tracking email 1x1 image PROBLEM 2

[Anon]

Hi,

Thanks for the answers to the previous post. Here is the other problem. I got php to draw a gif and execute a database query and show up on a page through the img tag.

Ex. <img src="image.phtml?stuff">

When I send it through in an html email though, the script does not execute. I don't think that when the email pulls the file from the server, it causes the php interpreter to execute the script because I get a blank image. (The script is suppose to draw a 10x10 blue box) How do I get the interpreter to execute the script from the email.

However if I run an html page that contains the above tag, the browser caches "image.phtml" and then the 10x10 box appears in the email although the database entry is never executed.

Does anyone have a solution to this. Thank you. You can email me at [e-mail]

-Chris

[neuromancer]

I would need more information

[Anon]

What do you need to know?

Basically, when I put the <img> tag into an html file and run the file off the server, the embeded php script runs.

If I put that same <img> tag into an html email and send it to myself, the script doesn't work when I open the email because it neither draws the image nor hits the database.

-Chris

[rrijnders]

I suspect your problem is that you are using a relative url in the image tag.
When you run a page in a browser, you are getting the source from a server:

==> http://www.mysite.com/index.php

so when you have an image tag on the page

==> <IMG SRC="myImage.php">

the browser actually formats the request as
==> http://www.mysite.com/myImage.php

to get the image off of the server.

When you created an html formatted email, the email client has no base url to use as a reference to find the image on the 'net, hence a blank box.

When you create your html formatted email, either use the <BASE> tag in the header to set the base for url's:

==> <BASE HREF="http://www.mysite.com/">

or just use absolute url's in your image tags:

==> <IMG SRC="http://www.mysite.com/myImage.php">

HTH

-- Rich Rijnders
-- Irvine, CA US

[Anon]

I am using absolute paths

[Anon]

Watch your access log (/usr/local/apache/log/access_log on my system).

See if the web server is getting a hit, if not then make sure you have the img tag specified with the full URL to the image (http://dom/path/php_script.php)

Other than that im not sure what to tell you, if the path is right in your img tag and the web server doesn't get a request for the image I would do some testing with other (real) images in email.

There is no magic in what your trying to do, it should be very simple.