Catching errors

timus

Hi I've got an email function using mail() that works fine, but i wanted to protect against problems connecting to the server

If it can't connect i get a timeout error (after 30 seconds)

I've tried mail() or Die('no email');
and i've looked at try / catch but i need to throw the exception which i can't do.

basically if the mail function can't connect i want it to skip it without raising the time out error

Any suggetsions would be gratefully received 🙂

Thanks

Tim

MarkR

Don't use mail() in a way which requires it to connect to a server which even might timeout.

If you're on a Windows box, run a local MTA. If you're on a Unix box, run a local MTA.

Bottom line: run a local MTA so that mail() won't timeout.

A timeout sending mail is not a permanent error, it could just be because something is temporarily unavailable, in which case you really want it to send the mail anyway once it's available again.

Mark

timus

Hi Mark

Thanks for the reply

I'm guessing that MTA is Message Transfer Agent? Is this like Outlook or another email application?

I'm not going to be hosting the server, so how might I be able to use an MTA via PHP?

Many thanks

Tim

MarkR

MTA is indeed message transfer agent.

Most hosts on Unix run a local MTA. This enables mail to be sent notwithstanding any external server, quickly. It won't timeout, even if the local mail server is down at the time, as it uses a pipe to get sendmail to place the mail in the outgoing queue.

This is a good thing.

Some Windows servers don't use this scheme, and instead encourage direct delivery or delivery via some remote, sometimes unavailable server. This is very bad, as a temporary failure will permanently cause a mail to be lost, moreover, mail() will timeout.

Talk to your systems administrator to ensure that their MTA is either local (i.e. on the same box) or very nearby and unlikely to be down at any given time.

Local is always preferred.

Even if the mail needs to be routed via another "smart host" server, a local MTA can keep it temporarily in a queue in case that other server is down.

Mark

timus

Hi Mark

Thanks again for the reply. I've got a test system set up on an XP box, how would i send the email data to the MTA?

Thanks

Tim

MarkR

On Windows, there is no support in PHP for sending mail through an external program as in Unix. So you effectively HAVE to use SMTP.

However, you can still run a local MTA, and have it relay mail from localhost (i.e. 127.0.0.1). Pick a MTA of your choice (you can EVEN use IIS if you really want), enable relaying from localhost, then configure PHP to use that.

The result will be that mail() will never time out, even if you invoke it when your network is completely dead, and the mail will still be delivered (albeit delayed).

Mark