johnajb has asked for the wisdom of the Perl Monks concerning the following question:

Hi I am trying to extract all email addresses from a text file. ( a ripped out mail header) What is the best module or way to do that? An example would help! thanks

Replies are listed 'Best First'.
Re: extract email addresses
by esskar (Deacon) on Feb 19, 2005 at 00:13 UTC
    I like Email::Find 
    use Email::Find;

# new object oriented interface
my $finder = Email::Find->new(\&callback);
my $num_found - $finder->find(\$text);

# good old functional style
$num_found = find_emails($text, \&callback);

sub callback {
   my ($addrobj, $addrstr) = @_;

   print "$addrstr\n";
}

    [download]
    Check the Email::Find pod for more detailed help!
[reply]
[d/l]
Re: extract email addresses
by Roy Johnson (Monsignor) on Feb 19, 2005 at 00:11 UTC
    The Email::Address module should extract them.
    Caution: Contents may have been coded under pressure.
[reply]
Re: extract email addresses
by sh1tn (Priest) on Feb 19, 2005 at 00:23 UTC 
    use strict; 

my $type  = shift || die "usage: filetype [directory]\n"; 
my $dir   = shift || ""; 
my $mail  = qr{\W*(\.*(?:\w+|-)+\.*\@\.*(?:\w+|-)+(?:\.\w+)+)\W*}; 
my @files = glob("$dir\*.$type"); 
my $mails; 

my $s_time = time; 

for( @files ){ 
    open FH, "$_" or die "can't open $_\n"; 
    my @cont = <FH>; 
    close FH; 
    for( @cont ){ 
        if( /$mail/go ){ 
            $mails->{$1} or $mails->{$1} = 1 
        } 
    } 
} 
     
my $e_time = time; 

if( keys %$mails ){ 
    print "Total time: ", $e_time - $s_time, "\n"; 
    print "Total email addresses: ", scalar keys %$mails, "\n\n"; 
    print "$_\n" for keys %$mails; 
     
}else{ 
    print "No email address found\n" 
}

    [download]


[reply]
[d/l]
      all email addresses will be formatted like so.
      <smtp:"emailaddress">
      could be something.something.something@something.something.something.com
      but it wil always be in the brackets with smtp: in it.
[reply]
        my $text = '<smtp:something.something.something@something.something.so
+mething.com>';
my @addresses = $text =~ m!<smtp:(.*@.*)>!g;
print "$_\n" foreach @addresses;

        [download]
        But i still prefer my Email::Find solution; then you will be safe! <edit>miss-spelling fixed</edit>
[reply]
[d/l]
        It does not matter - this regular expression takes care:
        $mail_reg  = qr{\W*(\.*(?:\w+|-)+(?:\.\w+|-)*\@\.*(?:\w+|-)+(?:\.\w+)+
+)\W*};
$mail_1    = '<smtp:"email.address@something.something.something.com">
+';
$mail_2    = '<smtp:emailaddress@something.something.something.com>';

$mail_1 =~ m#$mail_reg# and print $1, $/;
$mail_2 =~ m#$mail_reg# and print $1, $/;

# which outputs:
# email.address@something.something.something.com
# emailaddress@something.something.something.com

        [download]


[reply]
[d/l]
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Re: extract email addresses
by TedYoung (Deacon) on Feb 19, 2005 at 00:10 UTC

    Well, you could scan over the file with a regex:

    use strict;
use warnings;

open F, 'file' or die $!;
undef $\; # Enable slurp mode
$_ = <F>;
close F;

print "$1\n" while /([\w.-]+\@[\w.-]+)/g;

    [download]

    But there are many ways to do this.

    Update:Fixed my most glaring use strings; error. -- Ted, sitting here with egg on his face! :-)

    Ted Young

    ($$<<$$=>$$<=>$$<=$$>>$$) always returns 1. :-)
[reply]
[d/l]
[select]
[reply]
[d/l]
      which strings module should i use?
[reply]

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