The problem I had was trying to send emails in Magento using GMAIL (Google Apps) using the code from this forum:

http://www.magentocommerce.com/boards/viewthread/1073/

The work around is that I setup a email account in Bluehost the same as the email I use in Google Apps.  I then modified the code in Magento to send out using bluehost’s SMTP servers:

For example:

Outgoing Mail Server: (SSL) boxnumber.bluehost.com (server requires authentication)
Supported Incoming Mail Protocols:

• POP3: port 110
• POP3S (SSL/TLS): port 995
• IMAP: port 143
• IMAPS (SSL/TLS): port 993

Supported Outgoing Mail Protocols:

• SMTP: port 26
• SMTPS (SSL/TLS): port 465

And it works, it sends the email out to the customers with the right email address sent from bluehost’s local SMTP servers, so when customers reply to the email address it will arrive in my google apps mail box.

References:

http://drupal.org/node/458044

Steps to resolve:

I enabled the cUrl extension in php.ini (running on a IIS platform)

Changed the code around line 6536:

curl_setopt($fp, CURLOPT_PROXY, $ip);
curl_setopt($fp, CURLOPT_PROXYPORT, $port);
curl_setopt($fp, CURLOPT_PROXYUSERPWD, $login . ‘:’ . $passwd);

where $ip is the proxy IP Address, $port is the port and $login:$password is the proxy authentication.

After this, I can load in external RSS feeds! YAY

References:

http://www.phpdig.net/ref/rn11re189.html

1. Use the System function and execute the ls command to find the binary
2. Use SSH access and action the command whereis php

References:

http://uk3.php.net/system