mail appears to be from my nameserver

[sneakyimp]

I've got a site that requires people to register and we send a confirmation email. When I use mail() to send these confirmation emails, they aren't getting through to certain addresses despite my best efforts at setting header info.

I think I know what the problem is. The emails appear to be from a separate domain than my 'from' address--even if I use the -f flag for sendmail as I did here:

mail('[e-mail]', 'testing mail with params', 'here goes tha message message', null, '[e-mail]')
  or die('mail didnt send');

Received: from myserver.myisp.com ([222.222.222.222]) by bay0-mc7-f2.bay0.hotmail.com with Microsoft SMTPSVC(6.0.3790.2444); Fri, 21 Jul 2006 17:18:25 -0700
Received: by myserver.myisp.com (Postfix, from userid 33)id 7FA5B22A003; Fri, 21 Jul 2006 19:21:15 -0500 (CDT)
X-Message-Info: txF87lGdW43hVUaBMdEAtfIcT/Hw3meBjXoQ+RfhFdk=
Return-Path: [e-mail]
X-OriginalArrivalTime: 22 Jul 2006 00:18:25.0449 (UTC) FILETIME=[5940E190:01C6AD24]

EDIT: I want mails to appear to be from mydomain.com, NOT myserver.myisp.com

I believe my solution to set up this particular project to send all mail through a mail server using some kind of library to connect such as:

Pear mail:
http://pear.php.net/package/Mail

or xpert mailer:
http://www.xpertmailer.com//?free=smtp_mail&func

HOWEVER, I am fairly certain my employer will want their resulting code to be distributable...meaning free of any license restrictions against redistribution for profit.

The Pear module says that it is 'PHP/BSD' license without providing any detail. I'm not lawyer but having googled around for BSD license:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bsd_license

It would appear that I might use the PEAR module in a proprietary project that I could distribute and license.

So, two questions:
1) will using the PEAR mail project help me solve the problem i'm having with emails - namely that the RECEIVED header information doesn't match my domain
2) If I use the PEAR mail module in my project , will my project still be distributable as proprietary software that we can require licenses to use, hopefully thereby making profits?

[sneakyimp]

After doing more research, I am starting to think that even using PEAR, email will appear to come from my ISP's mail server rather than my domain. Does anyone have experience with this? I'm really concerned about spam filters intercepting my address confirmation emails and receipts for items purchased.

[PABobo]

PHPMailer better solution http://phpmailer.sourceforge.net/

[Drakla]

Sounds like you might also need to set up an SPF record, when I added it to my server the email tracking stats almost tripled.

http://openspf.org

In the email header it still says it's from the server name but you set up a 'friendship' deal. There's load out there on it.

[PABobo]

http://www.openspf.org/
http://openspf.org/ doesn't work

[sneakyimp]

thanks for that tip. now tell me something...do we think I've lost the trust of other service providers with this particular machine, or am I doing something really stupid with my mail function?? Also, will getting phpmailer help with the issue of my mail falling into the spam filter black hole or is it some other problem-- like something that can be solved with openspf-type stuff?

Here's my mail function:

function my_mail($mailto, $mailfrom, $mailsubject, $mesg, $mailheader='') {
  // define additional headers
  if (!empty($mailheader)) {
    $additional_headers = "\r\n";
  } else {
    $additional_headers = "";
  }
  $additional_headers .= "MIME-Version: 1.0\n" .
			"Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii\n" .
			"From: " . $mailfrom . "\n" .
			"To:" . $mailto . "\n" .
			"Reply-To: " . $mailfrom . "\n" .
			"Return-Path: <" . $mailfrom . ">\n" .
			"X-Priority: 1\n" .
			"X-MSMail-Priority: High\n" .
			"X-Mailer: PHP/" . phpversion() . "\n";

  mail($mailto, $mailsubject, $mesg, $mailheader . $additional_headers)
    or die("Mail failed to send!");

  return true;
} // my_mail()

I tried sending a mail to an account of mine on the mail server that handles all send mail and it arrived almost instantly. Please notE the absence or presence of headers I've specified (i've changed the addresses to protect the innocent):

Return-Path: <[e-mail]>

X-Original-To: [e-mail]

Delivered-To: [e-mail]

Received: from localhost (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by mail.mynameserver.com (Postfix) with ESMTP id A309EDFDA0 for <[e-mail]>; Mon, 24 Jul 2006 20:48:01 -0500 (CDT)

Received: from devmachine.mynameserver.com (11.111.111.111.transedge.com [111.111.111.11]) by mail.mynameserver.com (Postfix) with ESMTP id 8D6CADFD7A for <[e-mail]>; Mon, 24 Jul 2006 20:47:59 -0500 (CDT)

Received: by devmachine.mynameserver.com (Postfix, from userid 33) id E306D398240; Mon, 24 Jul 2006 20:50:55 -0500 (CDT)

To: [e-mail]
Subject: An extensive subject

Mime-Version: 1.0

Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii

From: [e-mail]
To: [e-mail]
Reply-To: [e-mail]
X-Priority: 1

X-Msmail-Priority: High

X-Mailer: PHP/5.1.2

Message-Id: <[e-mail]>

Date: Mon, 24 Jul 2006 20:50:55 -0500 (CDT)

X-Virus-Scanned: by mynameserver.com

X-Spam-Status: No, hits=-3.7 tagged_above=-999.0 required=2.7 tests=ALL_TRUSTED, AWL, BAYES_00, MISSING_MIMEOLE, NO_DNS_FOR_FROM, NO_REAL_NAME

X-Spam-Level:

---

Adfreakos.com totally rocks your world and you
better damn will get this message.

In particular I have noticed that adelphia.net is scanning these jokers out.
It really upsets me.

It's worth noting that 'www-data' is the user that apache runs as on my development machine. transedge is the ISP that's provides access to my development machine (devmachine.mynameserver.com) and DNS is handled by two machines at mynameserver.com.

As another interesting experiment, I tried logging into devmachine (a debian box running apache 2) and emailed like this:

mail [e-mail]

The email arrives instantly, but if I try anything at hotmail or adelphia or other domains, it NEVER ARRIVES. WTF?? It's worth noting further that a separate machine (call it originaldevemachine.mynameserver.com) on the same intranet sends mail to hotmail just fine. WTF???

[sneakyimp]

Ok.

I'm not sure how i should have known this, but there was something wrong with the sendmail config on the server. mail was getting rejected and YET, mail() was returning TRUE. According to the PHP docs, this indicates that 'mail was accepted for delivery' which apparently was NOT happening.

At any rate, I've decided to use PHPMailer now and mail does seem to be getting through. the mail headers still look pretty rough, but whatever.