For a simple introduction to the mail() function see the PHP_Advanced article. This article describes some of the more advanced features that can be achieved through the mail function.
Assign Names to email addresses
When receiving an email you will notice that the To field often contains a name rather than the email address it was send to.
<HTML>
<BODY>
<?PHP
mail(‘bob@email.com’, ‘Test email’,
‘This is a test email’,
“To: Bob Jones <bob@email.com>\n” .
“From: Jane Jones <jane@email.com>\n” .
“cc: Another Person <another@email.com>\n” .
“Bcc: Yet Another <more@email.com\n>”);
?>
</BODY>
</HTML>
HTML Emails
The next stage is sending HTML email messages, this allows for standard HTML tags to be used when composing the message content. When sending a message in HTML it must be declared that is it HTML in the header of the email, this is done through both the Content-type: and MIME-Version headers’:
<HTML>
<BODY>
<?PHP
mail(‘bob@email.com’, ‘Test email’,
‘<html><body><b>Hello! World</b> \n <i>this is a test email</i></body></html>’,
“MIME-Version: 1.0\n” .
“Content-type: text/html; charset=iso-8859-1″);
?>
</BODY>
</HTML>
The MIME-Version (Mulitpurpose Internet Mail Extensions) header indicates that the email follows the internet standards, following that the Content-type header can declare the format being used; text/html; followed by the character set being used charset=iso-8859-1
Mixed Format Emails
Although the majority of email clients support HTML email messages, there are some that don’t. The mixed format ensures that the email clients that do support it see the HTML formatted message, where as the ones that don’t see a plain text version.
The technique involved is to actually send two versions of the message and rely on the email client to read and understand Content-Type: multipart/alternative; header which will make the client only display the supported version.
*** PHP code not fully completed yet ***
Emailing Attachments
Emailing file Attachments work in the same way that mixed format email messages do. The header Content-Type: multipart/mixed; is used and the message split into two parts; one the message and the other the file attachment(s).
This is more complicated than previous email examples, all the steps required are explained below. The examples assume that the email details including the file to be emailed have been submitted to the PHP page from another page.
$to = $_POST['to'];
$from = $_POST['from'];
$subject = $_POST['subject'];
$message = $_POST['message'];
Attributes of the file attachment
The first stage is to extract the required attributed from the file that has been passed. The file details in PHP are stored in an array named $_FILES which are extracted to variables.
// example: /tmp/phpfile12345 – tmp file name and loc where uploaded
$file_loc = $_FILES['fileatt']['tmp_name'];
// example: text/text – will vary depending on file type
$file_type = $_FILES['fileatt']['type'];
// example: mywork.txt – always the name of the file
$file_name = $_FILES['fileatt']['name'];
Extract data from file attachment
The data within the file is required to be placed into a variable then used Base64 encoding to convert (possible) binary data into text. The is_uploaded_file function is used to ensure that the file was in fact uploaded by an http get command, this helps to ensure no malicious activity.
if (is_uploaded_file($file_loc)) {
// Read the file in ‘rb’ read binary
$file = fopen($file_loc,’rb’);
$filedata = fread( $file (comma) filesize ($file_loc));
// Base64 encode the file data
$filedata = chunk_split(base64_encode($filedata));
The data is now in a format that is ready to be emailed, the next stage is producing the standard mail parameters.
Producing mail function
The basic mail parameters are set in the same manor, the diffrences come in the header and message parameters
The header parameter contains the MIME version, the Content-Type: multipart/mixed; declares that there will be an attachment, finally the boundary string (containing random text) is used as a marker to split the message into the two sections.
“\nMIME-Version: 1.0\n” .
“Content-Type: multipart/mixed;\n” .
” boundary=\”==Multipart_Boundary_x45985365x\”";
The message section starts with a declaration which MIME compatible email clients will not show, next is the Multipart Boundary string denoting the beginning of the first section. Following this the usual header information is declared, following by the desired message text.
“This is a multi-part message in MIME format. you should not see this\n\n” .
“–==Multipart_Boundary_x45985365x\n” .
“Content-Type: text/plain; charset=\”iso-8859-1\”\n” .
“Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit\n\n” .
“This is the message contents, there should be a file attached to this message”
After the text of the message, the next part is the message attachment which follows the same format as above.
“–==Multipart_Boundary_x45985365x\n” .
“Content-Type: {$file_type};\n” .
” name=\”{$file_} \n” .
“Content-Disposition: attachment;\n” .
” filename=\”{$file_name}\”\n” .
“Content-Transfer-Encoding: base64\n\n” .
$filedata . “\n\n” .
“–==Multipart_Boundary_x45985365x–\n”;
Then message should always have the message boundary string followed by – to signify the end.
To see the fully working source code, please see here
For more information on different MIME types see here
Many thanks to the tutorials where this information came from, W3Schools & PHP & sitepoint