Sending a dynamically generated image

Question

I need to create an image dynamically and then send it to the user. Here is the script image creation:

//Get the blank coupon $rImg = ImageCreateFromJPEG('coupon.jpg'); $color = imagecolorallocate($rImg, 0, 0, 0); imagestring($rImg,5,135,140,'$first_name', 'black'); imagestring($rImg,5,135,160,'$last_name', 'black'); imagestring($rImg,5,135,180,'$email_address', 'black'); 

From there I want to take this image and send it to a person. Can I just include it in my email application or do I really need to write it to the server?

I tried to do this:

 function email_coupon($first_name, $last_name, $email_address){ //Get the blank coupon $rImg = ImageCreateFromJPEG('coupon.jpg'); $color = imagecolorallocate($rImg, 0, 0, 0); imagestring($rImg,5,135,140,'$first_name', 'black'); imagestring($rImg,5,135,160,'$last_name', 'black'); imagestring($rImg,5,135,180,'$email_address', 'black'); //define the receiver of the email $to = '$email_address'; //define the subject of the email $subject = 'Your coupon'; //create a boundary string. It must be unique //so we use the MD5 algorithm to generate a random hash $random_hash = md5(date('r', time())); //define the headers we want passed. Note that they are separated with \r\n $headers = "From: [e-mail] \r\nReply-To: [e-mail] "; //add boundary string and mime type specification $headers .= "\r\nContent-Type: multipart/mixed; boundary=\"PHP-mixed-".$random_hash."\""; //read the atachment file contents into a string, //encode it with MIME base64, //and split it into smaller chunks ob_start(); imagejpeg($rImg); $i = ob_get_clean(); $attachment = chunk_split(base64_encode($i)); //define the body of the message. ob_clean(); ob_start(); //Turn on output buffering ?> --PHP-mixed-<?php echo $random_hash; ?> Content-Type: multipart/alternative; boundary="PHP-alt-<?php echo $random_hash; ?>" --PHP-alt-<?php echo $random_hash; ?> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Hello World!!! This is simple text email message. --PHP-alt-<?php echo $random_hash; ?> Content-Type: text/html; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit <h2>Hello World!</h2> <p>This is something with <b>HTML</b> formatting.</p> --PHP-alt-<?php echo $random_hash; ?>-- --PHP-mixed-<?php echo $random_hash; ?> Content-Type: image/jpeg; name="coupon.jpg" Content-Transfer-Encoding: base64 Content-Disposition: attachment <?php echo $attachment; ?> --PHP-mixed-<?php echo $random_hash; ?>-- <?php //copy current buffer contents into $message variable and delete current output buffer $message = ob_get_clean(); //send the email $mail_sent = @mail( $email_address, $subject, $message, $headers ); //if the message is sent successfully print "Mail sent". Otherwise print "Mail failed" if($mail_sent == true) { echo 'sent'; } else { echo 'failed'; }; 

};

Does anyone have any ideas?

Thanks in advance.

Answer 1

You do not need to write anything to your server / file, but imagejpeg with one argument will automatically print the image in the browser. To get it in a variable, use ob_start and ob_get_contents :

 ob_start(); imagejpeg($rImg); $i = ob_get_contents(); $attachment = chunk_split(base64_encode($i)); // clear the buffer, but don't destroy it ob_clean(); // echo out mail like usual echo("Mail body here"); $message = ob_get_clean(); 

http://www.php.net/manual/en/ref.outcontrol.php

For your code:

 function email_coupon($first_name, $last_name, $email_address){ //Get the blank coupon $rImg = ImageCreateFromJPEG('coupon.jpg'); $color = imagecolorallocate($rImg, 0, 0, 0); imagestring($rImg,5,135,140,'$first_name', 'black'); imagestring($rImg,5,135,160,'$last_name', 'black'); imagestring($rImg,5,135,180,'$email_address', 'black'); //define the receiver of the email $to = '$email_address'; //define the subject of the email $subject = 'Your coupon'; //create a boundary string. It must be unique //so we use the MD5 algorithm to generate a random hash $random_hash = md5(date('r', time())); //define the headers we want passed. Note that they are separated with \r\n $headers = "From: [e-mail] \r\nReply-To: [e-mail] "; //add boundary string and mime type specification $headers .= "\r\nContent-Type: multipart/mixed; boundary=\"PHP-mixed-".$random_hash."\""; //read the atachment file contents into a string, //encode it with MIME base64, //and split it into smaller chunks ob_start(); imagejpeg($rImg); $i = ob_get_contents(); $attachment = chunk_split(base64_encode($i)); //define the body of the message. ob_clean(); ?> --PHP-mixed-<?php echo $random_hash; ?> Content-Type: multipart/alternative; boundary="PHP-alt-<?php echo $random_hash; ?>" --PHP-alt-<?php echo $random_hash; ?> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Hello World!!! This is simple text email message. --PHP-alt-<?php echo $random_hash; ?> Content-Type: text/html; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit <h2>Hello World!</h2> <p>This is something with <b>HTML</b> formatting.</p> --PHP-alt-<?php echo $random_hash; ?>-- --PHP-mixed-<?php echo $random_hash; ?> Content-Type: image/jpeg; name="coupon.jpg" Content-Transfer-Encoding: base64 Content-Disposition: attachment <?php echo $attachment; ?> --PHP-mixed-<?php echo $random_hash; ?>-- <?php //copy current buffer contents into $message variable and delete current output buffer $message = ob_get_clean(); //send the email $mail_sent = @mail( $email_address, $subject, $message, $headers ); //if the message is sent successfully print "Mail sent". Otherwise print "Mail failed" if($mail_sent == true) { echo 'sent'; } else { echo 'failed'; };