PHP mail() returns true but doesn't work

Posted on 16th Feb 2014 07:03 pm by admin

First off I apologize if this is a newbie question, and I generally don't like asking questions that have already been asked 1,000,000 times, but I've searched far and wide and cannot find a solution to my problem.

Basically I run an experimental server on my home network. I use LAMP (Ubuntu Server, Apache2.2, MySQL5, PHP5).

I simply want to take the data from an HTML form and submit it as an e-mail. I tried using the mail() function like this:
Code: $email = $_POST['email'];
$message = $_POST['message'];
$subject = $_POST['subject'];

$sentmail = mail("example@gmail.com",$subject,$message,"FROM: ".$email."rn");
if($sentmail) {
echo 'Your message has been sent!';
} else {
echo 'Cannot send message.';
}

After some googling, I found one solution that said to add this line:
Code: ini_set("sendmail_from", "example@gmail.com");but it made no difference.

I finally decided to try a different approach using SMTP:
Code: require_once "Mail.php";

$from = "Form Data <".$_POST['email'].">";
$to = "My Name <example@gmail.com>";
$subject = $_POST['subject'];
$body = $_POST['message'];

$host = "ssl://smtp.gmail.com";
$port = "465";
$username = "foo@gmail.com";
$password = "bar";

$headers = array ('From' => $from,
'To' => $to,
'Subject' => $subject);
$smtp = Mail::factory('smtp',
array ('host' => $host,
'port' => $port,
'auth' => true,
'username' => $username,
'password' => $password));

$mail = $smtp->send($to, $headers, $body);

if (PEAR::isError($mail)) {
echo("<p>" . $mail->getMessage() . "</p>");
} else {
echo("<p>Message successfully sent!</p>");
}

Still not working!

This is quite frustrating. It always returns a value of "true" but never actually sends the messages!

Maybe it would help if I had a better understanding of what the mail() function actually does. Where does the message go when handled by mail()? Mustn't it go through a mail server at some point? Port 25 is iffy on my setup, so that could be the issue with mail().

When using the PEAR method though, I specifically indicate port 465, so that can't be the issue.

What am I missing here?

Your Answer:

Login to answer

Other forums

PHP doesn't send my mail
Hi all, I found this and used it to send mail. Simple contact form with some required fields. The va

do while...woes
I'm sure this is childsplay but it is stumping me, everytime i try what I think would make this work

PHP - HTML
Could anyone give me some GOOD sample links for php - html email tutorial.

Thanks!

Echo multiple lines of html code
Hi guys,

I would like to know if there is a way to echo multiple lines of html codes.

How to ... (FAQs)
... get e-mail notifications As several people asked how to get e-mail notifications when new posti

Better Method of a Member Cloud
I assume most people know how tag clouds work, where the tags most used are bigger and the least use

Pro-rata Billing in Periodic Billing for Rental
Hi guys,

We have a situation, where a rental contract starts at the mid of the month say

frames get header location..
i have two frames, one top, one bottom. how do i do a form on the bottom frame that gives me the ur

PHP template help
Ok, I don't know if anyone can help me but I am using PHP templates to make a site. I am a newbie an

Cannot Display Array from Select Statement + Login question
Hi,
I'm new to PHP but so far so goog. I was assigend a project and I'm very close to completion.