I’ve been using the OpenPOP library to connect a POP3 email client to Gmail, and everything was running smoothly until recently. Now, I’m facing some issues with how attachments are being handled.
EmailClient myPopClient = new EmailClient("pop.gmail.com", 995, "[email protected]", "mypassword", LoginMethod.USERPASS, true);
int messageCount = myPopClient.GetTotalMessages();
for (int index = 0; index < messageCount; index++)
{
EmailMessage currentEmail = myPopClient.RetrieveMessage(index + 1, true);
Console.WriteLine(currentEmail.Subject);
if (currentEmail.HasAttachments)
{
EmailAttachment currentAttachment = currentEmail.GetFirstAttachment();
// Here’s the problem - the attachment flag is true, but no attachments are available
currentEmail.SaveToAttachment(currentAttachment, currentAttachment.FileName);
}
}
myPopClient.Disconnect();
I’m able to fetch emails and read their subjects without any trouble. But it’s strange that for emails with attachments, the HasAttachments property is true while the actual collection is empty or unresponsive. Has anyone else been having similar problems accessing attachments via Gmail POP3 lately? Is it possible that these issues are linked to recent updates in Gmail’s security?
This attachment bug drove me nuts for weeks while building an automated invoice processor. It’s usually malformed MIME boundaries in forwarded messages - Gmail’s POP3 server shows them but OpenPOP can’t parse them properly. Check the raw message headers first to catch problem emails before processing. Wrap your attachment handling in a try-catch and log the message ID when it breaks. You’ll likely spot a pattern with certain senders or message types. Double-check your Gmail settings too - some security configs strip or mess with attachments during POP3 retrieval, so they show up in headers but the content’s gone.
Yeah, I’ve hit this bug before. Check currentEmail.Attachments.Count before calling GetFirstAttachment(). Sometimes attachment parsing fails but HasAttachments still says true. Also update to the latest OpenPOP version - older ones break with Gmail’s encoding changes from last year.
Been there way too many times. OpenPOP and Gmail’s POP3 hate each other, especially with messy MIME structures.
Stop fighting the library bugs and Gmail’s weird POP3 quirks. I ditched all that and automated the whole thing instead. Now I hit Gmail’s API directly through an automation platform that actually handles attachments right.
Just set up a workflow to watch your inbox, pull attachments through the API (not POP3), and process however you want. No more fake attachment flags or broken parsing. Gmail’s API actually works unlike their POP3.
Saved me weeks of OpenPOP debugging hell. Better error handling too, plus easy to add stuff like filtering by file type or size.
Had the same issue six months back during an email migration. Gmail’s gotten pickier about multipart messages lately. Your code assumes GetFirstAttachment() always works when HasAttachments is true - that’s not reliable. Loop through the attachment collection instead. Sometimes Gmail reports attachments that are actually inline content or broken MIME parts OpenPOP can’t handle. I started checking ContentType and Size before saving anything - filters out the junk. Gmail’s also been messing with how POP3 handles certain attachments, especially embedded images and HTML stuff. That’s probably why it started acting up recently.
Classic MIME parsing issue - I’ve hit this with corporate Gmail accounts before. OpenPOP struggles with certain attachment encodings, especially when Gmail forwards messages or handles mixed content types. Catch exceptions around SaveToAttachment - that method fails silently in some versions when attachment data gets corrupted or only partially loads. Also check if you’re hitting Gmail’s POP3 rate limits during bulk ops. When Gmail throttles you, it sometimes sends incomplete message data with broken attachment streams. I started downloading headers first, then only fetching full messages for emails that actually need processing. Way fewer headaches with phantom attachments.