AttributeError: 'file' object has no attribute 'encode'

Question

Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "E:\blahblahblah\emailsend.py", line 26, in <module>
    msg.attach(MIMEText(file))
  File "E:\blahblahblah\Python 2.7.11\lib\email\mime\text.py", line 30, in __init__
    self.set_payload(_text, _charset)
  File "E:\blahblahblah\Python 2.7.11\lib\email\message.py", line 226, in set_payload
    self.set_charset(charset)
  File "E:\blahblahblah\Python 2.7.11\lib\email\message.py", line 268, in set_charset
    cte(self)
  File "E:\blahblahblah\Python 2.7.11\lib\email\encoders.py", line 73, in encode_7or8bit
    orig.encode('ascii')
AttributeError: 'file' object has no attribute 'encode'https://stackoverflow.com/questions/ask#

I've been looking this up a lot but I haven't found an answer.

The only important parts of the code is this:

file = open('newfile.txt')

msg.attach(MIMEText(file))

There are other parts but I've debugged it and I get the error at the 'msg.attach(MIMEText(file))' line.

Any help?

@IgnacioVazquez-Abrams I thought the open() would convert it to a string inside the variable. — Chickenator
– Chickenator, Commented Jun 15, 2016 at 18:07
open() returns a file object. docs.python.org/2/library/functions.html#open. In python 2 another name for open() is file(), which is why you should not have a variable named file. — cdarke
– cdarke, Commented Jun 15, 2016 at 18:08
@cdarke thank you for the link. I am relatively new to Python so I assumed it would open a .txt as a string. — Chickenator
– Chickenator, Commented Jun 15, 2016 at 18:10

kindall · Accepted Answer · 2016-06-15 18:24:30Z

4

MIMEText takes the content of the file, not the file object.

msg.attach(MIMEText(open("newfile.txt").read()))

edited Jun 15, 2016 at 18:24

answered Jun 15, 2016 at 18:07

kindall

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1 Comment

Chickenator Over a year ago

thanks it worked. You are missing another closing bracket though. It should be: msg.attach(MIMEText(open("newfile.txt").read()))

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