email processing script, need help trying to catch =0D and =5f encoded characters

[chris_fieldhouse@hotmail.com]

Hi,

I have a script for processing emails,
The script finds email sent to a particular alias, grabs the body text
of the email and stores it into a database.

Problem is that certain character like '_' sometimes get stored as =5F,
and some email clients seem to add in =0D encoded characters.

I store the text in an Mysql database, and depending on the message
type I also set a flag to indicate whether its a plain text message, or
a MIME message with HTML coding.
Its alwasy the HTML messages that have the extra characters.

here is the code segment I modified from php.net to break down the
email structure and grab just the body text (not interested in storring
any attachments).

Any help would be appreciated.

# some borrowed code to get the email contents and attachments,
$MIME = FALSE;
$debug = "";

$struct = imap_fetchstruc ture($conn, $msg);
$parts = $struct->parts;
$i = 0;

# messages are either simple, only text, or complex with attachments.
if (!$parts) { /* Simple message, only 1 piece */
$content = imap_body($conn , $msg);
} else { /* Complicated message, multiple parts */

# complex message: multi-part - dump attachments (do not forward to
ANK).
$endwhile = false;
$stack = array(); /* Stack while parsing message */
$content = ""; /* Content of message */

while (!$endwhile) {
if (!$parts[$i]) {
if (count($stack) > 0) {
$parts = $stack[count($stack)-1]["p"];
$i = $stack[count($stack)-1]["i"] + 1;
array_pop($stac k);
} else {
$endwhile = true;
}
}

if (!$endwhile) {
/* Create message part first (example '1.2.3') */
$partstring = "";
foreach ($stack as $s) {
$partstring .= ($s["i"]+1) . ".";
}
$partstring .= ($i+1);
$debug .= strtoupper($par ts[$i]->subtype) . "\n";

# only grab the plain text message - everything else will get dumped!

if (strtoupper($pa rts[$i]->subtype) == "PLAIN" && $MIME ==
FALSE) { /* Message */
$content = imap_fetchbody( $conn, $msg, $partstring);
}
if (strtoupper($pa rts[$i]->subtype) == "HTML" ) { /*
Message */
$content = imap_fetchbody( $conn, $msg, $partstring);
$MIME = TRUE;
}
}

if ($parts[$i]->parts) {
$stack[] = array("p" => $parts, "i" => $i);
$parts = $parts[$i]->parts;
$i = 0;
} else {
$i++;
}
} /* while */
} /* complicated message */

[d]

Re: email processing script, need help trying to catch =0D and =5f encoded characters

<chris_fieldhou se@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:1139412284 .395848.305720@ o13g2000cwo.goo glegroups.com.. .[color=blue]
> Hi,
>
> I have a script for processing emails,
> The script finds email sent to a particular alias, grabs the body text
> of the email and stores it into a database.
>
> Problem is that certain character like '_' sometimes get stored as =5F,
> and some email clients seem to add in =0D encoded characters.
>[/color]

[snippy snip snip]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quoted-printable

It's a type of MIME encoding called "quoted printable". Read up about it -
it's really quite simple to encode/decode.

dave

[chris_fieldhouse@hotmail.com]

Re: email processing script, need help trying to catch =0D and =5f encoded characters

Ah,

So I should do this check
if (strtoupper($pa rts[$i]->encoding) == "QUOTED-PRINTABLE")
and if true, then use
imap_qprint function to convert it to 8-Bit.

Does that seem like a reasonable approach?

Thanks for your help.

[Mike Scougall]

Re: email processing script, need help trying to catch =0D and =5f encoded characters


<chris_fieldhou se@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:1139412284 .395848.305720@ o13g2000cwo.goo glegroups.com.. .[color=blue]
> Hi,
>
> I have a script for processing emails,
> The script finds email sent to a particular alias, grabs the body text
> of the email and stores it into a database.
>
> Problem is that certain character like '_' sometimes get stored as =5F,
> and some email clients seem to add in =0D encoded characters.
>
> I store the text in an Mysql database, and depending on the message
> type I also set a flag to indicate whether its a plain text message, or
> a MIME message with HTML coding.
> Its alwasy the HTML messages that have the extra characters.
>
> here is the code segment I modified from php.net to break down the
> email structure and grab just the body text (not interested in storring
> any attachments).
>
> Any help would be appreciated.
>[/color]

You could try using addslashes($con tent) just before writing the string to
the DB. Use stripslashes() when you pull the string back out.

There are also strip_tags() and htmlspecialchar s() functions that strip out
or convert HTML and PHP tags. You might find one of those useful.

HTH

------------------------------------
Mike S
Copywriting for the IT Professional

https://www.redmaplesoftware.com

[chris_fieldhouse@hotmail.com]

Re: email processing script, need help trying to catch =0D and =5f encoded characters

I currently do the addslashes before saving to the database.

Doing a simple echo of the $contents in the php script right after the
imap_fetchbody shows me that the Quoted-Printable are already present,
so it now becomes a problem of recognising that they are in there and
converting them accordingly.

Chris.

[chris_fieldhouse@hotmail.com]

Re: email processing script, need help trying to catch =0D and =5f encoded characters

Dave,

Just putting this code in does the trick:
if (strtoupper($pa rts[$i]->encoding) == "4")
$content = imap_qprint($co ntent);

All the Quoted Printable characters are converted.

Thanks.

Chris

[d]

Re: email processing script, need help trying to catch =0D and =5f encoded characters

<chris_fieldhou se@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:1139430604 .447530.308590@ f14g2000cwb.goo glegroups.com.. .[color=blue]
> Dave,
>
> Just putting this code in does the trick:
> if (strtoupper($pa rts[$i]->encoding) == "4")
> $content = imap_qprint($co ntent);
>
> All the Quoted Printable characters are converted.
>
> Thanks.
>
> Chris[/color]

Nice!

dave