README
¶
Hermes
Hermes is the Go port of the great mailgen engine for Node.js. Check their work, it's awesome! It's a package that generates clean, responsive HTML e-mails for sending transactional e-mails (welcome e-mails, reset password e-mails, receipt e-mails and so on), and associated plain text fallback.
Demo
Usage
First install the package:
go get -u github.com/matcornic/hermes
Then, start using the package by importing and configuring it:
// Configure hermes by setting a theme and your product info
h := hermes.Hermes{
// Optional Theme
// Theme: new(Default)
Product: hermes.Product{
// Appears in header & footer of e-mails
Name: "Hermes",
Link: "https://example-hermes.com/",
// Optional product logo
Logo: "http://www.duchess-france.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/gopher.png",
},
}
Next, generate an e-mail using the following code:
email := hermes.Email{
Body: hermes.Body{
Name: "Jon Snow",
Intros: []string{
"Welcome to Hermes! We're very excited to have you on board.",
},
Actions: []hermes.Action{
{
Instructions: "To get started with Hermes, please click here:",
Button: hermes.Button{
Color: "#22BC66", // Optional action button color
Text: "Confirm your account",
Link: "https://hermes-example.com/confirm?token=d9729feb74992cc3482b350163a1a010",
},
},
},
Outros: []string{
"Need help, or have questions? Just reply to this email, we'd love to help.",
},
},
}
// Generate an HTML email with the provided contents (for modern clients)
emailBody, err := h.GenerateHTML(email)
if err != nil {
panic(err) // Tip: Handle error with something else than a panic ;)
}
// Generate the plaintext version of the e-mail (for clients that do not support xHTML)
emailText, err := h.GeneratePlainText(email)
if err != nil {
panic(err) // Tip: Handle error with something else than a panic ;)
}
// Optionally, preview the generated HTML e-mail by writing it to a local file
err = ioutil.WriteFile("preview.html", []byte(emailBody), 0644)
if err != nil {
panic(err) // Tip: Handle error with something else than a panic ;)
}
This code would output the following HTML template:

And the following plain text:
------------
Hi Jon Snow,
------------
Welcome to Hermes! We're very excited to have you on board.
To get started with Hermes, please click here: https://hermes-example.com/confirm?token=d9729feb74992cc3482b350163a1a010
Need help, or have questions? Just reply to this email, we'd love to help.
Yours truly,
Hermes - https://example-hermes.com/
Copyright © 2017 Hermes. All rights reserved.
Theme templates will be embedded in your application binary. If you want to use external templates (for configuration), use your own theme by implementing
hermes.Theme
interface with code searching for your files.
More Examples
To run the examples, go to examples
folder, then run go run *.go
. HTML and Plaintext example should be created in given theme folders.
Plaintext E-mails
To generate a plaintext version of the e-mail, simply call GeneratePlainText
function:
// Generate plaintext email using hermes
emailText, err := h.GeneratePlainText(email)
if err != nil {
panic(err) // Tip: Handle error with something else than a panic ;)
}
Supported Themes
The following open-source themes are bundled with this package:
default
by Postmark Transactional Email Templates
flat
, slightly modified from Postmark Transactional Email Templates
RTL Support
To change the default text direction (left-to-right), simply override it as follows:
// Configure hermes by setting a theme and your product info
h := hermes.Hermes {
// Custom text direction
TextDirection: hermes.TDRightToLeft,
}
Language Customizations
To customize the e-mail's greeting ("Hi") or signature ("Yours truly"), supply custom strings within the e-mail's Body
:
email := hermes.Email{
Body: hermes.Body{
Greeting: "Dear",
Signature: "Sincerely",
},
}
To use a custom title string rather than a greeting/name introduction, provide it instead of Name
:
email := hermes.Email{
Body: hermes.Body{
// Title will override `Name`
Title: "Welcome to Hermes",
},
}
To customize the Copyright
, override it when initializing Hermes
within your Product
as follows:
// Configure hermes by setting a theme and your product info
h := hermes.Hermes{
// Optional Theme
// Theme: new(Default)
Product: hermes.Product{
// Appears in header & footer of e-mails
Name: "Hermes",
Link: "https://example-hermes.com/",
// Custom copyright notice
Copyright: "Copyright © 2017 Dharma Initiative. All rights reserved."
