bounced email

[many_pets]

I am having trouble getting my bounced emails returned to me. I am setting the headers for Errors-To, Return-Path, From , Reply-To. The problem (I think) is that the Return-Path is being overwriten by the server, and that Errors-To are ignored.

I am on a host using Unix, running php4 something. Therefore I don't have access to php.ini. The tech help on this host leaves a bit to be desired... Can anyone help??

I've tried:
-the optional 5th argument to mail().
-sendmail() wrapper
-imap_mail()
-set sendmail_from right before sending, and reset right after

Any ideas? Do things like FreeSMTP work? Or opening connections and sending without using Mail()?

I've seen lots of posts on this problem, but no solutions for people without access to php.ini file. Thanks!

[Xoid]

If your having problems using Mail() you could always try using an SMTP server directly, for example:

ok, so it's not the best solution in the world, but it does the job.

hope it helps you out!

<?php
   $smtp = @fsockopen("IP_Addr_goes_here",25,$errno,$errdesc,30);

   if(!$smtp)
   {
    print "Could not connect to SMTP server";
   }
    else { 
           print "Connected to SMTP server\n"; 
           print fgets($smtp,1024);

       $helo = fputs($smtp, "helo server\n");
       print fgets($smtp,1024);

       $send = fputs($smtp, "MAIL FROM: from_email_goes_here\n");
       print fgets($smtp,1024);

       $send2 = fputs($smtp, "RCPT TO: to_email_goes_here\n");
       print fgets($smtp,1024);

       $send3 = fputs($smtp, "DATA\n");
       print fgets($smtp,1024);

       $send4 = fputs($smtp, "Just testing SMTP\n.\n");
       print fgets($smtp,1024);

       fputs($smtp,"QUIT\n");
       print fgets($smtp,1024);

       fclose($smtp);

     }
?>

[many_pets]

Thank you! After a bunch of experimentation, I have this working now. I added subject and headers for MIME content after the DATA line:
$send3 = fputs($smtp, "DATA\n");
$send4b = fputs($smtp, "To: $to\n");
$send4c = fputs($smtp, "Subject: $subject\n");
$send4a = fputs($smtp, "$smtp_headers\n");
$send4d = fputs($smtp, "$message\n.\n");
This is working well, with the return-path being correct, and bounced mail coming back to me.

So what is the best way to send out bulk mail (dues notifications, not spam!)? I read something about this method taking time to open/close connections.

How would one access bounced mail from a php script (like to automatically flag bad email addresses)?

Thanks.