smartmail/readme.plan.md

Improvement Plan for SmartMail

Current Code Analysis

Core Components

• EmailAddressValidator: Validates email addresses checking for validity, whether they are disposable or free

  • Uses MX record checks to validate domains
  • Has a domain map from external source that classifies domains as 'disposable' or 'freemail'
  • Has placeholder 'reason' field in results that's not implemented ("todo")
  • Fetches domain list from GitHub or falls back to local copy
  • No validation of email format before DNS checks

• Smartmail: Email representation class

  • Basic email structure with from, subject, body
  • Supports file attachments via smartfile
  • Uses mustache templates for subject and body
  • Lacks recipient handling (to, cc, bcc)
  • No method to send emails
  • No HTML body support

Dependencies

• Uses several @push.rocks packages:
  • smartdns: For DNS lookups
  • smartfile: For file handling/attachments
  • smartmustache: For template processing
  • smartpath: For path operations
  • smartrequest: For HTTP requests

Testing

• Basic tests for EmailAddressValidator
  • Tests validation of regular, free, and disposable emails
  • No tests for invalid email formats or edge cases
• Minimal test for Smartmail creation
  • No tests for attachments, templates, or other features

Enhanced Improvement Plan

1. Complete the EmailAddressValidator implementation

   • Implement proper reason messages for validation results
   • Add email format validation before DNS checks (RFC 5322 compliance)
   • Add local part validation (check for illegal characters, proper format)
   • Improve domain validation (check syntax before DNS lookup)
   • Add email normalization (handle case sensitivity, plus addressing)
   • Implement caching mechanism for DNS lookups to improve performance
   • Add option to disable online domain list fetching

2. Enhance the Smartmail class

   • Add support for multiple recipients (to, cc, bcc arrays)
   • Add email preparing capabilities via MIME format
   • Support HTML email bodies with plain text fallback
   • Add reply-to and headers support
   • Implement method to convert to standard email formats (MIME)
   • Add email priority and importance flags
   • Add validation of email addresses used in from/to/cc/bcc

3. Improve testing

   • Add tests for email format validation (valid/invalid formats)
   • Test domain validation edge cases (non-existent domains, etc.)
   • Add tests for attachment handling
   • Test template processing with different data structures
   • Add tests for HTML emails and conversion
   • Test recipient handling with multiple addresses

4. Performance & security improvements

   • Optimize domain list handling
   • Implement intelligent caching strategy for validation results
   • Add configuration options for external service calls
   • Ensure secure handling of email data and attachments

5. Documentation improvements

   • Update README with comprehensive examples
   • Add detailed API documentation with JSDoc
   • Document all configuration options
   • Add usage examples for common scenarios
   • Document security considerations
   • Add TypeScript type documentation

6. Advanced features

   • DKIM/SPF validation support
   • Implement email address suggestions for typos
   • Add disposable email detection improvements
   • Support for internationalized email addresses (IDN)
   • Email address reputation checking
   • Add email deliverability scoring
   • Implement bounce address validation

7. Code quality

   • Add more TypeScript interfaces for clearer API definitions
   • Improve error handling with specific error types
   • Add configuration options via constructor
   • Make domain list updates configurable
   • Improve code organization with better separation of concerns