My first post - help with Email

Short answer for @fox_racing: PHP's mail() sends the message directly from the webserver, it does not open the visitor's Outlook or other mail client. As @NickEvan already pointed out, it will work if the server's mail subsystem (sendmail/postfix on Linux, or SMTP configured on Windows/php.ini) is present and correctly configured. On many shared hosts this is ready; on a local PC you often need extra setup or an SMTP relay.

Practical steps to implement a safe contact form: post the form to a server script (use POST), validate and sanitize every field server-side, and never inject user input directly into mail headers. Reject input that contains newline characters to block header injection. Use a fixed From address on your domain and put the visitor email in a Reply-To header so SPF/DMARC are not violated. Log attempts and return clear success/failure feedback to the user.

Small, useful server-side check for header injection:

function has_header_injection($s) {
    return preg_match('/[\r\n]|%0A|%0D|\\n|\\r/i', $s);
}

For reliability and deliverability consider a library (PHPMailer/SwiftMailer) and send via authenticated SMTP rather than relying solely on the system mailer. SMTP with authentication keeps messages out of the spam folder more often and lets you use TLS. Add a CAPTCHA or honeypot and rate limits to block spam bots.

Troubleshooting checklist: test a tiny script on the host (not on local XAMPP), check spam folders, check server mail logs and phpinfo() for sendmail_path/SMTP settings, and ask host support if mail() returns true but nothing arrives. Before coding, also check whether phpBB3 or an extension already offers a contact form you can enable—reusing forum functionality is often simpler and safer than a custom script.