How to send an email with a CSV attachment from a string

email, php

Solution

You can wrap the CSV creation code into a single function easily in a much shorter and more efficient way.

The correct MIME type for CSV files is `text/csv`. Also, you should use string concatenation and explicit `\r\n` sequences, since RFCs call for CRLF line separations and by using heredoc/nowdoc/output buffering with literal new lines, you will end up with 2 problems:

- Your indentation may screw up the message format

- Copying the file via FTP in ASCII mode may break the line endings

Try this instead:

function create_csv_string($data) {

  // Open temp file pointer
  if (!$fp = fopen('php://temp', 'w+')) return FALSE;

  // Loop data and write to file pointer
  foreach ($data as $line) fputcsv($fp, $line);

  // Place stream pointer at beginning
  rewind($fp);

  // Return the data
  return stream_get_contents($fp);

}

function send_csv_mail ($csvData, $body, $to = 'youraddress@example.com', $subject = 'Test email with attachment', $from = 'webmaster@example.com') {

  // This will provide plenty adequate entropy
  $multipartSep = '-----'.md5(time()).'-----';

  // Arrays are much more readable
  $headers = array(
    "From: $from",
    "Reply-To: $from",
    "Content-Type: multipart/mixed; boundary=\"$multipartSep\""
  );

  // Make the attachment
  $attachment = chunk_split(base64_encode(create_csv_string($csvData))); 

  // Make the body of the message
  $body = "--$multipartSep\r\n"
        . "Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed\r\n"
        . "Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit\r\n"
        . "\r\n"
        . "$body\r\n"
        . "--$multipartSep\r\n"
        . "Content-Type: text/csv\r\n"
        . "Content-Transfer-Encoding: base64\r\n"
        . "Content-Disposition: attachment; filename=\"file.csv\"\r\n"
        . "\r\n"
        . "$attachment\r\n"
        . "--$multipartSep--";

   // Send the email, return the result
   return @mail($to, $subject, $body, implode("\r\n", $headers)); 

}

$array = array(array(1,2,3,4,5,6,7), array(1,2,3,4,5,6,7), array(1,2,3,4,5,6,7));

send_csv_mail($array, "Hello World!!!\r\n This is simple text email message.");

Problem

Here is my attempt at it can you let me know what I am doing wrong? allputcsv converts the array into a csv formatted string. That is then base64 encoded and chunk split, this seems to work for normal files but is there something different I should do because I am using a string? ``` <?php function sputcsv($row, $delimiter = ',', $enclosure = '"', $eol = "\n") { static $fp = false; if ($fp === false) { $fp = fopen('php://temp', 'r+'); } else { rewind($fp); } if (fputcsv($fp, $row, $delimiter, $enclosure) === false) { return false; } rewind($fp); $csv = fgets($fp); if ($eol != PHP_EOL) { $csv = substr($csv, 0, (0 - strlen(PHP_EOL))) . $eol; } return $csv; } function allputcsv($arr) { $str = ""; foreach($arr as $val) { $str .= sputcsv($val); } return $str; } function send_mail($arr) { $to = 'youraddress@example.com'; $subject = 'Test email with attachment'; $random_hash = md5(date('r', time())); $headers = "From: webmaster@example.com\r\nReply-To: webmaster@example.com"; $headers .= "\r\nContent-Type: multipart/mixed; boundary=\"--".$random_hash."\""; $attachment = chunk_split(base64_encode(allputcsv($arr))); ob_start(); ?> --<?php echo $random_hash; ?> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Hello World!!! This is simple text email message. --<?php echo $random_hash; ?> Content-Type: application/vnd.ms-excel; name="test.csv" Content-Transfer-Encoding: base64 Content-Disposition: attachment; filename="test.csv" <?php echo $attachment; ?> --<?php echo $random_hash; ?>-- <?php $message = ob_get_clean(); $mail_sent = @mail( $to, $subject, $message, $headers ); } $array = array(array(1,2,3,4,5,6,7),array(1,2,3,4,5,6,7),array(1,2,3,4,5,6,7)); send_mail($array); ?> ``` Notes: I have to use the mail function I don't have a choice (I could use a wrapper but I would prefer not to) and I cant save the file on the server side.

Original source