Need basic question answered

[Anon]

Brand new to this. Trying to use PHP to process data from a mortgage application form. Don't know PHP myself, but friend of hubby wrote a script that is supposed to send contents of form to an email address. Friend has since disappeared! I keep getting the following error message when I hit my submit button:

parse error, expecting `'('' on line 4
$MailToAddr = "[e-mail]";

Here are some relevant lines of script:

<?php

here is where we set/declare the variables to be used.

$MailToAddr = "[e-mail]";
$ReplyToAddr = "";
$FromAddr = "Realnet Mortgage Application Robot";

This is a fake address dont worry about it

$SendingName = "[e-mail]";
$redirectUrl = "http://www.realnetct.com";

{
$headers = "From: $SendingName \n Reply-To: [e-mail]";
$message .= "Name: ". $POST['name'] ."\n";
$message .= "Social Security Number: ". $POST['ssn']. "\n";
$message .= "Email Address: ". $_POST['email_address'] ."\n";
mail($MailToAddr, $FromAddr, $message, $headers);
print "<center><b><font size=+3 color=blue> Sucessfully Submitted, re-directing you </font></b></center>";

}

What's wrong? Would I insert the `'(" stuff, the error says it's expecting? If so, where?

Thanks for any help.

[linus]

Please post the first 4 lines of the source code.

[linus]

Unless of course that was the beginning of the script you posted... if this is line 4:

$MailToAddr = "[e-mail]";

I really don't see what's wrong with it. Guess you'll have to wait until someone else comes along. =\

[Anon]

Yes, that is beginning of script. Thanks for trying.

[Anon]

Hi Bette-Ann, I have worked with CGI and ASP quite a bit and they (9/10) want you to place a \ (escape character) before certain symbols, the @ being one of them like so:

some_name@some_domain.com

Do me a favor and run this test; place a # at the start of the $MailToAddr = "[e-mail]"; like like so:

$MailToAddr = "[e-mail]";

then if you get the same error (check the line number carefully) I was wrong, and can not help, but if it should give you another error on line 8, I think it is.

Just do the same to the email address on that line too!

That said: The only other thing I can see it the empty ReplyToAddr line (line 5) - as a last resort try adding a bogus email address in there just to test it.

Please let me know if this works for you!

Regards,
Charlie

[Anon]

That won't work. Perl (as the language is called; CGI is just the protocol, but then ASP is not a language either) uses @ to indicate arrays. PHP uses $.

I can't see anywhere it would be expecting a '(' except where it already has one. Like Linus says, line 4 is completely harmless, and so are all the lines above it. In fact, my copy of PHP agrees with me, not complaining about any missing '('.

In short, there is no such error as you describe in that script. All I can think of is that it's another PHP file that has the problem.

[bette-ann]

I tried putting in the # on line 4. I then get the same error message for line 5, not line 8. It seems like it doesn't like ANY of the statements. This website is running on earthlink's business server (Apache). The basic info I have from earthlink is this:

"Your MindSpring Web Hosting Site supports both versions 2.x and 3.x of PHP. Your PHP scripts are denoted by their extension, either .phtml or .php3

PHP files using the extension .phtml will be interpreted by PHP 2.0.PHP files using the extension .php3 will be interpreted by PHP 3.0.

PHP 2.x is supported only for backward compatibility for customers who already use it, and will be phased out at some point in the future. We strongly recommend that new customers use version 3.0 (.php3).

Note: Although MindSpring's web servers are equipped with PHP, MindSpring's Business Services Support technicians cannot assist in the creation or maintenance of PHP scripts."

I only got it to run at all using .phtml extension. Does this give any more info regarding my problem?

[bette-ann]

If I try running it with the .php3 extension, I get this error message on hitting the submit button:

(5)Unable to open: /verify_form.phtml - is your DOCUMENT_ROOT of remove set right?

Not sure what this means.