Re: Email verification (was: [PHP] Removing Invalid Users)

"Arcady Genkin" <a.genkin@utoronto.ca> wrote: > If I understand correctly, vrfy does not wholy depend on that > functionality to be supported by the server. I think that it simply > connects to the smtp port of the mail exchanger and emulates an email > delivery, aborting halfway. I hadn't used the tool until after this thread started, but it appears it uses the vrfy command when checking an email address, other flags let you check a domain's mx record or attempt to use the etrn command. > Basically it wants to determine whether > the mail exchanger would accept email for a given domain. In most > cases it won't give you 100% certainty that the email addy is legit, > but at least you know that the domain part is not faked, and there is > a mail exchanger willing to serve it. I'll give you that b/c it does have a way to do it. IMO, it makes more sense to use PHP's built in functions that can do the same, but YMMV. vrfy does appear to be a decent tool, my point was that when checking email addresses (not domains) most servers will deny the vrfy command and so it won't be very useful. In fact, I tried a number of different email addresses on different hosts and all reported "Command Unimplemented". -- Steve Werby President, Befriend Internet Services LLC http://www.befriend.com/