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Configuring XAMPP to send e-mails without Mercury

PostPosted: 03. July 2008 15:53
by Tim Dawson
I've recently upgraded my XAMPP installation. The previous version was running without any problems, but I felt I should get the latest PHP, MySQL etc.

In the previous version I was able to SEND e-mails into the real world (from a form on my test web site on localhost), but I managed to do this without running Mercury. I cannot recall exactly what I did to achieve this. Can anyone give me some help here, please.

OS=WinXP Home SP2, Firefox3

PostPosted: 03. July 2008 18:51
by Milligan

PostPosted: 04. July 2008 06:46
by Tim Dawson
Thank you. I've got it working now, although I don't really understand why.

I followed your links, and compared the /apache/bin/php.ini files in my old and new XAMPP installations. The only setting that appeared relevant was '; For Unix only. You may supply arguments as well (default: "sendmail -t -i").
sendmail_path = "D:\xampp\sendmail\sendmail.exe -t"', which was commented OUT in the new installation. Deleting the ';' and restarting Apache solved the problem.

My computer is running WinXP, not Unix. I'm aware that Apache is normally run in the Unix environment, so perhaps that is the explanation. The main thing is, it works (and the e-mails went to my ISP and were routed back to my e-mail address as intended).

PostPosted: 04. July 2008 08:21
by Milligan

PostPosted: 04. July 2008 09:05
by Tim Dawson
Milligan wrote:My guess is that in your email form, sendmail has been selected to send your email form's content.


Your guess is correct. Thank you for the explanation. I'd half realised that Fake Sendmail came in there somewhere, but hadn't got any further. I spent quite a long time trying various options in the 'sendmail.ini' until I realised it made no difference.

I will take a look at the Fake Sendmail web site. Many thanks.

PostPosted: 04. July 2008 09:16
by Milligan

PostPosted: 04. July 2008 10:03
by Tim Dawson
The e-mail addresses are variables in the PHP, and don't actually show on the forms. We don't seem to have suffered a lot of spam, and it's been running for about four years.

The only reason I need to use sendmail is for testing the forms locally, so I can be sure that they work as intended. I could test on a live sandbox but it's easier this way.

To put the e-mail addresses into sendmail.ini at the ISP where the live site is hosted might prove tricky. I've not tried it, and am not certain I can FTP to the right place. I'll look.

Thanks again.

Later: I've downloaded the latest Fake Sendmail, and it seems to be working OK.