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This is in addition to my previous post about creating a simple contact form. This post will utilize the Akismet service to classify some messages as spam.

The Prerequisites

To follow this tutorial, I assume you already have a simple contact form in place.

Akismet PHP Library

The folks at Aching Brain created a nifty PHP class to make utilizing the Akismet service easier. Download this library then put it in the same directory as your contact form file.

There are implementations available in other languages as well.

The PHP

This code will completely replace the PHP code from the previous post. However, I assume the HTML used is unchanged.

First, include the Akismet library:

<?php
require "Akismet.class.php";

Now, create a more generic function for sending an email:

function send_mail( $name, $email, $website, $ip, $is_spam, $message)
  {
  		$subject = '';
  		if( $spam == true )
  			$subject = "[SPAM?]";
  		$subject .= "[Your_site.com] E-mail received from ".$author_name."//".$author_email."//".$ip;

  		mail( "send_to_this_address@to.com", $subject,
		$author_name.", ".$author_email.", ".$author_website. ".\r\n\r\n".$message);
}

If the $is_spam parameter is set to true, we simply prepend “[SPAM?]” at the beginning of the subject line. This allows us to see right away what it is in our inbox. Further, you could create an e-mail filter to automatically put these messages in a different e-mail folder.

Now, we have to set-up the Akismet class. This will require a WordPress API Key. If you don’t have one, it’s easy and free to get one.

	if(isset($_POST['action']))
	{
		$wp_key = 'xXxXxXxXxXxX';
		$our_url = 'http://www.your_website.com';

		$name = $_POST['name'];
		$email = $_POST['email'];
		$website = $_POST['website'];
		$message = $_POST['message'];
		$ip = $_SERVER['REMOTE_ADDR'];

		$akismet = new Akismet($our_url, $wp_key);
		$akismet->setCommentAuthor($name);
		$akismet->setCommentAuthorEmail($email);
		$akismet->setCommentAuthorURL($website);
		$akismet->setCommentContent($message);
		$akismet->setUserIP($ip);

		send_mail( $name, $email, $website, $ip, $akismet->isCommentSpam(), $message);
	}
?>

That’s it! Now if a line of spammers hits your contact form, you have a safe guard against it. If you have questions about this piece of code or anything else, feel free to leave a comment!

In conlusion, Akismet is the best!