Send emails using cronjob in Magento

Hi All !! While working on one of my project client ask me to create a cronjob which send emails to customers. Firstly, I thought it might be difficult but it was so easy. In this post we will learn it. Suppose package name is 'MyPackage' and module name is 'MyModule. MyModule is in local directory.

Following are the files on which we have to work:

1) app/code/local/MyPackage/MyModule/etc/config.xml
2) app/code/local/MyPackage/MyModule/etc/system.xml

3) app/code/local/MyPackage/MyModule/Model/Observer.php
4) app/locale/en_US/template/email/<custom_email_template>

Step 1:
1) File Name:  app/code/local/MyPackage/MyModule/etc/config.xml
Add below code inside config tag


<config> 
<crontab>

    <jobs>

        <your_cronjob_code>

            <schedule>

                <cron_expr>* * * * *</cron_expr>

            </schedule>

            <run>

                <model>MyModule/observer::MyFunction</model>

            </run>

            </your_cronjob_code>

    </jobs>

</crontab>
</config>

Here <schedule> tag shows time interval for cronjob to run.
<cron_expr>15, 30, 45 * * * *</cron_expr> means cron will run at every 15 minutes interval.
<model>MyModule/observer::MyFunction</model> means that whatever action we want to perform we can put it in MyModule's observer file. In that file MyFunction named function will have logic we want to perform.
Now we have to define which email template will be used for this cron. Add below code inside <global> tag.

       

<config>

    <global>

        <template>



            <email>

                <customer_product_email_question_notify_template translate="label" module="MyModule">

                    <label>My Email Template Label</label>

                    <file><custom_email_template></file>

                    <type>html</type>

                </customer_product_email_question_notify_template>

            </email>

        </template>


    </global>


 </config>

2) File Name: app/code/local/MyPackage/MyModule/etc/system.xml

       

<?xml version="1.0"?>


<config>

    <sections>

        <customer translate="label" module="MyModule">

            <groups>

                <product_email translate="label">

                    <label>My Product Email Label</label>

                    <frontend_type>text</frontend_type>

                    <sort_order>5</sort_order>

                    <show_in_default>1</show_in_default>

                    <show_in_website>0</show_in_website>

                    <show_in_store>0</show_in_store>

                    <fields>

                        <custom_email_template translate="label">

                            <label>My Product Email Label</label>

                                <frontend_type>select</frontend_type>                                              <source_model>adminhtml/system_config_source_email_template</source_model>

                                <sort_order>3</sort_order>

                                <show_in_default>1</show_in_default>

                                <show_in_website>1</show_in_website>

                                <show_in_store>1</show_in_store>

                            </custom_email_template>

                    </fields>

                </product_email>

            </groups>

        </customer>

    </sections>

</config>

Now we have defined cronjob and custom email template for our cronjob.
We have to create the MyFunction, this function will have our logic which we want to run on cron run.

3) File Name: app/code/local/MyPackage/MyModule/Model/Observer.php

       
Class MyPackage_MyModule_Model_Observer  extends Mage_Cron_Model_Observer
{
    const XML_PATH_EMAIL_TEMPLATE = 'MyModule/product_email/email_template';    
    /*
     *function already defined in config.xml
     */
    public function MyFunction()
    {
        $translate = Mage::getSingleton('core/translate');
        /* @var $translate Mage_Core_Model_Translate */
        $translate->setTranslateInline(false);
        $mailTemplate = Mage::getModel('core/email_template');

        $this->_resource = Mage::getSingleton('core/resource')->getConnection('core_write');
        $result = $this->_resource->fetchAll("SELECT QUERY");

        foreach ($result as $recipient) {
            if($recipient['email']!= '') {
            $mailTemplate->setDesignConfig(array('area'=>'frontend', 'store'=>Mage::app()->getStore()->getId()))
                ->sendTransactional(
                    Mage::getStoreConfig(self::XML_PATH_EMAIL_TEMPLATE, Mage::app()->getStore()->getId()),                    Mage::getStoreConfig(Mage_Sales_Model_Order::XML_PATH_EMAIL_IDENTITY,Mage::app()->getStore()->getId()),
                    $recipient['email'],
                    null,
                    array(  'customer'  =>null )
                );
            }
        } 

4) File Name: app/locale/en_US/template/email/<custom_email_template>
We have to create a custom template file. We will use that template file at the time of assigning email template.

Now cron is ready and we can set the time interval as per requirement.

Author: Mohit Verma