In this article, we will learn various techniques and methods on how to send birthday wishes emails with python.

If you want to know about automating boring keyword and mouse talk, I strongly suggest checking this article on Mouse and Keyboard automation using Python.

Why automate birthday wishes email?

In the generation of social media and busy life, people often forget to wish their loved ones, family, and friends on their birthday. The reason can be anything like you were busy, or you are bad at remembering dates just like me. That can make it difficult to remember all the birthday dates of the people we know.

So what we can do to tackle this task, as developers or python developers, is to automate this whole process at once so that we can wish everyone on their birthdays.

Now lets us know what we need to accomplish our task of sending birthday wishes emails using python.

Method to how to send birthday wishes email with python

Prerequisites Python Libraries:

• Pandas
• DateTime
• smtplib

First, let’s understand what these libraries are used for in python.

Pandas:

Pandas is mainly used to create, edit and manipulate the dataset or data frame and are Mostly used in machine learning and data science work. Pandas is one of the most powerful tools for Machine learning. Python pandas package is mainly used for data manipulation and analyzing large data.

Datetime:

DataTime libraries add Dates and time zones in python. It can print or be used as an object in various tasks. We will use it to schedule the tasks as per of requirement.

smtplib:

The smtplib is used to add mailing operations like sending and receiving an email with all the mailing functionalities like adding a subject, attachment, and other things in python code. Smtplib uses SMTP mailing protocol, which stands for Simple Mail Transfer Protocol.

How To Install Python Libraries?

I highly recommend beginner python developers to make a virtual environment with every python project because once in the future, you might face issues related to python libraries version issues.

How to make a virtual environment in python?

Fellow the below steps to create the virtual environment in python.

python -m venv virtual_enviroment_name

Here, we are using the venv python argument to create a virtual environment followed by the name whatever you name it.

Now let’s active our virtual environment and install our packages.

How to an active virtual environment in python?

For windows, the user uses the below command.

virtual_enviroment_name\Script\activate

For Linux and mac os users, use the below command.

source virtual_enviroment_name\bin\activate.

As we are creating a now, let’s install python packages.

Use the below steps to install pandas and smtplib package, as DateTime is already comes built-in with the python version, so there is no need to install it separately.

pip install -U pandas smtplib

We are using the standard pip function to install our packages, and -U stands for the upgrade that will install the latest version of provided libraries.

The last thing we require is a CSV file that contains details of the person we send emails to. Information like Name, Email, birthdate, and year. By the way, for those new to python, CSV file means comma separate value file that can be created with any spreadsheet software like Microsoft Excel or google sheet.CSV is super helpful in machine learning and data science domain.

So let’s create one and name it birthday_list.csv, which should look like this in a google sheet.

name,email,contacts,birthday,year
Tinesh,megh660@gmail.com,99########,1996-11-06,1996
Khushal,khushaljethwa14@gmail.com,99########,1998-1-27,1998
Khushbu,khushbushah007@gmaillist.com,99########,1999-1-1,1999

Also, check out the t How to make a Hangman Game in Python project.

So all the prerequisites are done we can start with the coding task, the best part.

How To Send Birthday Wishes Email With Python?

Follow the below steps to get started with the coding.

Step 1:  Firstly, let’s import the necessary libraries.

import pandas as pd
import time
from datetime import datetime
import smtplib

Step 2: Now we will create two global variables for an email and password for smtplib.

EMAIL = "Your_Email"
PassWD = "Your_Email_Password"

Step 3: In this step, we will create a function to send an email by taking the necessary arguments.

def SendEmailFunc(send_to,email_subject,wish_msg):
    #Setup gmail with SMTP
     smtp_email = smtplib.SMTP("smtp.gmail.com",587)
    #initialize the smtp session
     smtp_email.starttls()
    #login with the credentials
     smtp_email.login(EMAIL,PassWD)
    #Setup Email template to sent email with arguments
     smtp_email.sendmail(EMAIL,send_to, f"Subject: {email_subject}\n\n{wish_msg}")
    #Ending the session
     smtp_email.quit()
    print("Birthday Email successfully sent to " + str(send_to) + "\n The subject is: " + str(email_subject) + "\nThe message is:" + str(wish_msg))

In this step we will initiation the stmp protocol using smtplib and also we are taking argument as email of the person, subject of the mail and message of the email.

