How to convert a certain special character using PHP

Question

I have a word with a special character in it that does not display properly in the subject line of an email (via mail()).

The word is O’Conner and the special character is ’

"as is" the word appears as O’Conner in the subject line of the incoming email message.

When I use html_entities_decode()the word appears as Oâ€™Conner in the subject line of the incoming email message.

When I use mb_encode_mimeheader("O’Conner", "UTF-8", "Q") the word appears as O’Conner in the subject line of the incoming email message.

Is there a way to get the word to appear is it should?

Other similar or seemingly duplicate question/answers do not see to resolve this particular issue.

I even tried UTF-7 -- that did not work.

Here's the email function:

/**
 * Send an html/smtp email
 */
use PHPMailer\PHPMailer\PHPMailer;
use PHPMailer\PHPMailer\SMTP;
use PHPMailer\PHPMailer\Exception;
function htmlEmailer( $email, $type, $parameter ) {

  require('/etc/phpmailer/vendor/phpmailer/phpmailer/src/Exception.php');
  require('/etc/phpmailer/vendor/phpmailer/phpmailer/src/PHPMailer.php');
  require('/etc/phpmailer/vendor/phpmailer/phpmailer/src/SMTP.php');

  mb_internal_encoding('UTF-8'); // 2021-06-18 added per https://stackoverflow.com/questions/7669668/how-to-use-special-characters-in-recipients-name-when-using-phps-mail-function/7670192#7670192

  // Instantiation and passing "true" enables exceptions
  $mail = new PHPMailer(true); // create a new object

  //Server settings
  $mail->SMTPDebug = 0; // see best_practices.txt file for settings
  $mail->isSMTP(); // set mailer to use SMTP
  $mail->Host = SMTP_SERVER; // specify main and backup SMTP servers separated by semi-colon (defined in config.php)
  $mail->SMTPAuth = true; // enable SMTP authentication
  $mail->Username = SMTP_USER; // SMTP username (defined in config.php)
  $mail->Password = SMTP_PASSWORD; // SMTP password (defined in config.php)
  $mail->SMTPSecure = 'tls'; // enable encryption [tls or ssl]
  $mail->Port = 587; // TCP port to connect to [465 or 587]

  //Recipients
  $mail->setFrom('info@example.com', mb_encode_mimeheader(SENDER_LAST_NAME, 'UTF-8', 'Q'));
  $mail->addAddress($email, ''); // add a recipient [2nd parameter "recipient's name" is optional and is separated by a comma]
  $mail->addReplyTo('no_reply@example.com', 'Do Not Reply');
  //$mail->addCC('me@example.com');
  $mail->addBCC('you@example.com');

  // Attachments
  //$mail->addAttachment('/home/cpanelusername/attachment.txt'); // Add attachments
  //$mail->addAttachment('/home/cpanelusername/image.jpg', 'new.jpg'); // Optional name

  // Content
  $mail->isHTML(true); // Set email format to HTML
  $mail->Subject = 'The message subject';
  $mail->Body = 'HTML message body'; // html formatted body
  $mail->AltBody = "Plain Text message body"; // plain text body

  // Send the Message
  $mail->send();

} // htmlEmailer()

Where are you getting the data from which contains the apostrophe? How is it stored there? How do you construct the email? `’` looks like the html-encoded version of the apostrophe — ADyson, Jun 18 '21 at 16:53
Yes, maybe it is HTML encoded but the email is plaintext, you'll need `Content-Type: text/html` — AbraCadaver, Jun 18 '21 at 16:56
[Email is super funky](https://stackoverflow.com/a/17064593/231316) in regards to encoding, specifically the subject. Please post how you are sending the email. — Chris Haas, Jun 18 '21 at 16:57
It comes from a PHP Constant `define( 'SENDER_LAST_NAME', 'O’Conner' );` — H. Ferrence, Jun 18 '21 at 17:09
I got it to work with `mb_encode_mimeheader(SENDER_LAST_NAME, 'UTF-8', 'Q')`! — H. Ferrence, Jun 18 '21 at 17:28

score 0 · Answer 1 · edited Jun 20 '22 at 09:52

0

Just replace it before sending:

$email_to = str_replace("’", "'", $email_to);

edited Jun 20 '22 at 09:52

helvete

2,455
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answered Jun 15 '22 at 22:20

Samuel_C

13
4

How to convert a certain special character using PHP

1 Answers1