Email MIME Types

byroncoolie

We built a site last year with a HTML email facility. It was working beautifully - pulled info out of a database and personlised the email. It has images etc etc and looks great.

I set up an facility so that I would receive a copy of these emails just to track its usage.

Here is the code that creates the email:

if (!mysql_query ($ins_str)) {
$success = false;
$msg = 'Problem saving records to the database';
} else {
$to = $Email;
$adminMail = "xxxx@xxxx.com.au";
$loanCalcMail = "xxxx@xxxxx.com.au";
$borrowid = str_pad(strval(mysql_insert_id()),6,"0", STR_PAD_LEFT);
$subject = "Pre-Approval Certificate #LC".$borrowid;
$adminSubject = "Another Pre-Approval Certificate #LC".$borrowid.", for ".$FirstName." ".$LastName."";
$headers = "From: loancalculator.com.au <xxxx@xxxx.com.au>\r\n";
$headers .= "Reply-To: xxxx.com.au <xxxx@xxxx.com.au>\r\n";
$headers .= "Return-Path: xxxx@xxxx.com.au\r\n";
$headers .= "MIME-Version: 1.0\r\n";
$headers .= "Content-Type: text/html; charset=ISO-8859-1\r\n";
$headers .= "X-Priority: 1\r\n"; //Message priority is set to HIGH
$headers .= "Organization: xxxx\r\n"; // Organisation

$message = "<body>";
$message .= "<html>
<head>
<title>Pre-Approval Certificate</title>
   </head>
   <body> ..... </body></html>

and the code that sends the email:

mail($to,$subject,$message,$headers) ) {

mail($adminMail,$adminSubject,$message,$headers); mail($loanCalcMail,$adminSubject,$message,$headers);

As of August last year I noticed that the emails I was getting simply put all the html code in the body of the email unformatted. This is the case for Outlook Express on PC and Entourage on Mac as well as Netscape on PC and Mac. The only application that appears to work is the default mail application on Mac!

As of this week the client has noticed the same thing - and obviously contacted me with his concerns. He is using the same hardware and software as he has in the past.

I think it has something to do with the MIME format in the header. (But I don't understand why its just decided to do weird things now).

Here is the header information as it is showing in the emails:

Return-Path: <xxxx@xxxx.com.au>
Delivered-To: 801-xxxx@xxxx.com.au
Received: (qmail 17563 invoked by uid 48); 16 Feb 2005 05:45:13 -0000
Date: 16 Feb 2005 05:45:13 -0000
Message-ID: <20050216054513.17562.qmail@chifley.ozhosts.net>
To: xxxx@xxxx.com.au
Subject: Another Certificate #LC000089, for xxxx
X-PHP-Script: www.xxxx.com.au/PHP/preapproval.php for 203.102.111.193
From: xxxx.com.au <xxxx@xxxx.com.au>
Reply-To: xxxx.com.au <xxxx@xxxx.com.au>
MIME-Version: 1.0

Content-Type: text/html; charset=ISO-8859-1

X-Priority: 1

(Note that everything after 'MIME-Version: 1.0' (in bold) is actually NOT appearing in the email header but in the BODY of the email).

Does anyone have any ideas?

Best Regards.

rehfeld

thats odd.

that sounds like a bug in the mailer.

what happens when you move the mime header before or after the other headers?

i doubt this is related since it is happening in more than 1 email client, but you do have an error in your html

your making <body> come before <html>

that should be fixed even if not related to this prob.

another thing i would do is check what email headers are really being received by the client program. look at the raw text email message instead of looking at the headers from within the email client. theres prob a raw text file somewhere you can look at. the client parses the data and displays whatever it thinks it is. maybe theres a parsing bug.

byroncoolie

Thanks Rehfeld.

Yes, I have tried all the things you have mentioned and scoured many threads and sites to find a solution.

Specifically,
I've changed the order of the headers and the order in which they are called here: mail($to,$subject,$message,$headers).
Originally I think it was mail($to,$subject,$headers,$message) but I've tried all combinations and looked at the headers of many other rich text emails I have received and/or created.

Further,
The reason there are two <body> tags (i.e. <body><html><head> xxx </head><body>) is for that very reason (i.e. testing things) because I have another mailer where you paste all your html into it and send it, and the email embeds the pasted html within its own <html<body></body></html> tags so I thought this may work.

Five hours later and I'm none the wiser !?!

Thanks once again for your insight. I'll keep searching.

If you have any other ideas or if anyone can offer some insight that would be fabulous!

Regards,
byronc

byroncoolie

I've even tried changing the "Content-Type: text/html; charset=ISO-8859-1\r\n"; tag.

i.e. multi-part/alternative etc...

and here you will notice I have the 'charset=ISO-8859-1' at the end of the current tag.

byron.

rehfeld

what happened when you moved the mime header around?

did all the headers that come after it dissapear/start appearing in the message body?

digitalfix

Hi - has the person that reported this problem in the first place been able to solve the problem ? I would be grateful of any help, as it is exactly the same problem I have been experiencing.