Send an Email Attachment with PHP

>> Send a PDF (or any other file) as a mail attachment

RESOURCE ADDED ON TUESDAY 18 JULY 2006, 16:44:54

To send email attachments you need to make use of MIME (Multipurpose Internet Mail Extensions) - a mechanism that allows email to go beyond a basic, limited character set. MIME has many uses but for the purposes of this tutorial we will send a multipart/mixed MIME email; this means we can send a text email and attach a PDF file to it (for information on attaching other file types please see the end of this tutorial). The MIME side of things will be exaplined as we go. Firstly, let's set the email details and the attachment details up.

Code: Set the Email and Attachment Details

<?php

        $to = "$name <$email>";
        $from = "John-Smith <john.smith@domain.com>";
        $subject = "Here is your attachment";

        $fileatt = "/public_html/pdfs/mypdf.pdf";
        $fileatttype = "application/pdf";
        $fileattname = "newname.pdf";

        $headers = "From: $from";

?>

Downloads: 18552

The email details are obvious; for the attachment we need the path to the file and the headers for the file type (PDF in this case). The $fileattname variable determines the name of the attachment - it doesn't have to match the name of the original file. Next, we need to transfer the file into a variable which we'll call $file.

Code: Read in the Attachment

<?php

        $file = fopen( $fileatt, 'rb' );
        $data = fread( $file, filesize( $fileatt ) );
        fclose( $file );

?>

Downloads: 9666

Now the file has been read in it needs to be converted a format that is compatible with standard email: 7-bit ASCII. Before that, the appropriate headers need to be added to the email so the recipient knows what to expect.

Code: Add the MIME content

Downloads: 15689

The conversion to 7-bit ASCII takes place at the $data = chunk_split( base64_encode( $data ) ) line. The file is then attached using the appropriate headers. Finally - send the email:

Code: Send the email

<?php

        if( mail( $to, $subject, $message, $headers ) ) {

            echo "<p>The email was sent.</p>";

        }
        else {

            echo "<p>There was an error sending the mail.</p>";

        }

    }

?>

Downloads: 8282

You can attach any kind of file you like - you need to make sure that change the $fileatttype variable to reflect the content type of the file you are attaching (e.g. image/gif for a GIF file).

This resource has been viewed 100221 times.

Back to Resources

Back to Tutorials

Back to Web Severside

Support Dr Quincy

These resources are provided free of charge. If, however, you would like to make a donation to help finance these resources, no matter how big or small, please use the PayPal button below.

Credits

This resource was written by Tim Bennett Bsc (Hons). Tim Bennett has a First Class Degree in Multimedia Systems Computing from Leeds Metropolitan University. He works as a freelance multimedia developer under the company name Texelate creating free and commissioned high-quality multimedia solutions. Find out more by visiting the portfolio section and viewing his blog. If you'd like to request a resource get in touch!

Rate this Resource

Click on the appropriate star below to rate this resource:

Num votes: 5860

Average: 8.8 / 10

Comments

Thanks!! Works perfectly
http//ramo.ra.ohost.de

David commented on 18/11/2008, 15:56:44

Thanks!! Works perfectly

David commented on 18/11/2008, 15:51:29

Thanks!

Sebastian commented on 18/11/2008, 15:50:47

I have simple form.html and send.php programe to send email, I would like to add file attachment option, could anyone give help to add.

Bellow is the "Form.html" content (please ignore the validation JScript):

<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN"
"http://www.w3.org/TR/html4/loose.dtd";>
<html>
<head>
<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=iso-8859-1">
<title>Email</title>
<script Language="JavaScript">

function isEmailAddr(email)
{
var result = false;
var theStr = new String(email);
var index = theStr.indexOf("@");
if (index > 0)
{
var pindex = theStr.indexOf(".",index);
if ((pindex > index+1) && (theStr.length > pindex+1))
result = true;
}
return result;
}
function validRequired(formField,fieldLabel)
{
var result = true;
if (formField.value == "")
{
alert('Please enter a value for the "' + fieldLabel +'" field.');
formField.focus();
result = false;
}
return result;
}
function validEmail(formField,fieldLabel,required)
{
var result = true;
if (required && !validRequired(formField,fieldLabel))
result = false;
if (result && ((formField.value.length < 3) || !isEmailAddr(formField.value)) )
{
alert("Please enter a complete email address in the form: yourname@yourdomain.com");
formField.focus();
result = false;
}
return result;
}
function validateForm(theForm)
{

// Customize these calls for your form
// Start ------->

if (!validRequired(theForm.Name,"Full Name"))
return false;
if (!validEmail(theForm.Email,"Email Address",true))
return false;

// <--------- End
return true;
}
</script>
</head>
<body>
<form method="post" name="f" action="mail.php" onSubmit="return validateForm(this);">
<table width="100%" border="0" align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="4">
<tr>
<td valign="top" class="search">Name *<br>
:</td>
<td valign="top"><div align="left">
<input name="Name" type="text" id="Name" size="30">
</div></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td valign="top" class="search">E-mail ID*
<div align="left">:</div></td>
<td valign="top"><div align="left">
<input name="Email" type="text" id="Email" size="30">
<br>
</div></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td valign="top" class="search"><div align="left">File attach<br>
<br>
</div>
<div align="left">:</div></td>
<td valign="top"><input type="file" name="attachment">
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td valign="top">Feedback </td>
<td valign="top"><textarea name="Feedback" cols="40" rows="3" id="Feedback"></textarea></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td colspan="2" valign="top" class="search"><div align="center">
<input type="submit" name="Submit" value=":: Send ::">
<input type="reset" name="Submit2" value="Reset">
</div></td>
</tr>
</table>
</form>
</body>
</html>

Bellow is the "send.php" content:

<html>
<head>
<title>Real Estate and Property Developers in Bangalore</title>
<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=iso-8859-1">
</head>
<?php

/* Start of Configurable Section */

// youremail@domain.com, yourotheremail@yourotherdomain.com etc.
$mailto="pandu@resourcedesign.co.in";
//$bcc="pandu@resourcedesign.co.in";

// What you want to show in the email subject line.
$subject="Send mail";

/* End of Configurable Section */
$domain=parse_url($HTTP_REFERER);
$domain=strtolower($domain['host']);
$message= '<html>
<head>
<title>send</title>
</head>
<body>
<table width="49%" border="0" align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="4">

<tr>
<td width="181" class="search">Name of father / mother <br>
/ guardian *<br> :</td>
<td width="229"><div align="left"> '.$Name.'</div></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td class="search">E-mail ID *
<div align="left">:</div></td>
<td><div align="left"> <font>'.$Email.'</font><br>
</div></td>
</tr>

<tr>
<td class="search">Feedback</td>
<td class="search"><font>'.$Feedback.'</font></td>
</tr>
</table>
</body>
</html>';

mail($mailto, $subject, $message, "Bcc: $bcc\nFrom: \"$Name\" <$Email>\nReply-To: \"$Name\" <$Email>\nX-Mailer: chfeedback.php 2.01\nContent-Type: text/html; charset=iso-8859-1" ); echo '<br><br><center><font type="arial" size="4" class="search">Thank you. Your feedback has been received.<br>For your reference, the form you have submitted is shown below.<br><a href="#" size="3">Back to homepage</a></center><br>' . $message;
?>
</body>
</html>

Pandu commented on 05/11/2008, 13:49:40

How do you include text with the email?

Underbelly commented on 04/11/2008, 18:09:58