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Comments on PHP emails are sent when $message is a string, but not when its an array
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PHP emails are sent when $message is a string, but not when its an array
I host my website on a CentOS-Bash, PHP and MySQL environment; my local email client is engined by Roundcube. I don't know almost anything about PHP nuances.
While my web domain registration is done by one company, my DNS records hosting, websites hosting and website emails hosting are all done by a second company.
I can send emails to myself (to my local email client) via running in terminal php example_1.php with:
<?php
$to = "example@example.com";
$subject = "Email Test";
$message = "PHP's mail function test";
mail($to, $subject, $message);
?>
I can't send emails to myself (to my local email client) via running in terminal php example_2.php with:
<?php
$to = "example@example.com";
$subject = "New email message";
$message = array (
$name = $_POST["name"] . "Name:" . "\r\n",
$email = $_POST["email"] . "Email:" . "\r\n",
$phone = $_POST["phone"] . "Phone:" . "\r\n",
$topic = $_POST["topic"] . "Topic:" . "\r\n",
$date = $_POST["date"] . "Date:" . "\r\n",
$time = $_POST["time"] . "Time:" . "\r\n",
$notes = $_POST["notes"] . "Notes:" . "\r\n"
);
mail($to, $subject, $message);
?>
What might cause messages by the second example pattern not to reach my email box?
Post
From the PHP mail manual
mail ( string $to , string $subject , string $message , array|string $additional_headers = [] , string $additional_params = "" ) : bool
PHP manual syntax (typical for many languages) lists the type of each function parameter prior to the name of the parameter. Since parameters are normally passed as $variables, that syntax is used for the names, though you can use any variable names that you want, and for most (there are some occasional exceptions) PHP function parameters you can use constants as well - e.g., a "quoted string" in place of a string.
Specifically, if a parameter is listed with a single type such as string then the parameter can only be of that type. Due to the way PHP works, using an incorrect type can result in any of:
- Automatic "useful" conversion - e.g., numeric to string
- Warning message
- Error message
- Conversion to some value that is not useful in the particular situation
If multiple types are listed, such as array|string, then each of those types is possible and they will each be handled appropriately. In the example of headers, you can either pass an array of strings or a string containing a single header or a string with multiple header strings separated by newline characters.
An interesting twist to the usual type insensitivity of PHP is the implode function which historically has allowed:
implode ( string $separator , array $array ) : string
or
implode ( array $array , string $separator ) : string
where the parameter sequence was determined by type, since the function requires exactly one array and exactly one string.
Back to the problem at hand:
The message is always, and only, a string. That string can be anything from one blob of plain text to multiple sections that include HTML, plain text and attachments. More elaborate functions take all those other parts and turn them into one giant string.
The additional_headers can be a string or an array. That is due to the way headers work. They are sent as a string, but they are processed as key/value pairs, each of which is handled as a string. So an array of strings works for headers. It doesn't work for messages.
In your example, just put it all together as one string.
$message = "Name: " . $_POST["name"] . "\r\n"
. "Email: " . $_POST["email"] . "\r\n"
. "Phone: " . $_POST["phone"] . "\r\n"
. "Topic: " . $_POST["topic"] . "\r\n"
. "Date: " . $_POST["date"] . "\r\n"
. "Time: " . $_POST["time"] . "\r\n"
. "Notes: " . $_POST["notes"] . "\r\n";
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