply_to	List<Utf8>	Yes	The email address(es) to which replies should be sent.
message_id	Utf8	Yes	A unique identifier for the email message.
in_reply_to	Utf8	Yes	The message_id of the email this message is replying to, if applicable.
content	Utf8	Yes	The raw email body of this message. Not retrieved when acceleration is disabled.

If a MIME-encoded value is retrieved for a field, it is not decoded and the MIME-encoded value is returned in SQL queries.

Most fields are optional, and depend on the implementation of the specific IMAP server being connected to. For example, the IMAP RFC specifies the message_id field SHOULD be supplied but the field is an optional field.

For more information, refer to the IMAP RFC 2822 - Section 3.6.

Retrieving email body contents

When the IMAP Data Connector is used without acceleration, the email body will not be retrieved - only header/subject values. To load the email body contents, specify an acceleration:

datasets:
  - from: imap:[email protected]
    name: emails
    params:
      imap_password: ${secrets:IMAP_PASSWORD}
    acceleration:
      enabled: true

With an acceleration enabled, the content field will be populated with the complete email body including headers, without any decoding applied. This field could be used for post-processing the email, like retrieving custom header values or decoding MIME-encoded content.

Limitations

• Email attachments are currently not parsed from the email body into separate dataset fields. To read email attachments, parse the multipart encodings from the content field.

Configuration

from

The from field must contain the email address for the mailbox to connect to. For example, [email protected], or [email protected].

name

The dataset name. This will be used as the table name within Spice.

Example:

datasets:
  - from: imap:[email protected]
    name: emails
    params: ...

SELECT COUNT(*) FROM emails;

+----------+
| count(*) |
+----------+
| 1234     |
+----------+

params

The IMAP connector supports the following connection and authentication parameters:

Parameter Name	Description
imap_username	Optional. The username to use for the IMAP connection. Defaults to the value of the from: mailbox field.
imap_password	Optional. The password to use for the IMAP connection, in plaintext authentication mode.
imap_host	Optional. The host or IP address of the IMAP server to connect to. Not required for known connections like Outlook or Gmail.
imap_port	Optional. The port of the IMAP server to connect to.
imap_mailbox	Optional. The mailbox to read mail from. Defaults to INBOX, the standard email inbox.
imap_ssl_mode	Optional. The IMAP SSL mode to use. Defaults to tls, permitted values of tls, starttls, disabled or auto.

Examples

Basic example

datasets:
  - from: imap:[email protected]
    name: emails
    params:
      imap_host: mail.example.com
      imap_password: ${ secrets:IMAP_PASSWORD }

Secrets

Spice integrates with multiple secret stores to help manage sensitive data securely. For detailed information on supported secret stores, refer to the secret stores documentation. Additionally, learn how to use referenced secrets in component parameters by visiting the using referenced secrets guide.

Cookbook

• A cookbook recipe to configure IMAP as a data connector in Spice. IMAP Data Connector
• A cookbook recipe to configure IMAP with Outlook using OAuth authentication as a data connector in Spice. Connecting to an Outlook mailbox