PERL CGI Beginners - Query on sendmail problem

Author

Query on sendmail problem

Dale

2005-10-05, 6:55 pm

Hi,

I'm hoping someone can help me with an issue I've got with, I assume,
sendmail.

I've copied part of a script below. If I use the first To: line (which
takes the e-mail address from a file - and this works) then a mail
doesn't arrive. If, however, I used the second To: line (which is
currently commented out - the xxxxxx is to stop spammers picking the
address up from this mail) then a mail is received.

I added a page after the sendmail just to make sure it was reading the
e-mail address from the file (which it was) but it still doesn't seem to
send. $manageremail is the correct variable name.

In the datafile, I've had the e-mail addresses formatted properly (e.g.
me@mydomain.co.uk) but also tried with \'s at appropriate places (e.g.
me\@mydomain\.co\.uk). I just can't get anything to work.

Anyone have any ideas what I could be doing wrong.

Thanks in advance!

-------------------------------------------------------------------------
-------------------------
open(MAIL, "|/usr/local/bin/sendmail -t");

print MAIL "To: $manageremail\n";
# print MAIL "To: projectelf\@xxxxxxx\.co\.uk\n";
print MAIL "From: projectelf\@xxxxxxx\.co\.uk\n";
print MAIL "Subject: Escalation logged\n";

print MAIL "Hi $manager\.\n\n";
print MAIL "The following escalation has been logged from your
team.\n\n";
print MAIL "Agent's Manager : $manager\n";
print MAIL "Agent's Name : $agentname\n";
print MAIL "Date Logged : $day\-$month\-$year\n";
print MAIL "Escalation Reason : $reason\n";
print MAIL "Short Description : $short\n";
print MAIL "Long Description : $long\n";
print MAIL "Justified? : $justified\n";
print MAIL "Name of Logger : $logger\n";

close (MAIL);
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
-------------------------

--
Dale

Wiggins d'Anconia

2005-10-05, 6:55 pm

Scott R. Godin

2005-10-07, 6:55 pm

Dale wrote:
> Hi,
>
> I'm hoping someone can help me with an issue I've got with, I assume,
> sendmail.
>
> I've copied part of a script below. If I use the first To: line (which
> takes the e-mail address from a file - and this works) then a mail
> doesn't arrive. If, however, I used the second To: line (which is
> currently commented out - the xxxxxx is to stop spammers picking the
> address up from this mail) then a mail is received.
>
> I added a page after the sendmail just to make sure it was reading the
> e-mail address from the file (which it was) but it still doesn't seem to
> send. $manageremail is the correct variable name.
>
> In the datafile, I've had the e-mail addresses formatted properly (e.g.
> me@mydomain.co.uk) but also tried with 's at appropriate places (e.g.
> me\@mydomain\.co\.uk). I just can't get anything to work.
>
> Anyone have any ideas what I could be doing wrong.
>
> Thanks in advance!
>
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------
> -------------------------
> open(MAIL, "|/usr/local/bin/sendmail -t");
>
> print MAIL "To: $manageremail\n";
> # print MAIL "To: projectelf\@xxxxxxx\.co\.uk\n";
> print MAIL "From: projectelf\@xxxxxxx\.co\.uk\n";
> print MAIL "Subject: Escalation logged\n";
>
> print MAIL "Hi $manager\.\n\n";
> print MAIL "The following escalation has been logged from your
> team.\n\n";
> print MAIL "Agent's Manager : $manager\n";
> print MAIL "Agent's Name : $agentname\n";
> print MAIL "Date Logged : $day\-$month\-$year\n";
> print MAIL "Escalation Reason : $reason\n";
> print MAIL "Short Description : $short\n";
> print MAIL "Long Description : $long\n";
> print MAIL "Justified? : $justified\n";
> print MAIL "Name of Logger : $logger\n";
>
> close (MAIL);
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------
> -------------------------
>

I'd more likely be using Mail::Mailer or MIME::Lite as the interface is quite
clean and straightforward.

example

#!/usr/bin/perl -T
use warnings;
use strict;
use MIME::Lite

# this data will come from somewhere else in your program flow
my %escalation = (
manager => '',
agentname => '',
logger => '',
datelogged => '',
reason => '',
justify => '',
shortdesc => '',
longdesc => '',
);

my( $selfaddr, $manageremail, $manager, $somecondition, $bccaddress ) =
('projectelf@xxxxx.co.uk', 'manager@xxxx.co.uk', 'Mr. Moribund', '', '');

my $msg = MIME::Lite->new(
From => $selfaddr,
To => $selfaddr,
Cc => $manageremail,
Subject => 'Escalation Logged',
Type => 'multipart/mixed',
);

if ($somecondition) {
$msg->add( 'Bcc' => '$ccaddress');
}

my $message = <<"END":

