Mandrill ignores line breaks (\n)

Question

Using the send-template method and the Lutung Mandrill Java API implementation, when a template variable contains line breaks of the form \n, they are totally ignored or stripped on generated emails. The Strings containing \n characters are kept untouched untill the GET send-template method is executed. So I guess there is some String analysis and conversion on Mandrill servers which removes special characters.

How can I make work again line breaks on Mandrill emails?

Answer 1

In my case I am using Handlebars for mandrill templates and I have solved this by sending HTML to the template <br/> instead of \n by replacing \n in my string with <br/> something like: .Description.Replace("\n", "<br/>");

And then on the mandrill template I put the variable inside {{{ variable }}} instead of {{ variable }}

http://blog.mandrill.com/handlebars-for-templates-and-dynamic-content.html

HTML escaping

Handlebars HTML-escapes values returned by an {{expression}}. If you don't want Handlebars to escape a value, use the "triple-stash", "{{{.

In your template:

<div> {{{html_tag_content}}} </div> In your API request:

   "global_merge_vars": [   {
      "name": "html_tag_content",
      "content": "This example<br>is all about<br>the magical world of handlebars"   } ]

The result:

This example
is all about
the magical world of handlebars

Answer 2

If you want to send more complex content, be it html, or variables with break lines and whatnot, you can first render the template and then send the message, instead of directly using send-template.

Render the template with a call to templates.render:

{
    "key": "example key",
    "template_name": "Example Template",
    "template_content": [
        {
            "name": "editable",
            "content": "<div>content to inject *|MERGE1|*</div>"
        }
    ],
    "merge_vars": [
        {
            "name": "merge1",
            "content": "merge1 content\n contains line breaks"
        }
    ]
}

Save the result to a variable rendered_content.

Send the message using the rendered template with messages.send:

{
    "message": {
        "html": rendered_content,
        ...
    ...
}