How do I send email with JavaScript without opening the mail client?

Question

I\'m writing a HTML page with a registration button that should just silently send an email without opening the local mail client. Here is my HTML:

Answer 1

Directly From Client

---

Send an email using only JavaScript

in short: 
1. register for Mandrill to get an API key
2. load jQuery
3. use $.ajax to send an email

Like this -

function sendMail() {
    $.ajax({
      type: 'POST',
      url: 'https://mandrillapp.com/api/1.0/messages/send.json',
      data: {
        'key': 'YOUR API KEY HERE',
        'message': {
          'from_email': 'YOUR@EMAIL.HERE',
          'to': [
              {
                'email': 'RECIPIENT@EMAIL.HERE',
                'name': 'RECIPIENT NAME (OPTIONAL)',
                'type': 'to'
              }
            ],
          'autotext': 'true',
          'subject': 'YOUR SUBJECT HERE!',
          'html': 'YOUR EMAIL CONTENT HERE! YOU CAN USE HTML!'
        }
      }
     }).done(function(response) {
       console.log(response); // if you're into that sorta thing
     });
}

https://medium.com/design-startups/b53319616782

Note: Keep in mind that your API key is visible to anyone, so any malicious user may use your key to send out emails that can eat up your quota.

---

Indirect via Your Server - secure

---

To overcome the above vulnerability, you can modify your own server to send the email after session based authentication.

node.js - https://www.npmjs.org/package/node-mandrill

var mandrill = require('node-mandrill')('<your API Key>'); 

function sendEmail ( _name, _email, _subject, _message) {
    mandrill('/messages/send', {
        message: {
            to: [{email: _email , name: _name}],
            from_email: 'noreply@yourdomain.com',
            subject: _subject,
            text: _message
        }
    }, function(error, response){
        if (error) console.log( error );
        else console.log(response);
    });
}

// define your own email api which points to your server.

app.post( '/api/sendemail/', function(req, res){

    var _name = req.body.name;
    var _email = req.body.email;
    var _subject = req.body.subject;
    var _messsage = req.body.message;

    //implement your spam protection or checks. 

    sendEmail ( _name, _email, _subject, _message );

});

and then use use $.ajax on client to call your email API.