Sendgrid API for Ruby on Rails

Question

I can't seem to find a step by step tutorial on how to integrate the Sendgrid web API in to a Ruby on Rails application. I'm pretty new to this so maybe I'm missing something obvious.

I would like to use the Sendgrid web API instead of the smtp delivery method (mailgun talks about the benefits of the web API over the SMTP method here: https://documentation.mailgun.com/quickstart-sending.html, and I was thinking that Sendgrid would either have the same benefits or I would potentially switch to mailgun later).

After installing the sendgrid gem (https://github.com/sendgrid/sendgrid-ruby), the documentation tells me to "Create a new client with your SendGrid API Key", and that I can do it 2 ways:

require 'sendgrid-ruby'

# As a hash
client = SendGrid::Client.new(api_key: 'YOUR_SENDGRID_APIKEY')

# Or as a block
client = SendGrid::Client.new do |c|
  c.api_key = 'YOUR_SENDGRID_APIKEY'
end

Where specifically in my application am I supposed to put this code? Should I put this in my mailer, my application mailer or in the config/environments/production.rb file?

I took a look at this tutorial that walks through how to set up the Mailgun API: https://launchschool.com/blog/handling-emails-in-rails

According to this tutorial it looks like the line client = SendGrid::Client.new(api_key: 'YOUR_SENDGRID_APIKEY') should actually go in to the mailer method itself. See below for the launchschool.com example (presumably replacing the mailgun specific info with the sendgrid info):

class ExampleMailer < ActionMailer::Base

      def sample_email(user)
    @user = user
    mg_client = Mailgun::Client.new ENV['api_key']
    message_params = {:from    => ENV['gmail_username'],
                      :to      => @user.email,
                      :subject => 'Sample Mail using Mailgun API',
                      :text    => 'This mail is sent using Mailgun API via mailgun-ruby'}
    mg_client.send_message ENV['domain'], message_params
  end
end

Additionally, how do I get my mailer method to send a mailer view instead of simple text as outlined in the launchschool example? For example, instead of sending the text 'This mail is sent using...' I would like to send a mailer view (something like account_activation.html.erb).

Finally, I am using Devise in my application, and I would like to have Devise use the web API to send emails (ie password reset, etc). Does this mean I need to create a custom mailer for Devise? If so, how do I do that?

According to Devise (https://github.com/plataformatec/devise/wiki/How-To:-Use-custom-mailer), I should "create a class that extends Devise::Mailer". Does that mean I simply make a file within my mailer folder with the info laid out in the docs? Do I need a separate mailer for Devise or can I have an existing mailer inherit from the Devise mailer? Finally, how do I tell devise to use the sendgrid web api to send emails (instead of the simple smtp method)?

Sorry for the long question, but hopefully others find it useful.

Thanks!

Answer 1

I would create a mailer class to do this

class SendgridWebMailer < ActionMailer::Base
  include Sendgrid

  def initialize
    @client = SendGrid::API.new(api_key: ENV['SENDGRID_API_KEY']).client
  end

  def send_some_email(record, token)
    mail = Mail.new
    // do your mail setup here
    mail = Mail.new
    mail.from = Email.new(email: YOUR_EMAIL_HERE)
    mail.subject = YOUR_SUBJECT

    // I personally use sendgrid templates, but if you would like to use html - 
    content = Content.new(
      type: 'text/html',
      value: ApplicationController.render(
        template: PATH_TO_TEMPLATE,
        layout: nil,
        assigns: IF_NEEDED || {}
      )
    mail.contents = content 

    personalization = Personalization.new
    personalization.to = Email.new(email: EMAIL, name: NAME)
    personalization.subject = SUBJECT

    mail.personalizations = personalization
    @client.mail._('send').post(request_body: mail.to_json)
  end
end

Call it using

SendgridWebMailer.send_some_email(record, token).deliver_later

For Devise

 class MyDeviseMailer < Devise::Mailer
   helper :application # gives access to all helpers defined within `application_helper`.
   include Devise::Controllers::UrlHelpers # Optional. eg. `confirmation_url`

   def reset_password_instructions(record, token, opts={})

      SendgridWebMailer.send_some_email(record, token).deliver_later
   end
end

in config/devise.rb

# Configure the class responsible to send e-mails.
  config.mailer = 'MyDeviseMailer'