get the 'From:' header

Hi,

I'm giving Manuel Lemos's Pop3 PHP class a go. I want to query a pop3 account and then store the email in a MySQL database. The bit I'm trying to do now is split the email headers into variables. I can see they are being read into an array, but I'm not up on email header information enough to know how to consitently say which one is the 'From:' line. So for example, if I just wanted the body, subject and from data, how would I extract that?

Tips, pointers much appreciated.

Probably the easiest way is to check all header lines to get the header names line this:

$header_name=strtolower(strtok($header,":"));

if(!strcmp($header_name,"from"))
$from=trim(strtok(""));

Thanks Manuel. That got me started. I ideally just want the actual email address, so I wrote this:

for($line=0;$line<count($headers);$line++)
{
preg_match_all('/From: ".*" <.*>/Uis',$headers[$line], $matches);
if (count($matches[0][0]==1))
{
preg_match_all('/<.*>/Uis',$matches[0][0], $emailmatch);
$emailmatch[0][0]=str_replace("<","",$emailmatch[0][0]);
$emailmatch[0][0]=str_replace(">","",$emailmatch[0][0]);
echo "<PRE>",HtmlSpecialChars($emailmatch[0][0]),"</PRE>\n";
}
}

(before i was getting, for example: From: My Name <[email protected]>)

I just want the [email protected] part. The above code does work, but it's not that robust. It shows you what I am trying to do though. Have you a better suggestion...? Much appreciated.

update to the above code:

This is a bit better as it should be able to handle whether the From email address has a name prefix before the <[email protected]> part.

<?
preg_match_all('/From: .*>/Uis',$headers[$line], $matches);
if (count($matches[0][0]==1))
{
preg_match_all('/<.*>/Uis',$matches[0][0], $emailmatch);
$emailmatch[0][0]=str_replace("<","",$emailmatch[0][0]);
$emailmatch[0][0]=str_replace(">","",$emailmatch[0][0]);
echo "<PRE>",HtmlSpecialChars($emailmatch[0][0]),"</PRE>\n";
}
?>

This only seems to work for the first message when placed into the test_pop3 code though. How would I loop through all messages that have been received and display the From <[email protected]>....? I'll be working on it in the meantime to see if I can figure it out.

Thanks!

He he, I think I'm getting there now actually. This loops through messages and displays the subject and email address:

<?
for($message=0; $message<=count($result); $message++){
if(($error=$pop3->RetrieveMessage($message,$headers,$body,2))=="")
{
for($line=0;$line<count($headers);$line++)
{
preg_match_all('/From: .*>/Uis',$headers[$line], $matches);
if (count($matches[0][0]==1))
{
preg_match_all('/<.*>/Uis',$matches[0][0], $emailmatch);
$emailmatch[0][0]=str_replace("<","",$emailmatch[0][0]); $emailmatch[0][0]=str_replace(">","",$emailmatch[0][0]);
echo "<PRE>",HtmlSpecialChars($emailmatch[0][0]),"</PRE>\n";

}

}
for($line=0;$line<count($body);$line++)
echo "<PRE>",HtmlSpecialChars($body[$line]),"</PRE>\n";

if(($error=$pop3->DeleteMessage(1))=="")
{
//echo "<PRE>Marked message 1 for deletion.</PRE>\n";
if(($error=$pop3->ResetDeletedMessages())=="")
{
//echo "<PRE>Resetted the list of messages to be deleted.</PRE>\n";
}
}
}
}
?>

Just posting this in case it helps someone else.

hi there manuel,
i need your help.
my problem is, i am hosting my website in godaddy, and i am planning to use POP3 to get all my email messages, i used several examples of pop3 from this site, but i connot connect to the server...please give me a good example for pop3...thnx
by the way i am using php

You need to try the test_pop3.php example, adjust the user, password and host variables, and tell me what is the error that it is showing.

Hi! Excuse for mine English.
It does not turn out in any way to take the information from a field "Subject". So for example is present " Subject: Test "
I can not therefrom take and variable meaning(importance) "Test"

And still question.
How to mark the letter, what it is already read?

It can be made using IMAP?