Anyway to make this faster?

[markster]

Hi.

I've been given the un-enviable job of writing a script to send 5000 emails to the addresses in a database. At the moment I'm uing this but it seems to take forever:

PHP Code:

<?php

mysql_connect("###############","##","##");
@mysql_select_db("##");

$query = trim(stripslashes($_POST['query']));

$result = mysql_query($query);

while ($row = mysql_fetch_array($result)) {
    $msg = wordwrap($_POST['message'],70);
    $msg = nl2br(trim(stripslashes($msg)));
    $sub = nl2br(trim(stripslashes($_POST['subject'])));
    $msg = preg_replace("`\[n\]`",$row[1],$msg);
    $sub = preg_replace("`\[n\]`",$row[1],$sub);
    $msg = preg_replace("`\[e\]`",$row[0],$msg);
    $sub = preg_replace("`\[e\]`",$row[0],$sub);
    $msg = preg_replace("`\[d\]`",date("d-m-Y"),$msg);
    $sub = preg_replace("`\[d\]`",date("d-m-Y"),$sub);
    $msg = preg_replace("`\[t\]`",date("g:i A"),$msg);
    $sub = preg_replace("`\[t\]`",date("g:i A"),$sub);
    $msg = "Can't read this? Plain text email:<br>\n".$_POST['plaintext']."<br>\r\n<br>\r\n".$msg;
    echo("Sending to ".$row[0]."... ");
    $headers  = 'MIME-Version: 1.0' . "\r\n";
    $headers .= 'Content-type: text/html; charset=iso-8859-1' . "\r\n";
    $mail = mail($row[0],$sub,$msg,$headers);
}
?>

What can I do to make it faster?

[teknomage1]

Why not build the message outside the while loop, I mean only the addresses come from the database right?

[markster]

I gave that a try and made it tell me for each one if it sent or not. it manages the first 300 exactly then starts failing

[teknomage1]

It could be that your outgoing smtp server has a flow control cap to prevent spamming.

[sde]

yeah, most web apps that do stuff like this will send 10-100 emails at a time. you could store the count of the email addresses in a session variable and then use a meta refresh on the page to only send x number of emails at a time. when you print the meta refresh, it will print a GET variable of where to start.

for example, your script maybe: mymailer.php .. so this script will first query the db for the total number of email addresses, store it in a session variable, send out the first 10 emails, and then print a meta refresh with a start variable incremented by 10.

here's some example psuedo code that is untested and not meant for use:

PHP Code:

<?php
// start the session
session_start();

// set how many emails you want to send per page
$limit = 20;

// if the count has not been set, then let's set it
if (!$_SESSION['count']) {
  $result = mysql_query("select count(*) from users");
  $_SESSION['count'] = mysql_result($result,0,0);
  
  // since we wouldn't have run this before, let's
  // set the starting point.  later this will be set in the url
  $_GET['start'] = 1;
}

// now we wil run the query with the start and limit vars
$result = mysql_query("select email from users limit ".$_GET['start'].", ".$limit);
while ($row= mysql_fetch_assoc($result)) {
  // send out the email here
  // maybe echo the people getting emailed here too
}

// now lets print out a meta refresh to the browser so
// the page will refresh and query a new set of results.
// only do this if we haven't reached the end yet.
if ($_GET['start']+$limit < $_SESSION['count']) {
  echo '<meta http-equiv="refresh" content="2;url=mymailer.php?start='.$_GET['start']+$limit.'">';
} else {
  echo "Mail complete";
}
?>

[markster]

in the meta refresh should it not be mymailer.php?start=$_GET['start']+$limit and not $_GET['start']+10?

[markster]

hmm, im using this:

PHP Code:

echo('<meta http-equiv="refresh" content="2;url=step2.2.php?start='.$start+$limit.'">'); 


but it only prints out 5">

[sde]

yes, that was a mistake.

what prints out 5?