Sending smtp mail without smtp server installed locally - php

Question

Should I be able to send SMTP email on my local development PC with CodeIgniter without having a SMTP server application installed on my local development PC?
For example, the following doesn't work.
application/config/email.php
$config['mailtype'] = 'html';
$config['protocol'] = 'smtp';
$config['charset'] = 'iso-8859-1';
$config['wordwrap'] = TRUE;
$config['smtp_host'] = 'ssl://smtp.gmail.com';
$config['smtp_port'] = 465;
$config['smtp_user'] = 'my_gmail_account#gmail.com';
$config['smtp_pass'] = '*********';
controller code
$this->load->library('email');
$this->email->from('my_gmail_account#gmail.com', 'Noel');
$this->email->to('my_gmail_account#gmail.com');
$this->email->subject('SMTP email Test');
$this->email->message('Testing smtp email in codeigniter.');
$this->email->send();
$data['message'] = "Sorry Unable to send email...";
if($this->email->send()){
$data['message'] = "Mail sent...";
}
$this->load->view('test_view', $data);
The following returns
Sorry Unable to send email...
and doesn't arrive at the destination email.

Answer 1

Try loading parameters into an array and then initializing the library using array source: CodeIgniter Forum:
$config = Array(
'protocol' => 'smtp',
'smtp_host' => 'ssl://smtp.googlemail.com',
'smtp_port' => 465,
'smtp_user' => 'xxx',
'smtp_pass' => 'xxx',
'mailtype' => 'html',
'charset' => 'iso-8859-1'
);
$this->load->library('email', $config);
$this->email->set_newline("\r\n");
// Set to, from, message, etc.
$result = $this->email->send();
Also, maybe you need to enable SSL in your php.ini. If you see the line:
;extension=php_openssl.dll
uncomment it by removing semicolon from the beginning of the line and then restart PHP.