},
}
To use a custom fallback text at the end of the email, change the TroubleText
field of the hermes.Product
struct. The default value is If you’re having trouble with the button '{ACTION}', copy and paste the URL below into your web browser.
. The {ACTION}
placeholder will be replaced with the corresponding text of the supplied action button:
// Configure hermes by setting a theme and your product info
h := hermes.Hermes{
// Optional Theme
// Theme: new(Default)
Product: hermes.Product{
// Custom trouble text
TroubleText: "If the {ACTION}-button is not working for you, just copy and paste the URL below into your web browser."
},
}
Elements
Hermes supports injecting custom elements such as dictionaries, tables and action buttons into e-mails.
Action
To inject an action button in to the e-mail, supply the Actions
object as follows:
email := hermes.Email{
Body: hermes.Body{
Actions: []hermes.Action{
{
Instructions: "To get started with Hermes, please click here:",
Button: hermes.Button{
Color: "#22BC66", // Optional action button color
Text: "Confirm your account",
Link: "https://hermes-example.com/confirm?token=d9729feb74992cc3482b350163a1a010",
},
},
},
},
}
To inject multiple action buttons in to the e-mail, supply another struct in Actions slice Action
.
Table
To inject a table into the e-mail, supply the Table
object as follows:
email := hermes.Email{
Body: hermes.Body{
Table: hermes.Table{
Data: [][]hermes.Entry{
// List of rows
{
// Key is the column name, Value is the cell value
// First object defines what columns will be displayed
{Key: "Item", Value: "Golang"},
{Key: "Description", Value: "Open source programming language that makes it easy to build simple, reliable, and efficient software"},
{Key: "Price", Value: "$10.99"},
},
{
{Key: "Item", Value: "Hermes"},
{Key: "Description", Value: "Programmatically create beautiful e-mails using Golang."},
{Key: "Price", Value: "$1.99"},
},
},
Columns: hermes.Columns{
// Custom style for each rows
CustomWidth: map[string]string{
"Item": "20%",
"Price": "15%",
},
CustomAlignment: map[string]string{
"Price": "right",
},
},
},
},
}
Dictionary
To inject key-value pairs of data into the e-mail, supply the Dictionary
object as follows:
email := hermes.Email{
Body: hermes.Body{
Dictionary: []hermes.Entry{
{Key: "Date", Value: "20 November 1887"},
{Key: "Address", Value: "221B Baker Street, London"},
},
},
}
Free Markdown
If you need more flexibility in the content of your generated e-mail, while keeping the same format than any other e-mail, use Markdown content. Supply the FreeMarkdown
object as follows:
email := hermes.Email{
Body: hermes.Body{
FreeMarkdown: `
> _Hermes_ service will shutdown the **1st August 2017** for maintenance operations.
Services will be unavailable based on the following schedule:
| Services | Downtime |
| :------:| :-----------: |
| Service A | 2AM to 3AM |
| Service B | 4AM to 5AM |
| Service C | 5AM to 6AM |
---
Feel free to contact us for any question regarding this matter at [support@hermes-example.com](mailto:support@hermes-example.com) or in our [Gitter](https://gitter.im/)
`,
},
}
}
This code would output the following HTML template:

And the following plaintext:
------------
Hi Jon Snow,
------------
>
>
>
> Hermes service will shutdown the *1st August 2017* for maintenance
> operations.
