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PHP

Posted by jerome moore
jerome moore
5,005 Points

TreeHouse Blog post on creating Jquery Ajax PHP mail form 500 error

I was following the blog post from http://blog.teamtreehouse.com/create-ajax-contact-form and I got all steps to work on my localhost/MAMP config EXCEPT getting the php script to actually mail the file contents. It keeps giving me a 500 error. did not know how to debug so If I can get some helpful tips, that would be awesome. PHP version on MAMP is 7.0.0

EDIT sorry - forgot something :-/

php code first:

<?php

    // Only process POST reqeusts.
    if ($_SERVER["REQUEST_METHOD"] == "POST") {
        // Get the form fields and remove whitespace.
        $name = strip_tags(trim($_POST["name"]));
                $name = str_replace(array("\r","\n"),array(" "," "),$name);
        $email = filter_var(trim($_POST["email"]), FILTER_SANITIZE_EMAIL);
        $message = trim($_POST["message"]);

        // Check that data was sent to the mailer.
        if ( empty($name) OR empty($message) OR !filter_var($email, FILTER_VALIDATE_EMAIL)) {
            // Set a 400 (bad request) response code and exit.
            http_response_code(400);
            echo "Oops! There was a problem with your submission. Please complete the form and try again.";
            exit;
        }

        // Set the recipient email address.
        // FIXME: Update this to your desired email address.
        $recipient = "jeromemoore@usa.com";

        // Set the email subject.
        $subject = "New contact from $name";

        // Build the email content.
        $email_content = "Name: $name\n";
        $email_content .= "Email: $email\n\n";
        $email_content .= "Message:\n$message\n";

        // Build the email headers.
        $email_headers = "From: $name <$email>";

        // Send the email.
        if (mail($recipient, $subject, $email_content, $email_headers)) {
            // Set a 200 (okay) response code.
            http_response_code(200);
            echo "Thank You! Your message has been sent.";
        } else {
            // Set a 500 (internal server error) response code.
            http_response_code(500);
            echo "Oops! Something went wrong and we couldn't send your message.";
        }

    } else {
        // Not a POST request, set a 403 (forbidden) response code.
        http_response_code(403);
        echo "There was a problem with your submission, please try again.";
    }

?>

The Javascript:

<script>
        $(document).ready(function($) {
     var form = $('#ajax-contact');
    $(form).submit(function(event) {
         var formData = {
             'name'              : $('#name').val(),
             'email'             : $('#email').val(),
             'message'           : $('#message').val()
         };
        //var formData = $(form).serialize();
        event.preventDefault();
        console.log(formData);
        $.ajax({
            type: "POST",
            url: $(form).attr('action'), 
            data: formData,
            success: function(msg){
              alert("form post success!");
                //$("#stayInformed").modal('hide');
            },
            error: function(){
                alert("form post failed");
            }   
        });
    });
  });
</script>

The Form:

      <div class="footer-right">

        <p class="holla">Contact Us</p>

        <form method="post" id="ajax-contact" name="emailform" action="email.php">
          <input type="text" name="name" placeholder="Name" id="name" required>
          <input type="text" name="email" placeholder="Email" id="email" required>
          <textarea name="message" placeholder="Message" id="message" required></textarea>
          <button type="submit" name='submit' value="submit">Send</button>

        </form>

      </div>

     Any Ideas?
Codin - Codesmite
Codin - Codesmite
8,600 Points
Codin - Codesmite
Codin - Codesmite
8,600 Points

Hi Jerome, can you post your code here so that we check and see what may be going wrong.

2 Answers

jerome moore
jerome moore
5,005 Points
jerome moore
jerome moore
5,005 Points

Any Ideas Ashley?

jack AM
jack AM
2,618 Points
jack AM
jack AM
2,618 Points

Hi Jerome,

What mail server are you using? Before I delve into anything else (because your code looks fine), I don't want to assume that you're not using one, but I happened to notice that in the tutorial you linked, the author assumes that those following has one up and running already. I assume this, because he doesn't mention it anywhere in the tutorial, however one is needed to send email using php's mail() function, and would be a good culprit as to why you're receiving that 500 error.

jerome moore
jerome moore
5,005 Points
jerome moore
jerome moore
5,005 Points

Hello Jack,

Thanks for the insight. I am using sendmail on a linux ubuntu 14.04 box. It gives a success message, but does not send mail. not sure what the issue is, but I suspect it is a configuration issue with sendmail?