Step 4: In this final step we will setup the main funcion to take input from the csv file and send mail.

def MainCode():
    
    #Read CSV file using pandas
    
    dataframe = pd.read_csv(r"birthday_list.csv")
    print(dataframe)
    #check todays Time and date
    today = datetime.now().strftime("%d-%m")

    #check Year format

    currentYear = datetime.now().strftime("%Y")

    #index where we store which friends birthday are wished
    friend= []

    for index,item in dataframe.iterrows():
        msg = "Happy Birthday To My Dear " + str(item['name']+ "Wish you many many happy returns of the day")
        #getting the birthdate from the excel sheet
        bday = datetime.strptime(item['birthday'], "%Y-%d-%m")

        bday = bday.strftime("%d-%m")

        #check the conditions, if matching send the birthday message
        if (today == bday) and currentYear not in str(item['year']):
            #call the functions
            SendEmailFunc(item['email'], "Happy Birthday", msg)
            friend.append(index)
    for i in friend:
        
        yr = dataframe.loc[i, 'year']
        dataframe.loc[i, 'year'] = str(yr) + ',' + str(currentYear)

  #  dataframe.to_excel('birthday_list.csv', index=False)

Step 5:  We will end the code by running the MainCode() function.

if __name__ == “__main__”:
    MainCode()

And the whole program will be look like this.

import pandas as pd
import time
from datetime import datetime
import smtplib

EMAIL = “Your_Email”
PassWD = “Your_Email_Password”


def SendEmailFunc(send_to,email_subject,wish_msg):
    #Setup gmail with SMTP
    smtp_email = smtplib.SMTP("smtp.gmail.com",587)
    #initialize the smtp session
    smtp_email.starttls()
    #login with the credentials
    smtp_email.login(EMAIL,PassWD)
    #Setup Email template to sent email with arguments
    smtp_email.sendmail(EMAIL,send_to, f"Subject: {email_subject}\n\n{wish_msg}")
    #Ending the session
    smtp_email.quit()
    print("Birthday Email successfully sent to " + str(send_to) + "\n The subject is: " + str(email_subject) + "\nThe message is:" + str(wish_msg))



def MainCode():
    
    #Read CSV file using pandas
    
    dataframe = pd.read_csv(r"birthday_list.csv")
    print(dataframe)
    #check todays Time and date
    today = datetime.now().strftime("%d-%m")

    #check Year format

    currentYear = datetime.now().strftime("%Y")

    #index where we store which friends birthday are wished
    friend= []

    for index,item in dataframe.iterrows():
        msg = "Happy Birthday To My Dear " + str(item['name']+ "Wish you many many happy returns of the day")
        #getting the birthdate from the excel sheet
        bday = datetime.strptime(item['birthday'], "%Y-%d-%m")

        bday = bday.strftime("%d-%m")

        #check the conditions, if matching send the birthday message
        if (today == bday) and currentYear not in str(item['year']):
            #call the functions
            SendEmailFunc(item['email'], "Happy Birthday", msg)
            friend.append(index)
    for i in friend:
        
        yr = dataframe.loc[i, 'year']
        dataframe.loc[i, 'year'] = str(yr) + ',' + str(currentYear)

  #  dataframe.to_excel('birthday_list.csv', index=False)
  
if __name__ == “__main__”:
    MainCode()

Now you can add gmail account email and password to check the results by giving a current date for testing purposes, and you check that our code is working like a charm.

Method to how to send birthday wishes sms with python

In this method, we will send a text SMS to the mobile number person, as we did in the previous method to send an email.

Here we will use almost the same code but change only one function. Instead of stmp, we will use win10toast and request a library for integrating the API.

We will use Fast2sms API services to send the SMS. Also, we need to create the account in order to access the API and get API credentials.

So let’s first install the wintoast in our virtual movement. Also, we will not install the request because it already comes built-in.

Follow the below command to install win10toast.

pip install win10toast

Now, let’s get started by following the below steps.

Step 1: We will import the libraries we need.

import pandas as pd
import time
from datetime import datetime
import requests
from win10toast import ToastNotifier

Step 2: We will initialize ToastNotifier and create a toast object.

