Email confirmation of new orders is unreadable.

[jptechnical]

Quite literally 'out of the blue' our production shopping cart started sending confirmation emails that are totally unreadable.

I'm not sure what this is, but it looks like a session ID or a hash or some other ascii, perhaps attachment encoding? I have searched google for "0tLS" which is repeated in the first line and found many cases of it but nothing that indicates what it is. So I am assuming it is mail encoding content related in some way.

Below are examples, please let me know what you think and where I should start. Like I said this is a production system and has been running fine for 2 years.





This is what I get in a normal (text only, no mime) order confirmation:
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I tried LF and CRLF, I also tried MIME and what I get is (slightly sanitized, although I bet you could decode it from the above somehow :

--=_65c079893aadd09074cd0cbd516868ca
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1"
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit

IAOM-US
------------------------------------------------------
Order Number: 473
Detailed Invoice: https://iaom-us.com/shop/account_history_info.php?order_id=473
Date Ordered: Wednesday 20 December, 2006

test order

Products
------------------------------------------------------
1 x Diagnosis and Treatment of the Upper Extremity () = $103.00
------------------------------------------------------
Sub-Total: $103.00
Total: $103.00

Delivery Address
------------------------------------------------------
Company name:
FirstName LastName
Job Title or Student ID:
742 Evergreen Terrace, suite 105
Springfield, IL    55555
United States

Billing Address
------------------------------------------------------
Company name:
FirstName LastName
Job Title or Student ID:
742 Evergreen Terrace, suite 105
Springfield, IL    55555
United States

Payment Method
------------------------------------------------------
Check/Money Order

Make Payable To: 

Send To:
IAOM-US
877-IAOM-WEB
P.O. Box 65179
Tucson, AZ 85728-5179

Your order will not ship until we receive payment.


--=_65c079893aadd09074cd0cbd516868ca
Content-Type: text/html; charset="iso-8859-1"
Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable

IAOM-US<br>------------------------------------------------------<br>Order =
Number: 473<br>Detailed Invoice: https://iaom-us.com/shop/account_history_i=
nfo.php?order_id=3D473<br>Date Ordered: Wednesday 20 December, 2006<br><br>= test order<br><br>Products<br>---------------------------------------------=
---------<br>1 x Diagnosis and Treatment of the Upper Extremity () =3D $103= .00<br>------------------------------------------------------<br>Sub-Total:=
 $103.00<br>Total: $103.00<br><br>Delivery Address<br>---------------------= ---------------------------------<br>Company name:<br>FirstName LastName<br>Job Ti=
tle or Student ID:<br>742 Evergreen Terrace, suite 105<br>Springfield, IL    55555<b=
r>United States<br><br>Billing 
r>Address<br>---------------------------------=
---------------------<br>Company name:<br>FirstName LastName<br>Job Title or Stude=
nt ID:<br>742 Evergreen Terrace, suite 105<br>Springfield, IL    55555<br>United Sta=
tes<br><br>Payment Method<br>----------------------------------------------=
--------<br>Check/Money Order<br><br>Make Payable To: <br><br>Send To:<br>I= AOM-US<br>877-IAOM-WEB<br>P.O. Box 65179<br>Tucson, AZ 85728-5179<br><br>Yo= ur order will not ship until we receive payment.<br><br>
--=_65c079893aadd09074cd0cbd516868ca--
uww

Here is my server info output:

Server OS: 	Linux 2.6.9-34.106.unsupportedsmp 	     Database: 	MySQL 3.23.58-log
Server Date: 	12/20/2006 15:13:30 	     Datebase Date: 	12/20/2006 15:13:30
Server Up Time: 	15:13:30 up 227 days, 21:20, 2 users, load average: 0.44, 0.44, 0.44
HTTP Server: 	Apache/1.3.34 (Unix)
PHP Version: 	4.4.2 (Zend: 1.3.0)
osCommerce
osCommerce 2.2-MS2
PHP Logo
PHP Version 4.4.2 with Hardening-Patch 0.4.8

System 	Linux  2.6.9-34.106.unsupportedsmp #1 SMP Sat Mar 18 16:08:26 CST 2006 i686
Build Date 	Dec 18 2006 17:06:34
Configure Command 	'./configure' '--with-mysql' '--enable-force-cgi-redirect' '--enable-discard-path' '--enable-fastcgi' '--with-gd=/usr/local' '--with-jpeg-dir=/usr/local' '--enable-calendar' '--enable-mbstring' '--with-freetype-dir=/usr' '--with-zlib=/usr' '--with-bz2'
Server API 	CGI/FastCGI
Virtual Directory Support 	disabled
Configuration File (php.ini) Path 	/usr/local/lib/php.ini
PHP API 	20020918
PHP Extension 	20020429
Zend Extension 	20050606
Debug Build 	no
Zend Memory Manager 	enabled
Thread Safety 	disabled
Registered PHP Streams 	php, http, ftp, compress.bzip2, compress.zlib


MySQL Support	enabled
Active Persistent Links 	0
Active Links 	1
Client API version 	3.23.49
MYSQL_MODULE_TYPE 	builtin
MYSQL_SOCKET 	/tmp/mysql.sock
MYSQL_INCLUDE 	no value
MYSQL_LIBS 	no value

[jptechnical]

Grrr... I tried another sample form to email script and it fails as well. I asked the stupid crappy host if they made any changes to sendmail or PHP and they said no. Liars!

I guess I will update this thread in case it ever comes up again.

[michael_s]

If you ever find out the cause of this, let us know. It looks to me like a mime type is being set differently on the server.