problem in ArGoSoft Mail Server after using mail()

[scorpioy]

Beside installed Apache and MySQL, I also installed ArGoSoft Mail Server version 1.8 (1.8.6.0). I have some problem in sending out emails. I know my question might not related to PHP directly, but I hope some experienced people could help me out.

After I use a loop that use mail() to send out all emails by mail server. Some of them cannot be emailed out and they seems unreachable, but if I email to those email addresses from my email account, they can be sent out and this proves that those email addresses are valid. Does any one know what kinds of reasons would cause this problem?

Thanks.

[tsinka]

Hi,

make sure that you use a valid From: header when using mail. Some server block mails with invalid or unresolvable From: email addresses. Additionally (or alternatively), you might need to change the configuration of your mail server to map the email address of the web server's user to a valid one (not something like [e-mail] if the hostname of the web server can't be resolved externally)

The From: address of your mail account is valid so this might be the reason why this works.

[scorpioy]

I use the following code for mail(), could you tell me where would be changed to solve the problem?

$to = "$email"; 
$subject = "My subject"; 
$headers = "MIME-Version: 1.0\r\n"; 
$headers .= "Content-type: text/html; charset=iso-8859-1\r\n"; 
$headers .= "To: $email\r\n"; 
$headers .= "From: My Name <[e-mail]>\r\n"; 
$msge = " ......... ";

mail($to, $subject, $msge, $headers);

I looked at headers of received emails carefully sent from my email account. I tried to be the same as it, but the problem remains. Some of email addresses work fine, some of them cannot be sent out by mail server.

I'm not quite understand what you wrote about this:

Originally posted by tsinka
Additionally (or alternatively), you might need to change the configuration of your mail server to map the email address of the web server's user to a valid one (not something like [e-mail] if the hostname of the web server can't be resolved externally)

Could you explain more about this?

Thanks.

[tsinka]

Hi,

try to remove the line

$headers .= "To: $email\r\n";

This will be done by PHP automatically using the $to parameter.
Some mail server might refuse to accept the mail if the To: header is set twice (I'm not really sure if this is the truth but just to make sure don't use it twice).
Also make sure that $to just contains an email address and not something like

Recepient name <email>

Also try if the mails are delivered successfully if you change the mail type to plain text.

I think the email address mapping is not neccessary in this case as long as you use a valid From: header in your mails.

If you don't use a From header php will use the web server user's mail address instead (at least on unix systems) which often is e.g.

[e-mail]

Often this host.domain.suffix can't be resolved externally so mail servers might refuse to deliver the mail.

The solution to this is to tell the mail delivery program to map e.g.

[e-mail] to [e-mail]

Thomas