problem with PHP email attachment

[cycleFun]

Hi All,

I am new to PHP but I have to do a coursework: developing PHP email application.
I am having problems with the attachment part. The code seems to be working but displays the attachment in the message body in a weird format:

//message body starts
boundary="==Multipart_Boundary_x22107cafc856a68ba80ff666963b34edx"

This is a multi-part message in MIME format.

--==Multipart_Boundary_x22107cafc856a68ba80ff666963b34edx
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1"
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit

From:

--==Multipart_Boundary_x22107cafc856a68ba80ff666963b34edx
Content-Type: application/msword;
name="companies_dissertation.doc"
Content-Disposition: attachment;
filename=""
Content-Transfer-Encoding: base64
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...
--==Multipart_Boundary_x22107cafc856a68ba80ff666963b34edx--

//message ends

Could anyone help me, please?
Cheers
cycleFun

[cycleFun]

This is my code:

    <?php
    /* ------------------------------------------------------
    mm564_lib.php script
     /* ------------------------------------------------------


    /* All form fields are automatically passed to the PHP script through the array $HTTP_POST_VARS. */
    $email = $HTTP_POST_VARS['recipient'];
    $subject = $HTTP_POST_VARS['subject'];
    $message = $HTTP_POST_VARS['messagebox'];

    // Generate a random string to be used as the boundary marker
    $mime_boundary="==Multipart_Boundary_x".md5(mt_rand())."x";

    // Building message headers
    $headers = "From: $from\r\n" .
               "MIME-Version: 1.0\r\n" .
               "Content-Type: multipart/mixed;\r\n" .
               "boundary=\"{$mime_boundary}\"";

    // Starting the message body
    $message = "From: " . $_POST['name'] . "\r\n";   
    $message = "This is a multi-part message in MIME format.\n\n" .
               "--{$mime_boundary}\n" .
               "Content-Type: text/plain; charset=\"iso-8859-1\"\n" .
               "Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit\n\n" .
               $message . "\n\n";

    // Processing the uploaded files
    foreach($_FILES as $userfile)
    {
          // store the file information to variables for easier access
          $tmp_name = $userfile['tmp_name'];
          $type = $userfile['type'];
          $name = $userfile['name'];
          $size = $userfile['size'];

          // if the upload succeded, the file will exist
          if (file_exists($tmp_name))
          {

             // check to make sure that it is an uploaded file and not a system file
             if(is_uploaded_file($tmp_name))
             {

                // open the file for a binary read
                $file = fopen($tmp_name,'rb');

                // read the file content into a variable
                $data = fread($file,filesize($tmp_name));

                // close the file
                fclose($file);

                // now we encode it and split it into acceptable length lines
                $data = chunk_split(base64_encode($data));
             }

             // Inserting a boundary to indicate that the attachment is started
             $message .= "--{$mime_boundary}\n" .
                "Content-Type: {$type};\n" .
                " name=\"{$name}\"\n" .
                "Content-Disposition: attachment;\n" .
                " filename=\"{$fileatt_name}\"\n" .
                "Content-Transfer-Encoding: base64\n\n" .
                $data . "\n\n";
          }
    }

    // Closing mime boundary that indicates the last of the message
    $message.="--{$mime_boundary}--\n";


    /* PHP form validation: the script checks that the Email field contains a valid email address and the Subject field isn't empty. preg_match performs a regular expression match. It's a very powerful PHP function to validate form fields and other strings - see PHP manual for details. */
    if (!preg_match("/\w+([-+.]\w+)*@\w+([-.]\w+)*\.\w+([-.]\w+)*/", $email)) 
    {
      echo "<h4>Invalid email address</h4>";
      echo "<a href='javascript:history.back(1);'>Back</a>";
    } elseif ($subject == "") {
      echo "<h4>No subject</h4>";
      echo "<a href='javascript:history.back(1);'>Back</a>";
    }

    /* Sends the mail and outputs the "Thank you" string if the mail is successfully sent, or the error string otherwise. */
    elseif (mail($email,$subject,$message, $headers)) 
    {
      echo "<h4>Thank you for sending email</h4>";
    } else {
      echo "<h4>Can't send email to $email</h4>";
    }


?>

[tinymark]

From a quick look, this jumps out.

$email = $HTTP_POST_VARS['recipient'];
$subject = $HTTP_POST_VARS['subject'];
$message = $HTTP_POST_VARS['messagebox'];

$HTTP_POST_VARS has been replaced as far as I know. Use $_POST

I was just looking into this for work I'm doing. Small world.

[cycleFun]

Hi tinymark,

thank for the reply. I tried your solution, it works but I still get the attachment encoded in the body part.

[tinymark]

Do you mean the code for an encoded exe file is showing up? I'm a little confused.
Do you have a form that submits files to be uploaded and then emailed somewhere?

[cycleFun]

I have an HTML form with sender, subject, message parts plus the attachment part.
When I send an email to my email address I receive it, I can see that the file is attached to the mail but the attachment appears on the message as an encoded component as it is shown above (see opening thread).

[tinymark]

I'm closing in on it. I know its the way you are setting up your message. Take everything out that is variable and hard-code it first. Does that work? I'm missing too many pieces of the puzzle (assets to test with).

When I aim it back towards what I'm doing with attachment and emails the code splits like crazy from yours.

Have a look at http://www.webcheatsheet.com/PHP/send_email_text_html_attachment.php. You will notice the differences.

[tinymark]

I have the crazy nonsense not showing up and my code gives me an attachment. I lose it when I'm picking up things from the form. I'm looking at how I'm serialized the data that I'm getting. All those lovely %40 for @ things.