Introduction

Magento is widely recognized as a robust e-commerce platform celebrated for its flexibility and scalability. Its comprehensive email capabilities are crucial for effective customer communication and marketing strategies. Email plays a pivotal role in e-commerce by fostering customer relationships, driving sales through promotional messages, and delivering essential transactional notifications. Magento’s email system offers built-in features for various types of communications, including order confirmations and shipment notifications. Additionally, businesses can customize email templates to align with their brand identity, ensuring consistent and impactful messaging across customer interactions.

Agenda

• Discovering Magento Email

Email Templates

Location of email templates in the Magento directory:

• Email templates are stored in the <module_dir>/view/<area>/email

• How to create new email template by admin panel:

  • Example Create “New New Account” email template to override Magento’s default

    • Create new template using admin panel

    • Select “New Account” on Load Default Template / Template

    • Set Template Name value is “New New Account”

    • Modifie Template Content:

      

    • Navigate to Stores > Configuration:

      • On the Configuration page, expand the General tab on the left, select Customer Configuration, on the right select Create New Account Options > Default Welcome Email change value to “New New Account”

        

• How to create new email template by code:

  • Defining email templates in email_templates.xml:

    • email_templates.xml is used to define email templates and their metadata.

  • Create the corresponding template file in app/code/Vendor/Module/view/frontend/email

  • Example:

    • create fileemail_templates.xml:
      

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      <?xml version="1.0"?> <config xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance" xsi:noNamespaceSchemaLocation="urn:magento:framework:Config/etc/email_templates.xsd"> <template id="order_confirmation" label="Order Confirmation Email" file="order_confirmation.html" type="html" module="Boolfly_CustomEmail" area="frontend"/> </config>

    • create fileapp/code/Vendor/Module/view/frontend/email/order_confirmation.html:

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      <!--@subject {{trans "You have added product to cart successful"}} @-->
      {{template config_path="design/email/header_template"}}
      <p>Dear {{var customer_name}},</p>
      <p>{{trans "Thank you for your order from %store_name." store_name=$store.frontend_name}}</p>
      <p>Best regards,</p>
      <p>Boolfly - Digital Commerce</p>
      {{template config_path="design/email/footer_template"}}

  • How Magento loads the specified email template file:

    • Magento\Framework\Mail\Template\TransportBuilder is a class in Magento 2 used to build and send email messages based on templates. This class is part of the Magento\Framework\Mail\Template namespace and is responsible for configuring and preparing emails to be sent, including setting the template, variables, recipients, and other email headers.

    • Using getTransport()->sendMessage() to send the email.

      • Example of creating and sending email templates:

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        protected function sendEmail($product)
        {
            try {
                $store = $this->storeManager->getStore();
        
                $transport = $this->transportBuilder
                    ->setTemplateIdentifier('example_email_template')
                    ->setTemplateOptions(
                        [
                            'area' => Area::AREA_FRONTEND,
                            'store' => 2
                        ]
                    )
                    ->setTemplateVars(['product_name' => $product->getName(), 'product_sku' => $product->getSku()])
                    ->setFromByScope('general', $store->getId())
                    ->addTo('example@gmail.com', 'Name')
                    ->getTransport();
        
                $this->emulation->startEnvironmentEmulation($store->getId(), Area::AREA_FRONTEND);
                $transport->sendMessage();
                $this->emulation->stopEnvironmentEmulation();
            } catch (\Exception $e) {
                $this->logger->error($e->getMessage());
            }
        }

        • setTemplateIdentifier: specifies the email template to use.

        • setTemplateOptions: sets the template options, including the area and the store ID.

          • “area”: This specifies the application area where the template will be used. By specifying the ‘area‘ as Area::AREA_FRONTEND, the email template is rendered with the same context and settings as the frontend area.

          • “store”: Specifying the “store” ensures that the template has access to the correct store’s settings, configurations, and variables. This is essential for multi-store setups where different stores might have different configurations and customizations.

        • setTemplateVars: sets the variables to be used in the email template.

        • setFromByScope: sets the sender’s email scope.

        • addTo: adds the recipient’s email and name.

        • getTransport: returns the transport object to send the email.

    • Environment Emulation: is used in Magento to emulate a specific store’s environment. This means it temporarily changes the current store context to the specified store, allowing you to execute code as if it were running within that store’s context. This is particularly useful when sending emails or generating content that is store-specific.