#initialize the ToastNotifier
toast = ToastNotifier()

Step 3: Now, we will define a user-define function to take necessary arguments and apply them to our Fast2sms API.

def SendSMSFunc(send_to,msg,name,subject):
    url = "https://www.fast2sms.com/dev/bulk"
    payload = f"sender_id=FSTSMS&message={msg}&language=english&route=p&numbers={to}"
     
    headers = {
        'authorization': "YOUR_API_KEY_HERE",
        'Content-Type': "application/x-www-form-urlencoded",
        'Cache-Control': "no-cache",
        }
 
    SMS_obj = requests.request("POST", url,
                                data = payload,
                                headers = headers)
    print(response_obj.text)
    print("SMS sent to " + str(to) + " with subject :" +
          str(sub) + " and message :" + str(msg))
     
    toast.show_toast("SMS Sent!" ,
                     f"{name} was sent message",
                     threaded = True,
                     icon_path = None,
                     duration = 6)
 
    while toast.notification_active():
        time.sleep(0.1)

Step 4: In fourth  step we will define a function to take required infromation from the csv file and use them as an arguments inside a SendSMSFunc() function.

def MainCode():
    
    #Read CSV file using pandas
    
    dataframe = pd.read_csv(r"birthday_list.csv")
    print(dataframe)
    #check todays Time and date
    today = datetime.now().strftime("%d-%m")

    #check Year format

    currentYear = datetime.now().strftime("%Y")

    #index where we store which friends birthday are wished
    friend= []

    for index,item in dataframe.iterrows():
        msg = "Happy Birthday To My Dear " + str(item['name']+ "Wish you many many happy returns of the day")
        #getting the birthdate from the excel sheet
        bday = datetime.strptime(item['birthday'], "%Y-%d-%m")

        bday = bday.strftime("%d-%m")

        #check the conditions, if matching send the birthday message
        if (today == bday) and currentYear not in str(item['year']):
            #call the functions
            SendSMSFunc(item['contact'], "Happy Birthday", msg)
            friend.append(index)
    for i in friend:
        
        yr = dataframe.loc[i, 'year']
        dataframe.loc[i, 'year'] = str(yr) + ',' + str(currentYear)
  #  dataframe.to_excel('birthday_list.csv', index=False)

Step 5: Now we will send our program by calling the MainCode() inside the init code.

if __name__ == "__main__":
    MainCode()

So our program on how to send birthday wishes sms with python is ready and the whole code will be look like this.

import pandas as pd
import time
from datetime import datetime
import requests
from win10toast import ToastNotifier

#initialize the ToastNotifier
toast = ToastNotifier()

def SendSMSFunc(send_to,msg,name,subject):
    url = "https://www.fast2sms.com/dev/bulk"
    payload = f"sender_id=FSTSMS&message={msg}&language=english&route=p&numbers={to}"
     
    headers = {
        'authorization': "YOUR_API_KEY_HERE",
        'Content-Type': "application/x-www-form-urlencoded",
        'Cache-Control': "no-cache",
        }
 
    SMS_obj = requests.request("POST", url,
                                data = payload,
                                headers = headers)
    print(response_obj.text)
    print("SMS sent to " + str(to) + " with subject :" +
          str(sub) + " and message :" + str(msg))
     
    toast.show_toast("SMS Sent!" ,
                     f"{name} was sent message",
                     threaded = True,
                     icon_path = None,
                     duration = 6)
 
    while toast.notification_active():
        time.sleep(0.1)

def MainCode():
    
    #Read CSV file using pandas
    
    dataframe = pd.read_csv(r"birthday_list.csv")
    print(dataframe)
    #check todays Time and date
    today = datetime.now().strftime("%d-%m")

    #check Year format

    currentYear = datetime.now().strftime("%Y")

    #index where we store which friends birthday are wished
    friend= []

    for index,item in dataframe.iterrows():
        msg = "Happy Birthday To My Dear " + str(item['name']+ "Wish you many many happy returns of the day")
        #getting the birthdate from the excel sheet
        bday = datetime.strptime(item['birthday'], "%Y-%d-%m")

        bday = bday.strftime("%d-%m")

        #check the conditions, if matching send the birthday message
        if (today == bday) and currentYear not in str(item['year']):
            #call the functions
            SendSMSFunc(item['contact'], "Happy Birthday", msg)
            friend.append(index)
    for i in friend:
        
        yr = dataframe.loc[i, 'year']
        dataframe.loc[i, 'year'] = str(yr) + ',' + str(currentYear)
  #  dataframe.to_excel('birthday_list.csv', index=False)

if __name__ == "__main__":
    MainCode()

Conclusion

We hope you guys have learned many thighs from our How to send birthday wishes email with python tutorial. Also, we have learned how to send birthday wishes SMS using python.

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