WCF Service fails to send mail through MailDefinition

Question

    // stuff......

    return SendCreationMail(Membership.GetUser((Guid)request.UserEntityId), request, new Control());
}

private const string TemplateRoot = "~/app_shared/templates/mail/";
private const string ServerRoot = TemplateRoot + "server/";

public static bool SendCreationMail(MembershipUser user, IServerAccountRequest request, Control owner)
{
    var definition = new MailDefinition { BodyFileName = string.Concat(ServerRoot, "creation.htm"), IsBodyHtml = true };
    var subject = "New {0} account created!".FormatWith(request.ServerApplicationContract.Id);

    var data = ExtendedData(DefaultData, subject, user);

    data.Add("<%ServerApplication%>", request.ServerApplicationContract.Id);
    data.Add("<%ServerApplicationName%>", request.ServerApplicationContract.ApplicationName);
    data.Add("<%AccountUsername%>", request.AccountUsername);

    data.Add("<%ServerInfo%>", "/server/{0}/info".FormatWith(request.ServerApplicationContract.Id.ToLower()));

    return definition.CreateMailMessage(user.Email, data, owner).Send(subject, ApplicationConfiguration.MailSenderDisplayName);
}

I get:

Value cannot be null. Parameter name: basepath

at System.Web.Util.UrlPath.Combine(String appPath, String basepath, String relative)
at System.Web.UI.WebControls.MailDefinition.CreateMailMessage(String recipients, IDictionary replacements, Control owner)
at Damnation.Website.Main.Common.MailTemplating.Server.SendCreationMail(MembershipUser user, IServerAccountRequest request, Control owner)
at Damnation.Website.Main.Common.MailTemplating.Server.SendCreationMail(IServerAccountRequest request)
at Damnation.Website.Main.Business.Model.ServerAccountRequest.UpdateRequestsAfterServerProcessing(IEnumerable`1 results)

Thing is I don't have an actual Control to pass to it, I'd like to know how to setup a control that avoids this senseless exception. I'm using a relative path... so this makes no sense.

The application that has the service is under ASP.NET WebForms .NET 4. The consumer application is a console application also under .NET 4

score 4 · Accepted Answer · edited Oct 06 '11 at 19:18

I had the same problem, and I learned that this is happening because it cannot find the path of the control when trying to execute your definition.CreateMailMessage. You want to create a blank web user control. Maybe this is not the most elegant solution but it does the work.

This is what I did:

1) Add a Web User Control file in your project, for example Test.ascx.

2) In your .svc file add the following code:

Page page = new Page();

Test test = (Test)page.LoadControl("Test.ascx");

3) Update your definition.CreateMailMessage line to:

return definition.CreateMailMessage(user.Email, data, test).Send(subject, ApplicationConfiguration.MailSenderDisplayName);

You will no longer get the basepath null exception.

I'm getting an exception on the `LoadControl` call: "relative virtual path is not allowed here". This is a console application in .Net 4.5.2 on VS 2015 Community. — Austin Mullins, Sep 12 '15 at 04:14

score 0 · Answer 2 · answered Jun 19 '15 at 16:51

0

I had the same problem but it was because I was on a project .NET console application, when I passed the code to ASP.NET not I run well without creating Page and Test.

answered Jun 19 '15 at 16:51

Cesar Alvarado Diaz

751
7
10

score 0 · Answer 3 · answered May 31 '19 at 16:13

0

I had the same error but the problem for me was that I was using relative paths for my BodyFileName and EmbeddedObjects. Changing them to absolute paths fixed this error for me.

answered May 31 '19 at 16:13

David Andrew Thorpe

838
1
9
23

WCF Service fails to send mail through MailDefinition

3 Answers3

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