      The typical usage of environment emulation involves three steps:

      1. Starting the Emulation: startEnvironmentEmulation is called with the store ID and the area (e.g., frontend, adminhtml).

      2. Performing Actions: Actions that require the specific store context (e.g., sending an email, generating a PDF) are performed.

      3. Stopping the Emulation: stopEnvironmentEmulation is called to revert back to the original store context.

         Example:
         

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         $storeId = $this->storeManager->getStore()->getId(); // The $storeId is default store id $this->emulation->startEnvironmentEmulation(2); ... $storeId = $this->storeManager->getStore()->getId(); // $storeId is 2 ... $this->emulation->stopEnvironmentEmulation(); $storeId = $this->storeManager->getStore()->getId(); // The $storeId is default store id
         
         

  • In the example above we can see many syntaxes such as: {{template config_path=””}} {{var …}} {{trans …}}. So how can Magento handle it?

    • The interface vendor/magento/framework/Filter/DirectiveProcessorInterface.php will answer this question. There are some Directive classes which implements DirectiveProcessorInterface. You can find them under vendor/magento/framework/Filter/DirectiveProcessor

      

  • We can customize a directive, example: create a directive to handle “if not”

    • Create di.xml file to define “if not” directive

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      <?xml version="1.0"?>
      <config xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance" xsi:noNamespaceSchemaLocation="urn:magento:framework:ObjectManager/etc/config.xsd">
          <type name="Magento\Framework\Filter\Template">
              <arguments>
                  <argument name="directiveProcessors" xsi:type="array">
                      <item name="ifnot" xsi:type="object">Vendor_Name\Module_Name\Plugin\IfNotDirectiveProcessor</item>
                  </argument>
              </arguments>
          </type>
      </config>

    • Create class IfNotDirectiveProcessor for handle “if not”

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      <?php
      
      namespace Vendor\Module\Plugin;
      
      use Magento\Framework\Filter\DirectiveProcessorInterface;
      use Magento\Framework\Filter\Template;
      use Magento\Framework\Filter\VariableResolverInterface;
      
      class IfNotDirectiveProcessor implements DirectiveProcessorInterface
      {
          public const CONSTRUCTION_IF_NOT_PATTERN = '/{{ifnot\s*(.*?)}}(.*?){{\\/ifnot\s*}}/si';
          
          private VariableResolverInterface $variableResolver;
      
          public function __construct(VariableResolverInterface $variableResolver)
          {
              $this->variableResolver = $variableResolver;
          }
      
          /**
           * @inheritDoc
           */
          public function process(array $construction, Template $filter, array $templateVariables): string
          {
              if (empty($templateVariables)) {
                  return $construction[0];
              }
      
              if ($this->variableResolver->resolve($construction[1], $filter, $templateVariables) == '') {
                  return $construction[2];
              }  
              
              return '';
          }
      
          /**
           * @inheritdoc
           */
          public function getRegularExpression(): string
          {
              return self::CONSTRUCTION_IF_NOT_PATTERN;
          }
      }

    • To use this directive we use the syntax {{ifnot ...}} ... {{/ifnot}}

    • Example:

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      <!--@subject {{trans "Out of stock"}} @-->
      <p>{{trans "Dear"}} Admin,</p>
      <p>{{trans "Product"}} <strong>{{var product_name}}</strong> (SKU: {{var sku}}) {{trans "is out of stock"}}</p>
      <p>{{trans "Regards"}},</p>
      <p>{{ifnot var_not_exist}}
              This content will be shown if 'var_not_exist' is not set or is false.
          {{/ifnot}}</p>
      <p>Boolfly</p> 

      

Email Queues

• Managing email queues for large-scale email sending: In Magento, by default, there is support for asynchronous email sending for “Sale Order” emails to help handle large volumes of emails to increase performance, essentially just using Cronjob to handle email sending.

  • Order in magento use two attributes “email_sent” and “send_email” included with the sales_order table to check and send emails when this config is enabled. To process the “email queue” Magento sends off emails to entities where the email_sent value is null. The maximum number of emails per send is the value of “sales_email/general/sending_limit” config.

  • To configure the Email Queue in Magento 2, follow these steps:

    1. Log in to your Magento 2 Admin Panel.

    2. Go to Stores > Configuration.

    3. Under Configuration, select Sales > Sales Emails.

    4. Expand the General Settings section, and you’ll find the “Asynchronous sending” option.

    5. Configure Settings: Enable the “Asynchronous sending” option, and you can adjust the other settings as needed.