Using a Template in the Classpath for an Email on Alfresco 3.4

When trying to use a template on the classpath with the MailActionExecutor but without much success.  I was under the impression that all one had to do was provide the relative path to the ftl file via the PARAM_TEMPLATE parameter (can't remember what I read that made me think this... it also doesn't help that there is not a whole lot of Java examples/documentation other than the skimpy javadocs).  I tried this, and was met with the following exception:

org.springframework.mail.MailPreparationException: Could not prepare mail; nested exception is java.lang.ClassCastException: java.lang.String cannot be cast to org.alfresco.service.cmr.repository.NodeRef

A quick look at the source code revealed why:

...
// See if an email template has been specified
String text = null;
NodeRef templateRef = (NodeRef)ruleAction.getParameterValue(PARAM_TEMPLATE);
if (templateRef != null)
...

It doesn't even attempt to differentiate between a template in the repository vs one in the classpath.  It automatically assumes it is in the repo (hence the cast to a NodeRef before anything else is done).  To get around this, I had to manually process the template to generate the text to be used in the email.

To do this, a model needs to be generated for the template to use.  I used the code that generates the model in the MailActionExecutor.java minus a few objects I deemed unnecessary for my use case.  Then I passed in the path to the ftl and the model to the template service and it generated the output string.  I then set it to the PARAM_TEXT parameter for the email.

Here is the code:

private static final String EXPIRE_EMAIL_TEMPLATE = "alfresco/extension/burris/common/templates/expiration-email-template.ftl";
...
// Process the template - the mail action executor expects it to be in the repository which is why this has to be done
Map model = new HashMap( 8, 1.0f );
NodeRef person = personService.getPerson( authenticationService.getCurrentUserName() );
model.put( "person", new TemplateNode( person, serviceRegistry, null ) );
model.put( "document", new TemplateNode( nodeRef, serviceRegistry, null ) );
NodeRef parent = nodeService.getPrimaryParent( nodeRef ).getParentRef();
model.put( "space", new TemplateNode( parent, serviceRegistry, null ) );
model.put( "message", new I18NMessageMethod() );

String text = templateService.processTemplate( "freemarker", EXPIRE_EMAIL_TEMPLATE, model );

// Send email notice detailing the state change
Action emailAction = actionService.createAction( MailActionExecuter.NAME );

emailAction.setParameterValue( MailActionExecuter.PARAM_SUBJECT, subject.toString() );
emailAction.setParameterValue( MailActionExecuter.PARAM_TO_MANY, emailList );
emailAction.setParameterValue( MailActionExecuter.PARAM_TEXT, text );

if ( log.isDebugEnabled() ) log.debug( "Sending email..." );
actionService.executeAction( emailAction, nodeRef );
...