Mail() from access db

[mathew_hooper]

Hi folks,

I'm running a small e-mail script that sends out an e-mail and adds in values such as name, e-mail address etc etc.

Its using an access database on a windows box using IIS PHP4 i think.

All e-mails are being sent in plain text but there are some issues with the e-mail address bouncing (due to domain name or user inbox not excisting) so i have had to code in reply addresses etc etc.

<?php
$batch = $_GET['batch'];
if ($batch == "")
{
echo "Please enter a batch number";
}
else
{
$conn = odbc_connect("DRIVER={Microsoft Access Driver (*.mdb)}; DBQ=accessdatabase.mdb", "", "");
if ($conn)
{
	// Select query from db
	$sql = "select * from table where batch = $batch";

// run query
$ecx = odbc_exec($conn, $sql);

}
else
{
	// Database not connected - Likly due to it being open locally
	echo "ODBC Not Connected!  Please make sure you have the local database closed and try again.<BR>"; exit;
}

if ($ecx)
{
	// Create First line of the table
	  print '<table width="100%" border="1" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0">
  				<tr>
					<th scope="col">ID</th>
    				<th scope="col">database values</th>
    				<th scope="col">E-mail sent?</th>
  				</tr>';
		$bug_workaround=0;

	// Start loop from database
  while(odbc_fetch_into($ecx, $inquiry))
  {

// grab values from the database and put them into variables
$db_values = $inquiry[0];

// display line in table format
print '
<tr>
<td>'. $db_value .'</td>

<td>' ; 
// Send Mail here
if (strtoupper(substr(PHP_OS,0,3)=='WIN')) { 
  $eol="\r\n"; 
} elseif (strtoupper(substr(PHP_OS,0,3)=='MAC')) { 
  $eol="\r"; 
} else { 
  $eol="\n"; 
}
// Make Headers
$headers = 'From: From address<[e-mail]>'.$eol; 
$headers .= 'Reply-To: From address<[e-mail]>'.$eol;   // edit - removed ' as not in original code!
$headers .= 'Return-Path: From address<[e-mail]>'.$eol;    // these two to set reply address 
$headers .= "Message-ID: <[e-mail]>".$eol; 
$headers .= "X-Mailer: Mailer Name".$eol;          // These two to help avoid spam-filters 
# Boundry for marking the split & Multitype Headers 
$mime_boundary=md5(time()); 
$headers .= 'MIME-Version: 1.0'.$eol; 
$headers .= "Content-Type: multipart/related; boundary=\"".$mime_boundary."\"".$eol;

// Set the body text up

$body = '
e-mail body and has values in it
';
// Send the E-Mail
$sendmail = mail($email,"Subjet", $body, $headers);

// Check to see if the mail has sent
if ($sendmail)
{
print "Sent!";
}
else
{
print "Not Sent!";
exit;

}
print '</td>
  </tr>';
 sleep(1); 	

  }
  print '</table>'; // Close the table
}
else
{	
 	// There was an error with the query
	echo "There was an error!";
}

}
?>

I havn't got a clue why its sending blank e-mails, using a closed mail relay.

I've even sent myself 100s of e-mails and they appear to be fine!

anyone got a clue!??! 😕

Thanks in advance

Matt

[mathew_hooper]

Nobody got an idea :queasy:

[fire_cracker]

I'm not sure if this has anything to do with it, but if you take a look at your code, where you were specifying the headers, it looks like you have an extra quote in there, and then another one on the line below it.

Might not solve the problem, but it looked funny to me 🙂

[mathew_hooper]

Sorry there was something else to add, most of the e-mails where sending fine but its the od few that send blank, tends to be hotmail, bt and yahoo e-mail addresses :S

[dalecosp]

$eol isn't dependent on the platform your program is running on. It's required by the receiver. It seems very likely, but I can't say for sure it's the problem, that some MTA's are being confused if you aren't sending "\r\n" for EOL characters. Of course, if you're running on windows and I understand correctly, you should be sending "\r\n".

There are some MTA's out there that don't care about details, and some that are sticklers for them. I ran into this yesterday, playing with socket programming and SMTP. When I changed from connecting to a UNIX host from a Win one, I had to rewrite a couple of things.

One thing that might help: can you run a traffic sniffer? If you can go back and read some packets, you might see where the thing is failing....

[dalecosp]

Also, since you're sending multipart mail, are you certain that the boundary appears in the $body variable?

[mathew_hooper]

okay i take your point about the var $eol, but shouldn't it just send it \r\n as its on a windows box?? should I just get rid of that var all together?

[dalecosp]

matthew.hooper wrote:

okay i take your point about the var $eol, but shouldn't it just send it \r\n as its on a windows box?? should I just get rid of that var all together?

It should just send '\r\n' not because of what box it is that's sending, but just because it'll work on any box that's receiving. As for "getting rid of the var", you could; but you've got to add the CRLF string somehow, so why not a quick variable? I can type $eol probably faster than "\r\n" ...

fire_cracker wrote:

I'm not sure if this has anything to do with it, but if you take a look at your code, where you were specifying the headers, it looks like you have an extra quote in there, and then another one on the line below it.

Might not solve the problem, but it looked funny to me

Yeah, I assume he's fixed those. If not he should, but I don't even see how it'd be working at all like that.

matthew.hooper wrote:

Sorry there was something else to add, most of the e-mails where sending fine but its the od few that send blank, tends to be hotmail, bt and yahoo e-mail addresses :S

So, it's something specific to their MTA's, or perhaps to their MUA's. Maybe you could post the source of a message (mail source) ... could be that the message body is broken somehow. Or that the accounts receiving at hotmail, etc., aren't set to receive HTML mail ... I note there's no text alternative being offered.

Incidentally, if you use this code to send me spam, I'll look you up and come over and stomp on your cat's testicles .... :mad:

😃

[mathew_hooper]

LOL, I wish I could post the content of the e-mail that would be sent but due to the data protection act in the UK that I am bound to where I work, I am unable to post the content of the e-mail that is sent. btw its not spam 😉 and the e-mail is being sent plain text.

Its really strange that it sends it to most people but not others, do you maybe think its something to do with mail servers, I know that btinternet gets fowarded onto btopenworld.com etc. I'm just putting ideas about now!

[mathew_hooper]

I did get a "bounce back" from a mail server and found the following 2 comments very interesting:

1. The message has some UUEncoded data that uses an unrecognised UUEncoding character set.

2. The message contains a malformed nested MIME multipart.

Does anyone know if I am missing anything in the headers?

[dalecosp]

Yes.

Or no.

You won't show us, we can't say.... :rolleyes:

[dalecosp]

BTW, #2 is more likely the source of the issue, 'tho #1 sounds pretty nasty, too....

[mathew_hooper]

hehehehe its being sent plain text so it cannot be the first one :S what do i need to add?