Update database with data received by email

Anon

I d like to create a little script that check a mail box, get message and then update my progres database with data from the email.
I need light on how to receive and process mail automatically.

Anon

I've done this, and the easiest way I have found is to have a cron job running that checks a particular mailbox. Make sure, though, that you have sufficient validation because anyone that gets their hands on that email address and wants to severly annoy you can. First of all, you need to make sure you compile the CGI version of PHP. Then, you can make a standalone script that runs every x minutes (i suggest 5 or so) that runs the script, checks for email, and updates your database accordingly. If you need some help with getting the mail, check out my pop3 class at http://www.mytrp.com/pop3class.phps .. if you need any other help just ask.

chris

Anon

Thanks for this, I will use your class and your advices.
Just a question :
Where is the php executable that I should use to run my php3 script or how do I specify that my script is a php (I presume I should have something like #!/usr/bin/php at the begining of the script)
I didnt found any info about this.

Thanks again.
Matt.

Anon

Ok, well, to compile a cgi version you simply need to uncompress the php tar archive, to a ./configure, make, and make install. That will install the php binary in /usr/local/bin/php by default. Then the first line of your file should look like

#!/usr/local/bin/php -q

the -q tag tells it to be quiet, don't output http headers because we are using this as a standalone script. Hope that helps!

Chris King

Anon

I created a file processmail.php (see below) but when I try to execute it, It just display the source but not executing it. The file /usr/local/bin/php exists and works fine (php -v return the version). I think I miss something somewhere, do you have a clue ?
(by the way : is it the proper usage of your class ?)
Thanks a lot for this help.

processmail.php :

#!/usr/local/bin/php -q

require('./pop3class.php');
$popCon = new pop3 ("pop.wanadoo.fr", "m.peters", "sodomipoule");
$popCon->connect();
$popCon->get_msg_list();
echo "Liste des messages : ";
while(list($id,$subject,$from,$date) = each($popCon->$msg_array)){
echo "$id,$subject,$from,$date";
}
echo "Fin de liste";
echo "Deconnexion en cours ...";
$popCon->disconnect();
echo "Deconnexion terminée";

Anon

Right after the #!/usr/local/bin/php -q line, you still need to tell the php parser to kick in with the infamous tags:

<?php

and then close it out at the end:

Anon

Yes sometimes I m really dumb. Hope my next question won t be so stupid 😉 :

I investigated a lot before submitting this. The mail server always return "-ERR no such user or illegal password".
I tried something : I did a "telnet my.mail.server 110"
then I typed "USER myuser" then "PASS mypassword"
and IT WORKED. But when i do the "same" with the fputs it seams it change something.

Do you have an idea what I could investigate on ?

Thanks again.