Sending Email in PHP

[borninblood]

Does anyone know a good method of sending emails en mass that are going to email addresses taken from a database.

Currently I use a rather poor method -

PHP Code:

while($row=mysql_fetch_array($result))
{
$to = "$row[email]";
$subject = "Title";
$body = "Body Content";
$headers = "From: webmaster@borninblood.co.uk\r\n" .
    "X-Mailer: php";
if (mail($to, $subject, $body, $headers)) {
  echo("<p>Message sent!</p>");
 } else {
  echo("<p>Message delivery failed...</p>");
 }
}
} 


But what happens when I run is the site goes into 403 meltdown assumedly because the server assumes this is a security breech.

Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

[mephisto]

Looks like you should setup a mail queuing system. Try having a look at using Mail_Queue from pear.

http://pear.php.net/package/Mail_Queue

[Coomkeen]

I use something similar and have had no problems:

while($row=mysql_fetch_row($result)) {
$name=$row[0];
$email=$row[1];
$body="";
$headers=$head . "Content-type: text/html; charset=iso-8859-1" . $eol . $eol;
$body="<p> Dear " . $name . ",</p>";
$body.=$tb;
mail($email, $subject, $tbody, $headers);
echo("<br>sent to " . $email );
$body="";
}

I've left out the unsubscribe link and other stuff for clarity.

The only 'problem' I now think I might have is some people's newsletters get classed as spam by Yahoo and others.
This isn't a general thing, but it does happen.
And when I look at the headers of my copy sent to me, it's got:

Sender: Nobody <nobody@sutherland.eukhost.com>

Anyone know a way around this?

I've got:

$head="Reply-To: \"Smallholders Online Newsletter\" <newsletter@smallholders.org>\n";
$head.="Return-Path: <newsletter@smallholders.org>\n";
$head.="From: \"Smallholders Online Newsletter\" <newsletter@smallholders.org>\n";

in the email header.

Ron.

[mephisto]

You need to use smtp rather than php's native mail function. This example uses the PEAR package Mail.

PHP Code:

<?php
    require_once ('Mail.php');
    
    // details of options can be seen at http://pear.php.net/manual/en/package.mail.mail.factory.php
    $options = array(
        'host' => 'mail.yoursmtpserver.com',
        'port' => 25 // or what ever yours is set at,
        'persist' => true, // good for sending multiple emails
    );
    
    //If you need smtp authentication then add your type (detection howto below) and credentials    
    
    $options = array_merge($options, array(
        'auth' => 'LOGIN',
        'username' => 'yourusername',
        'password' => 'yourpassword'
    ));
    
    $mailer =& Mail::factory('smtp', $options);
    
    if(PEAR::isError($mailer)) {
        die('Could not create mailer: ' . $mailer->getMessage());
    }
    
    $recipients = 'who@where.com';
    $headers = array(
        'From' => 'you@where.com',
        'To' => 'who@where.com',
        'Subject' => 'Test Message',
        'Date' => date('r')
    );
    
    $body = 'email body';
    
    $error = $mailer->send($recipients, $headers, $body);
    if(PEAR::isError($error)) {
        die('Failed to send email: ' . $error->getMessage());
    }
?>

To detect the supported auth types from your mailer server do, server responses in bold

telnet mail.yoursmtpserver.com 25
220 mail.yoursmtpserver.com NO UCE ESMTP
ehlo localhost
250-AUTH LOGIN PLAIN
250-AUTH=LOGIN PLAIN
250-PIPELINING
250 8BITMIME

The supported auth types are after the 250-AUTH response, LOGIN, PLAIN etc.

You can of course expand on this further by sending multipart email, text/plain and text/html so that more users can see your email.

PHP Code:

<?php
    require_once('Mail.php');
    require_once('Mail/mime.php');
    
    $options = array(
        'host' => 'mail.yoursmtpserver.com',
        'port' => 25 // or what ever yours is set at,
        'persist' => true, // good for sending multiple emails
        'auth' => 'LOGIN',
        'username' => 'yourusername',
        'password' => 'yourpassword'
    ));
    
    $mailer =& Mail::factory('smtp', $options);
    
    if(PEAR::isError($mailer)) {
        die('Could not create mailer: ' . $mailer->getMessage());
    }
    
    $recipients = 'who@where.com';
    $headers = array(
        'From' => 'you@where.com',
        'To' => 'who@where.com',
        'Subject' => 'Test Message',
        'Date' => date('r')
    );
    
    $txtbody = 'email body';
    $htmlbody = '<p>email body</p>';
    
    $crlf = "\n";    
    $mime = new Mail_mime($crlf);
    
    $mime->setTXTBody($txtbody);
    $mime->setHTMLBody($htmlbody);
    
    $body = $mime->get();
    $headers = $mime->headers($headers);
    
    $error = $mailer->send($recipients, $headers, $body);
    if(PEAR::isError($error)) {
        die('Failed to send email: ' . $error->getMessage());
    }
?>

enjoy

[Coomkeen]

Wow.
Thanks Mephisto.
Lots to get my teeth into there.
Should keep me occupied for a while.

Thanks again.

Ron

[borninblood]

Originally Posted by mephisto

Looks like you should setup a mail queuing system. Try having a look at using Mail_Queue from pear.

http://pear.php.net/package/Mail_Queue

Sounds perfect, I will have a wee read of it, cheers!

[Coomkeen]

So far so good.

I'm going to PEAR's Mail Factory.
The first try sent the mail server into panic mode after about 50 had been sent.
Not surprising really.

Not keen on a queue system that uses a database, which might be huge and anyway all the mail addresses are coming from a database already.
So rather than put a ginormous delay after each 'send', it would be nice to have some feedback when the mail server had sent each one, then I could step onto sending the next.

Is there any way this can be done?

Ron

[mephisto]

You could try something like

PHP Code:

// build up Mail instance above
$recipients = array();

// add recipients into array
$recipients[] = 'me@mydomain.com';
// ...

foreach($recipients as $recipient) {
   if(PEAR::isError($result = $mail->send($recipient, $headers, $body)) {
      // log not sent, or how ever you handle the fact they are not sent
      echo $result->getMessage();
   }
}