How do I configure the hostname for Rails ActionMailer?

Question

I'm working on a fairly traditional forgot password email - I want to email the user a password change token embedded in a link that they can click on in order to change their password. I'm emailing via the traditional ActionMailer.

If I use a normal link_to tag

<%= link_to "click here", :controller => foo, :action => 'bar', :token => token %>

I get a relative link - rather useless from an email.

If I add in

:only_path => false, then it errors saying I need to set default_url_options[:host]. The ActionController docs imply that you do that by overriding the #default_url_options methods in your controller. Surely there's a configuration option to tell Rails what it's hostname is without adding my own config file, parsing it, etc?

+1 for both the question and answer, this is so weird ... why is this setting on action mailer? — Sam Saffron, Aug 19 '09 at 11:53
When sending an email, then there is no HTTP Request to take these values from. — Pascal, May 02 '11 at 05:20

score 37 · Accepted Answer · edited Feb 15 '16 at 14:48

37

default_url_options is available from config.action_mailer and should be set in your environment's configuration file.

For example, in config/environments/production.rb:

config.action_mailer.default_url_options = {
  :host => 'www.yourdomain.com'
}

For local testing, modify config/environments/development.rb:

config.action_mailer.default_url_options = {
  :host => '127.0.0.1',
  :port => 3000
}

Then, assuming you have a named route called forgot_password_login, you can generate the login link URL in your mailer using something like this:

forgot_password_login_url(:token => 'a7s8q15sk2...')

edited Feb 15 '16 at 14:48

Bryan Ash

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answered Apr 28 '09 at 18:58

not you have a "hanging" comma in your default_url_options hash. I would edit it but its a 1 char edit which is verboten on SO. – engineerDave Jun 02 '14 at 15:16
I feel like im losing my mind. This is not working for me – Noah Passalacqua Nov 11 '16 at 21:34

mcr · Answer 2 · 2014-08-22T15:50:36.093

26

You probably want to set :protocol => 'https' as well, btw.

config.action_mailer.default_url_options = { 
    :host => "portal.example.com", 
    :protocol => 'https' 
}

edited Aug 22 '14 at 15:50

answered Mar 14 '11 at 19:20

mcr

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Thanks for the :protocol => 'https' pointer. using 'portal.example.com' does not seem to work properly, at least with Devise mailers. The resulting urls begin with 'https://example.com/' regardless of the subdomain). – Kevin Aug 22 '12 at 03:03

score 4 · Answer 3 · edited Aug 12 '13 at 12:35

4

There is another alternative, as described in http://pivotallabs.com/how-i-leaned-to-stop-hating-and-love-action-mailer/

This solution has the advantage that it doesn't require any configuration (so less of a hassle), and works fine as long as you send emails from within controllers.

But if you plan on sending email without going through a controller (e.g. from command line or in response to another email), you need the static configuration.

edited Aug 12 '13 at 12:35

radex

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answered Apr 22 '10 at 10:45

Michael Reinsch

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That's a good tip, though I'm afraid I need the static configuration. For some reason, I keep running into more and more processing that needs to happen outside of a web hit. – edebill Apr 23 '10 at 16:28
current link. http://pivotallabs.com/how-i-leaned-to-stop-hating-and-love-action-mailer/ – Sudhir Apr 08 '13 at 07:35

score 0 · Answer 4 · edited Oct 01 '12 at 14:58

0

Setting default_url_options directly is deprecated in Rails 3.1. Use url_for instead.

Add parameter :protocol to override default value (http), :protocol => 'https://'. This will create url starting with "https://..." instead of default "http://"

edited Oct 01 '12 at 14:58

Andrei Petrenko

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answered Sep 06 '12 at 07:34

Sameer

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score 0 · Answer 5 · answered Feb 26 '17 at 15:28

Interestingly, I had the same issue as you did, but in unit tests (while following Michael Hartl's railstutorial). I had this line in my test.rb file, but that didn't help:

config.action_mailer.default_url_options = { host: 'example.com', protocol: 'http' }

I've also added another line like this to test.rb, and surprisingly this solved the issue

default_url_options = { host: 'example.com', protocol: 'http' }

score -1 · Answer 6 · answered Jan 19 '12 at 17:36

-1

Setting default_url_options directly is deprecated in Rails 3.1

Use the url_for helper to create it:

<%= link_to "click here", url_for(:controller => foo, :action => 'bar', :token => token, :host => 'www.yourdomain.com') %>

answered Jan 19 '12 at 17:36

Joe

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score -2 · Answer 7 · answered Apr 28 '09 at 18:00

-2

Can you just do

<%="click here", :controller => foo, :action => 'bar', :token => token, :host=>request.host -%>

answered Apr 28 '09 at 18:00

Rob Di Marco

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5

request isn't available from within a mailer – John Douthat Apr 28 '09 at 18:00
Exactly. I could pass it as one of the parameters to the email generation - but we just decided to move this particular email to being sent from our Application Server instead of the web front-end. I think that means I need to make that custom config file that has the URL of the frontend website in it. – edebill Apr 28 '09 at 18:26
doh, missed the mailer part of it – Rob Di Marco Apr 28 '09 at 21:12

How do I configure the hostname for Rails ActionMailer?

7 Answers7

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