Composing Text Messages

To compose a simple text message, you can use the ComposeMessage method and specify the body of the message, along with the other standard header fields. For example, if you had a form with TextBox controls for the sender, recipients, subject and message body you could use code like this:

Dim nError As Long

nError = MailMessage1.ComposeMessage(editFrom.Text, _
                                     editTo.Text, _
                                     editCc.Text, _
                                     editBcc.Text, _
                                     editSubject.Text, _
                                     editMessage.Text)
If nError Then
   MsgBox "Unable to compose a new message" & vbCrLf & _
          MailMessage1.LastErrorString, vbExclamation
   Exit Sub
End If

If you have a text file that contains the body of the message that you want to use, then you can create a message without a message body and then read the contents of the file and assign it to the Text property. For example:

Dim nError As Long

nError = MailMessage1.ComposeMessage(editFrom.Text, _
                                     editTo.Text, _
                                     editCc.Text, _
                                     editBcc.Text, _
                                     editSubject.Text)
If nError Then
   MsgBox "Unable to compose a new message" & vbCrLf & _
          MailMessage1.LastErrorString, vbExclamation
   Exit Sub
End If

' Open the file for and assign the contents of the file to the
' Text property which will put it in the body of the message
hFile = FreeFile()
Open strFileName For Input As hFile
MailMessage1.Text = Input(LOF(hFile), hFile)
Close hFile

To access the complete message, use the Message property, which will return the complete message including the headers and message body. This is most commonly used with the SMTP control to submit the message to a mail server for delivery to the recipients.