How to store attachment file in an email in a database?

Question

I used this code to store attachment xlsx files from a specific address email in Outlook, but now I would like to store these files in a database in SQL Server, not in a folder in my laptop? Do you have any idea about how to store these files directly in a database? Many thanks.

outputDir = r"C:\Users\CMhalla\Desktop\Hellmann_attachment"
i=0
for m in messages:
    if m.SenderEmailAddress == '[email protected]':
       body_content=m.Body
       for attachment in m.Attachments:
           i=i+1
           attachment.SaveAsFile(os.path.join(outputDir,attachment.FileName + str(i)+'.xlsx'))

Answer 1

The Oultook object model doesn't provide any property or method for saving attachments to DBs directly. You need to save the file on the disk first and then add it to the Db in any convenient way.

However, you may be interested in reading the bytes array of the attached item in Outlook. In that case you may write the byte array directly to the Db without touching the file system which may slow down the overall performance. The PR_ATTACH_DATA_BIN property contains binary attachment data typically accessed through the Object Linking and Embedding (OLE) IStream interface. This property holds the attachment when the value of the PR_ATTACH_METHOD property is ATTACH_BY_VALUE, which is the usual attachment method and the only one required to be supported.

The Outlook object model cannot retrieve large binary or string MAPI properties using PropertyAccessor.GetProperty. On the low level (Extended MAPI) the IMAPIProp::GetProps() method does not work for the large PT_STING8 / PT_UNICODE / PT_BINARY properties. They must be opened as IStream in the following way - IMAPIProp::OpenProperty(PR_ATTACH_DATA_BIN, IIS_IStream, ...). See PropertyAccessor.GetProperty( PR_ATTACH_DATA_BIN) fails for outlook attachment for more information.