Understanding
Web Forms		  
two parts
  1. The HTML Form
  2. Mechanism for processing the form
    • E-mail the form data to a mailbox
    • Use a server-side CGI script to process form data
    • Use a public form-hosting service

 
the HTML
form

Consists of

  • The Form Tag - contains the method and action for processing the form

<form name= "form name"
method="post"
action = "destination">

-form elements-

</form>

  • The form elements
  • text box
  • password box
  • radio buttons
  • checkboxes
  • drop-down menus
  • larger text-area
  • clickable images
  • The Submit Button

<input type = "submit"
value ="text for submit button"/>


EXAMPLES


 
CGI scripts

Common Gateway Interface -

Standard developed to allow external computer programs to interface with web servers.

Essentially, the standard allows a client's web browser to ask a web server to run a program or script.

This program then sends information to the server, which returns it in HTML to the browser.

Things a CGI program can do:

  1. Process info from a form and return some info to the client.
  2. Provide an interface to a searchable database and return the result to the client.
  3. Process guest books, including logging info to a database or file, return msg to client.
  4. Provide the current hit count as part of a page each time someone accesses it.

CGI languages -
CGI programs can be written in any scripting or programming language: Perl, VB, C, PHP ...

 
How to
get a script		 Write the script in a programming language

Download and edit a script
Form hosting
services		 Provider that will provide scripts for you to process the forms:


Questions to ask:

  • Who creates the form: you or them?
  • What do you have to do in exchange for them processing the forms?
    • Pay?
    • Run ads?
  • Will they process forms for commercial sites or only personal sites?
  • How do you get the data?

Creating a form

tutorials and wizards:
Create this
form

 

answer: click here