Which is better to send e-mail using .net or trigger in the SQL table

Question

We have this module where user can register and they need to confirm their e-mail address.

Currently I used .NET to send e-mail. So after adding the record I will now call my email method. But what I noticed is there are times that the e-mail functionality does receive a timeout error and since I catch all the exception this error is presented to the user.

What I wanted is to send the e-mail on the background. If there are any mail connection timeout, the e-mail method will just retry sending the e-mail for probably a minute or two. And I'm thinking of using the SQL mail to achieve this. But I'm not sure if its the best solution.

Answer 1

You have a few options:

1. Use SQL Server Database Mail to perform the heavy lifting around the email queuing and sending. The application would still be responsible for constructing the message and sending it to the database. Relay through a separate SMTP server (installing SMTP services directly on a SQL machine is probably not a good idea).

2. Use async email methods from your web application, eg SmtpMail.SendAsync() . This will allow you to handle errors without holding up the user (or interacting with the user), but it's not durable. If your web process restarts, the operation is lost.

3. Use a Windows service. This will be a simple, separate application which simply monitors the database for new email tasks and/or is sent a message from the web application that a task needs to be performed.

Option #2 using SendAsync() will be the quickest to implement. Depending on your needs, that may be sufficient.

Option #1 shouldn't require much more effort. Option #3 really shines when you need to implement complex business logic around the recipient list and the email contents. It's also possible to combine options #1 and #3 (see the conversation between @RemusRusanu and me in the comments).

With both option #1 and #3, if the environment goes down, a service restarts, or an error occurs, you won't have lost any data or failed to send an email.

Answer 2

Rather manage the time-out in the .net application. If there is an issue or a time out in the trigger your data may not be committed. Rather allow the DB to complete the data transaction, and check the state from your .net App.

I dont think there is a definitive answer to this, but this would be my preference.