Sending Email via PHP Not Working - php

Question

I have a site running on Windows Azure that contains a simple contact form for people to get in touch. Unfortunately, that form isn't work right now...
I have an index.php file that contains the form:
<div class="form">name="name" placeholder="Name" id="contactname" />
<input type="text" name="email" placeholder="Email" id="contactemail" />
<textarea name="message" placeholder="Message" id="contactmessage"></textarea>
<button>Contact</button>
</div>
I then have a JS file like this:
if ($('#contact').is(":visible")) {
$("#contact button").click(function() {
var name = $("#contactname").val();
var message = $("#contactmessage").val();
var email = $("#contactemail").val();
var emailReg = /^[a-zA-Z0-9._+-]+#[a-zA-Z0-9-]+\.[a-zA-Z]{2,4}(\.[a-zA-Z]{2,3})?(\.[a-zA-Z]{2,3})?$/;
// client-side validation
if(emailReg.test(email) == false) {
var emailValidation = false;
$('#contactemail').addClass("error");
}
else
$('#contactemail').removeClass("error");
if(name.length < 1) {
var nameValidation = false;
$('#contactname').addClass("error");
}
else
$('#contactname').removeClass("error");
if(message.length < 1) {
var messageValidation = false;
$('#contactmessage').addClass("error");
}
else
$('#contactmessage').removeClass("error");
if ((nameValidation == false) || (emailValidation == false) || (messageValidation == false))
return false;
$.ajax({
type: "post",
dataType: "json",
url: "send-email.php",
data: $("#contact").serialize(),
success: function(data) {
$('.form').html('<p class="success">Thanks for getting in touch - we\'ll get back to you shortly.</p>');
}
});
return false;
});
};
and finally, a php file to send the email called send-email.php:
$destination = 'info#clouddock.co'; // change this to your email.
// ##################################################
// DON'T EDIT BELOW UNLESS YOU KNOW WHAT YOU'RE DOING
// ##################################################
$email = $_POST['email'];
$name = $_POST['name'];
$message = $_POST['message'];
$subject = $name;
$headers = "From: ".$name." <".$email.">\r\n" .
"Reply-To: ".$name." <".$email.">\r\n" .
"X-Mailer: PHP/" . phpversion() . "\r\n" .
"MIME-Version: 1.0\r\n" .
"Content-Type: text/plain; charset=\"iso-8859-1\r\n" .
"Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit\r\n\r\n";
mail($destination, $subject, $message, $headers);
}
When I fill in the contact form, the JS validation appears to be working, and when I click send the 'Thanks for getting in touch...' text appears, as if the message has been sent. But I don't receive any email. Can anyone advise as to where the problem might be? Could it be Azures configuration blocking the messages from being sent out?

Answer 1

You are using $("#contact").serialize() to get data to send but you've got no elements with ID contact.
You should use $("#contactname, #contactemail, #contactmessage").serialize() (and fix first input ;) ).
And always validate input data in PHP, not only in JS!

Answer 2

Of course it will display the thanks message, all it needs is a response back from the server. What you need is to test whether the mail actually sent or not, then return that back to your original script to determine what message to show.
if(mail($destination, $subject, $message, $headers)) {
return '<p class="success">Thanks for getting in touch - we\'ll get back to you shortly.</p>';
} else {
return '<p class="fail">The e-mail failed to send.</p>';
}
And then set your AJAX to:
$.ajax({
type: "post",
url: "send-email.php",
data: $("#contact").serialize(),
success: function(data) {
$('.form').html(data);
}
});
You'll probably find that you get the fail message, and that could well be the setup of your server, or it could be you not passing the right thing to the mail() function. You then need to debug your script to find out whether the right information is being passed etc.
With Windows servers they need to be configured to pass all mail from the mail() function to an SMTP server, so if that's not been done on your Azure server then your mail will instantly fail.