Joey
(@leglesslizard)
Hi,
I think you would want to either setup some behavioural tests using something like codeception or behat which can be a little complex but allows you to programmatically run a process as a user would.
Or code a plugin that mimics the behaviour of the email sending service you are using. This is the option I’d go with as I am far more familar with this kind of process:
– build a custom plugin
– add functions to mimic sending emails for each of the plugins you use
– add checks to make sure these plugins are installed
– add the required functions onto a cron task (automatic) to fire at a regular interval
– add a function that details the error in an email to yourself (site name, service being used, email details etc)
I could be wrong but I don’t think there is a way to confirm for sure that an email has gone out AND has been received by the intended recipient. Best you can do on your end is check your mail function sent it.
This could be quite an undertaking, however, depending on your coding experience. If this isn’t what you were after hopefully someone has an idea of something out there that can help. I would think your best bet would be an extension for each plugin but I assume you’ve checked this out and came up with nothing.
I hope you sort it one way or the other!
Joey
The problem with contact forms is never going to be the form itself, it’s going to be something in the email process. Testing the wp_mail() functionality should be adequate. If that works, the contact form will work, assuming it was tested to work initially and has not been changed.
There’s no reliable way to confirm email is received using automation that I know of. Like Joey suggests, you could setup a periodic scheduled task that sends you mail at regular intervals. The problem is even if you receive messages from the server, there is no guarantee your client or who ever normally processes contact form email will also successfully receive email.
Email is simply unreliable. At least CF7 has a plugin extension that saves messages to the DB instead of emailing. It hasn’t been maintained in a while, but it still works properly last time I checked. I don’t know about the other contact form plugins. This is much more reliable. It does mean the client needs to login to the site in order to check for messages, but it’s really no worse than logging into an email web client.
