In fact, I don't see a perl question at all. I think the answer somehow relates to the fact that the To: header is really part of the body of the message and the smtp "rcpt to:" command describes the actual recipients.

If you want to do this in a perl way, look at Net::SMTP and MIME::Lite. And if you want to really really avoid work, see Net::SMTP::OneLiner.

OK, I was a bit brief on the code that I actually use. Here's the perl code:

$mailProg = "/usr/sbin/sendmail -t";
open (MAIL, "|$mailProg");
print MAIL "Date: $mailheader_date -0500\n";
print MAIL "To: $recipient\n";
print MAIL "From: $adminEmail\n";
print MAIL "Subject: Borrow Request\n";
print MAIL "***********************************\n";
(more print statements with the body of the msg in here)
close (MAIL);
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So yes, it could be that I'm doing it the wrong way .... although this has worked for a long time on a lot of different servers. :)

What call to the sendmail program would work then, if it should have something else for the envelope besides what's in the body?

Yes, that works acceptably well. It's not wrong... It's not really perl though. And I definitely don't know how to send to more than one recipient that way. When I'm doing bigger jobs, I always use Net::SMTP. A lot of people like MIME::Lite too, so I'd check there. I believe it forks a sendmail in some modes.

-Paul

If you insist on doing it that way, it is your job to decipher the sendmail program. The Evolution of Perl Email Handling

Most people use MiME::Lite to avoid those hassles. I think the preferred way to do it is with a Bcc list, but your ISP may think you are spamming.

#! /usr/bin/perl -w
#
#This program takes a list of email addresses and emails them.
#NOTE: This program must be changed for each edition of the newsletter
#

use strict;
use MIME::Lite;

open(INDEX, "<index.htm") or die "Can't open index.htm file";
my $body = do { local $/; <INDEX> }; #Slurp the whole file in
close(INDEX);

my $msg = MIME::Lite->new(
       Subject =>'New phase of funding to support life-saving vaccines
+',
       Type    =>'multipart/related',
       );
   
$msg->attach(Type =>'text/html', Data =>$body, Disposition=>'inline');
$msg->attach(Type =>'image/jpg', Path =>'index_files/Hivheader1.jpg', 
+Disposition=>'inline');
$msg->attach(Type =>'image/jpg', Path =>'index_files/image001.jpg', Di
+sposition=>'inline');
$msg->attach(Type =>'image/jpg', Path =>'index_files/image002.jpg', Di
+sposition=>'inline');
$msg->attach(Type =>'image/gif', Path =>'index_files/image003.gif', Di
+sposition=>'inline');
$msg->attach(Type =>'image/jpg', Path =>'index_files/image004.jpg', Di
+sposition=>'inline');
$msg->attach(Type =>'image/jpg', Path =>'index_files/image005.jpg', Di
+sposition=>'inline');
$msg->attach(Type =>'image/jpg', Path =>'index_files/image006.jpg', Di
+sposition=>'inline');
   
while (<>) {
   $msg->add(To=>"$_");
   $msg->send("sendmail","/usr/bin/qmail-inject");
}; #while there are more address on the command line
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I don't know how you're calling sendmail, but your example shows a RFC RFC 2822 header line. The SMTP protocol (RFC RFC 2821) actually considers those lines to be part of the body of the message and not really involved in delivery. The address used for delivery is normally called the envelope address, and that's passed on the sendmail command line.