python reading YAML, stdout, and sending an email

this article includes:

• using YAML library in Python3,
• reading YAML file in Python by using load() method from yaml module,
• redirecting the Python output to a file,
• sending that file to Google Mail.

let's start by writing YAML fomartted file:

fruits.yaml
mangos: 10
tomotos: 30
strawberrys: 12
apples: 20

after that, I must install YAML library in Python:

$ pip install pyyaml

let's now try to read the data file by using a Python script. The load() method from the yaml module can be used to read YAML files.

i specified yaml.FullLoader is the value for the Loader parameter, which loads the full YAML language, avoiding arbitrary code execution.

and define Logger class to redirect stout to a file (using sys module):

process_yaml.py
import yaml, sys
with open(r'fruits.yaml') as file:

# The FullLoader parameter handles the conversion from YAML
# scalar values to Python the dictionary format

fruits_list = yaml.load(file, Loader=yaml.FullLoader)

# Redirect stdout to a file
class Logger(object):
def __init__(self, filename="Default.log"):
self.terminal = sys.stdout
self.log = open(filename, "a")

def write(self, message):
self.terminal.write(message)
self.log.write(message)

def flush(self):
pass

sys.stdout = Logger("log.txt")
sys.stdout.flush()

# Print the result
print(fruits_list, flush=True)

sending_email.py with an attachment using smtplib module:

import smtplib
from email.mime.text import MIMEText
from email.mime.multipart import MIMEMultipart
from email.mime.base import MIMEBase
from email import encoders
import os.path

email = 'freecodecamp@gmail.com'
password = 'xdncndumcnsbabcd'
send_to_email = 'codeacademy@gmail.com'
subject = 'Sending Email with an attachment'
message = 'Please find the attachment to email, thanks'
file_location = 'log.txt'

msg = MIMEMultipart()
msg['From'] = email
msg['To'] = send_to_email
msg['Subject'] = subject

msg.attach(MIMEText(message, 'plain'))

# Setup the attachment
filename = os.path.basename(file_location)
attachment = open(file_location, "rb")
part = MIMEBase('application', 'octet-stream')
part.set_payload(attachment.read())
encoders.encode_base64(part)
part.add_header('Content-Disposition', "attachment; filename= %s" % filename)

# Attach the attachment to the MIMEMultipart object
msg.attach(part)

server = smtplib.SMTP('smtp.gmail.com', 587)
server.starttls()
server.login(email, password)
text = msg.as_string()
server.sendmail(email, send_to_email, text)
server.quit()

smtplib library defines a Simple Mail Transfer Protocol (SMTP) client session object that can be used to send mail to any Internet machine with an SMTP or ESMTP listener daemon.

since May 30, 2022, ​​the less secure app access setting has been unavailable for Gmail. So, you may get an error message:

> python3 sending_email.py                                                                                                                            
smtplib.SMTPAuthenticationError: (534, b'5.7.9 Application-specific password required. Learn more at\n5.7.9  https://support.google.com/mail/?p=InvalidSecondFactor b64-20020a621b43000000b0056c3a0dc65fsm3758432pfb.71 - gsmtp')

setup an App Password to fix it.

• go to your Goolge Account, Security, and turn on 2 Steps Verification.
• in Security section, setup an App Password as below:

it generates a random password. Then, I can use such a password to send emails in Python.

now, I have a Gmail test account and can send emails using Python!

python3 sending_email.py