Attention $manager,

The following esclation has been logged from your team:

Agent's Manager: $escalation{manager}
Agent's Name: $escalation{agentname}
Name of Logger: $escalation{logger}
Date Logged: $escalation{datelogged}
Escalation Reason: $escalation{reason}
Justification: $escalation{justify}
Short Description: $escalation{shortdesc}
Long Description: $escalation{longdesc}

END

$msg->attach(
Type => 'TEXT',
Data => $message,
);

$msg->send;

__END__

For html-type messages (created via CGI.pm's function-oriented interface, for
example), you can also in addition to the plaintext, attach a html-format copy
thusly:

#very very simplistic example -- you can embed css and images as well
push @myarray,
start_html(
-style=>{-code=>$stylesheet},
-title=>"Escalation Alert",
),
div({-id="Container"},
h1({-class=>'alert'}, "header"),
p("content"),
),
end_html();

$msg->attach(
Type => 'text/html',
Disposition => 'attachment',
Encoding => 'quoted-printable',
Data => @myarray,
Filename => 'escalation.htm',
);

...for example.

MIME::Lite has many more details you can manipulate, attaching image/pdf/log
files, or as illustrated above, sending both plaintext/html-based messages...

http://search.cpan.org/~yves/MIME-Lite-3.01/ for details.

Mail::Mailer (which I mentioned earlier) is part of the MailTools package, which
you can look over, here: http://search.cpan.org/~markov/MailTools-1.67/

It's rare I'll try and hit up sendmail directly as you have done, when there are
mechanisms such as these to do it more cleanly and with more control.

Dale

2005-10-08, 3:55 am

Hi Wiggins d'Anconia, you wrote:

>Dale wrote:
>
>You're not using a module... Don't think that is what you meant though.

Thanks for looking at this for me!

I'm not using a module for this - took the instructions from a tutorial
site (though can't remember which one at the moment).

>
>Are you chomp'ing $manageremail? If it has a newline on it in the file
>and you have added an additional new line above then you have stopped
>the header, surprisingly it should still be sending but below should be
>in the body. You should probably have a look at the mail logs generated
>by sendmail to see if it is complaining, and more specifically about what.

$manageremail doesn't need chomping as it is in the middle of a comma
separated line of data.

(On a side note, when I read the last variable from a line of data, even
after chomping it, it still has a newline after it and I can't seem to
get rid of it!)
--
Dale - Liverpool, England

A menace to society - apparently!

Spam block: Please don't mail me with "abuse" - use my name instead!

Dale

2005-10-08, 3:55 am

Hi Scott R. Godin, you wrote:

>I'd more likely be using Mail::Mailer or MIME::Lite as the interface is
>quite clean and straightforward.
>
>example
>
>#!/usr/bin/perl -T
>use warnings;
>use strict;
>use MIME::Lite
>
># this data will come from somewhere else in your program flow
>my %escalation = (
> manager => '',
> agentname => '',
> logger => '',
> datelogged => '',
> reason => '',
> justify => '',
> shortdesc => '',
> longdesc => '',
> );
>
>my( $selfaddr, $manageremail, $manager, $somecondition, $bccaddress ) =
>('projectelf@xxxxx.co.uk', 'manager@xxxx.co.uk', 'Mr. Moribund', '',
>'');

Can I just check something on this as I'm a bit

. I would just
read $manageremail and $manager from the data file wouldn't I? Or would
I need to have something like the following so it's part of the "my" :

my( $selfaddr, $manageremail2, $manager2, $somecondition, $bccaddress )
= ('projectelf@xxxxx.co.uk', $manageremail, $manager, '', '');

Or... since the next section has $manageremail in it, can I leave it out
of the "my" and just take it that the Cc => $manageremail will accept
what I've already got it to read from the datafile? (Hope that makes
sense *grin*)

>my $msg = MIME::Lite->new(
> From => $selfaddr,
> To => $selfaddr,
> Cc => $manageremail,
> Subject => 'Escalation Logged',
> Type => 'multipart/mixed',
> );

*Snip*

>MIME::Lite has many more details you can manipulate, attaching
>image/pdf/log files, or as illustrated above, sending both
>plaintext/html-based messages...
>
>http://search.cpan.org/~yves/MIME-Lite-3.01/ for details.
>
>Mail::Mailer (which I mentioned earlier) is part of the MailTools
>package, which you can look over, here:
>http://search.cpan.org/~markov/MailTools-1.67/
>
>It's rare I'll try and hit up sendmail directly as you have done, when
>there are mechanisms such as these to do it more cleanly and with more
>control.

Thanks for the examples and the links - I really appreciate the help,
especially as I actually understood the excellent example as well! :)
I'll certainly read through the links you've been kind enough to
include.
--
Dale - Liverpool, England

A menace to society - apparently!

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