[Resolved] how to capture email sent to [e-mail] and forward to REAL email address

[biggus]

I've been asked by a client to enable their website (a classifieds site) to capture email sent to [e-mail], for example, and forward to the REAL email address of the person who placed the ad, [e-mail], for example. Anyone know how to do this? This may not be the correct forum, but I'm building the site in PHP and will host on Linux/Unix, but not my own server.

Thanks a ton,
Biggus

[rebelo]

Email delivery not only has nothing to do with php but nor does it have anything to do with webpages even. You need to setup sendmail to do this or whatever other mail software you like.

[biggus]

geez. Thanks for being so helpful and nice. I've been using this forum for 3 years both asking and answering questions. This just happens to be one of the things I don't know how to do (and I KNOW it's not done with PHP), but I wasn't sure where to ask. Since I was accustomed to others being friendly, I was hoping to get pointed in the right direction, that's all. If someone peed in your cornflakes, don't take it out on me.

[tsinka]

Hi,

do you have full access to the server that receives the mails ? If yes, which mail server is running on that server ? I might give you some hints ... at least for postfix or sendmail.

Thomas

[biggus]

I've found a few hosting companies where I'll have root access and the ability to configure sendmail. So, it's sendmail on RedHat.

besten Dank,
Biggus

[rebelo]

Originally posted by biggus
geez. Thanks for being so helpful and nice. I've been using this forum for 3 years both asking and answering questions. This just happens to be one of the things I don't know how to do (and I KNOW it's not done with PHP), but I wasn't sure where to ask. Since I was accustomed to others being friendly, I was hoping to get pointed in the right direction, that's all. If someone peed in your cornflakes, don't take it out on me.

I assumed you didn't already know that this is a non-php issue because you posted it in the "PHP Coding" forum. And I did point you in the right direction when I said you need to look into sendmail or whatever mail server you run. So what's the problem? Don't get all bitchy at me just because I didn't give you the easy answer.

For the record, if I did know the answer, I would have offered it. I don't involve myself in mail server issues, however, so I told you where to look.

Thank you for being so friendly and receptive to assistance, though.

[MarkR]

On most Unix mail servers, it's sufficient to create a normal account, and place the email address you want to forward to in a file called ".forward" in their home directory.

However it should be noted that this is not the only way, or necessarily the best way to do it on a given mail server.

If using sendmail,

man aliases

Mark

[biggus]

yep...alias looks to be the answer. I'll have PHP update the alis file and then have cron kickoff the "newalias" command every so many minutes.

Thanks everyone.

Biggus