PHP contact form handler not working? - php

Question

I need a very simple, but effective PHP form handler that will work with this form:
<form id="contact" method="post" action="contact_handle.php">
<label for="name">Name:</label>
<input type="text" class="text_style" placeholder="John Doe" name="name" /><br />
<label for="email">Email:</label>
<input type="email" class="text_style" placeholder="email#example.com" name="email" /><br />
<label for="message">Subject:</label>
<textarea class="areawidth" rows="4" name="message" /></textarea><br />
<button id="contactbutton" type="submit">Submit</button>
</form>
This is what I currently have but it doesn't send an email and it doesn't redirect like I intended. And I cant seem to figure out whats going on.
<?php
$invalid = '';
$my_email = 'my#email.com';
// Validate input:
if(empty($_POST['name']) ||
empty($_POST['email']) ||
empty($_POST['message']))
{
$invalid.= "\n All fields are required";
}
$name = $_POST['name'];
$email = $_POST['email'];
$message = $_POST['message'];
// Validate email:
if (!preg_match(
"/^[_a-z0-9-]+(\.[_a-z0-9-]+)*#[a-z0-9-]+(\.[a-z0-9-]+)*(\.[a-z]{2,3})$/i",
$email))
{
$invalid .= "\n Invalid email address";
}
// Send email if no errors detected:
if( empty($invalid))
{
$to = $my_email;
$subject = "Contact form submission: $name";
$body = "You have received a new message. ".
" Here are the details:\n Name: $name \n ".
"Email: $email\n Message:\n $message";
$headers = "From: $email\n";
$headers .= "Reply-To: $email";
mail($to,$subject,$body,$headers);
//redirect to the thank you page:
header('Location: contact_thanks.php');
}
?>
When it is submitted it takes me to contact_handle.php that displays blank and fails to redirect.

Answer 1

i think the redirect has to be the first output to the browser, so if anything else is being output it won't work.
why don't you just include the thank you page rather than redirecting to it, ie.
include 'contact_thanks.php';

Answer 2

If you're providing all of the code, the issue is that your form is throwing an error (by adding text to $invalid, but there is no code to handle $invalid not being empty. To solve this, add this after the closing } at the end:
echo $invalid;