>
>
Services will be unavailable based on the following schedule:
+-----------+------------+
| SERVICES | DOWNTIME |
+-----------+------------+
| Service A | 2AM to 3AM |
| Service B | 4AM to 5AM |
| Service C | 5AM to 6AM |
+-----------+------------+
Feel free to contact us for any question regarding this matter at support@hermes-example.com ( support@hermes-example.com ) or in our Gitter ( https://gitter.im/ )
Yours truly,
Hermes - https://example-hermes.com/
Copyright © 2017 Hermes. All rights reserved.
Be aware that this content will replace existing tables, dictionary and actions. Only intros, outros, header and footer will be kept.
This is helpful when your application needs sending e-mails, wrote on-the-fly by adminstrators.
Markdown is rendered with Blackfriday, so every thing Blackfriday can do, Hermes can do it as well.
Troubleshooting
- After sending multiple e-mails to the same Gmail / Inbox address, they become grouped and truncated since they contain similar text, breaking the responsive e-mail layout.
Simply sending the
X-Entity-Ref-ID
header with your e-mails will prevent grouping / truncation.
Contributing
See CONTRIBUTING.md
License
Apache 2.0
Documentation
¶
Index ¶
Constants ¶
This section is empty.
Variables ¶
This section is empty.
Functions ¶
This section is empty.
Types ¶
type Body ¶
type Body struct { Name string // The name of the contacted person Intros []string // Intro sentences, first displayed in the email Dictionary []Entry // A list of key+value (useful for displaying parameters/settings/personal info) Table Table // Table is an table where you can put data (pricing grid, a bill, and so on) Actions []Action // Actions are a list of actions that the user will be able to execute via a button click Outros []string // Outro sentences, last displayed in the email Greeting string // Greeting for the contacted person (default to 'Hi') Signature string // Signature for the contacted person (default to 'Yours truly') Title string // Title replaces the greeting+name when set FreeMarkdown Markdown // Free markdown content that replaces all content other than header and footer }
Body is the body of the email, containing all interesting data
type Default ¶
type Default struct{}
Default is the theme by default
func (*Default) HTMLTemplate ¶
HTMLTemplate returns a Golang template that will generate an HTML email.
func (*Default) PlainTextTemplate ¶
PlainTextTemplate returns a Golang template that will generate an plain text email.
type Entry ¶
Entry is a simple entry of a map Allows using a slice of entries instead of a map Because Golang maps are not ordered
type Flat ¶
type Flat struct{}
Flat is a theme
func (*Flat) HTMLTemplate ¶
HTMLTemplate returns a Golang template that will generate an HTML email.
func (*Flat) PlainTextTemplate ¶
PlainTextTemplate returns a Golang template that will generate an plain text email.
type Hermes ¶
type Hermes struct { Theme Theme TextDirection TextDirection Product Product }
Hermes is an instance of the hermes email generator
func (*Hermes) GenerateHTML ¶
GenerateHTML generates the email body from data to an HTML Reader This is for modern email clients
type Markdown ¶
Markdown is a HTML template (a string) representing Markdown content https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Markdown
type Product ¶
type Product struct { Name string Link string // e.g. https://matcornic.github.io Logo string // e.g. https://matcornic.github.io/img/logo.png Copyright string // Copyright © 2017 Hermes. All rights reserved. TroubleText string // TroubleText is the sentence at the end of the email for users having trouble with the button (default to `If you’re having trouble with the button '{ACTION}', copy and paste the URL below into your web browser.`) }
Product represents your company product (brand) Appears in header & footer of e-mails
type Table ¶
type Table struct { Data [][]Entry // Contains data Columns Columns // Contains meta-data for display purpose (width, alignement) }
Table is an table where you can put data (pricing grid, a bill, and so on)
type Template ¶
Template is the struct given to Golang templating Root object in a template is this struct
type TextDirection ¶
type TextDirection string
TextDirection of the text in HTML email
const TDLeftToRight TextDirection = "ltr"
TDLeftToRight is the text direction from left to right (default)
const TDRightToLeft TextDirection = "rtl"
TDRightToLeft is the text direction from right to left