Chapter Fourteen - Formmail

FormMail is a generic www form to e-mail gateway, which will parse the results of any form and send them to the specified user. This script has many formatting and operational options, most of which can be specified through the form, meaning you don't nee d any programming knowledge or multiple scripts for multiple forms. This also makes FormMail the perfect system-wise solution for allowing users form-based user feedback capabilities without the risks of allowing freedom of CGI access. 

There is only one form field that you must have in your form, for FormMail to work correctly. This is the recipient field. Other hidden configuration fields can also be used to enhance the operation of FormMail on your site. The action of your form needs to point towards this script (obviously), and the method must be POST in capital letters.

Here's an example of the form fields to put in your form:

<FORM ACTION = "/cgi-sys/FormMail.cgi" METHOD = "POST"> 
<input type=hidden name="recipient" value="ANYONE@YOURDOMAIN.COM"> 
<input type=hidden name="subject" value="SUBJECT"> 
<input type=hidden name="return_link_title" value="TITLE"> 
<input type=hidden name="redirect" value="http://YOURDOMAIN.COM/PAGE.HTML">

The following are descriptions and proper syntax for fields you can use with FormMail.

Recipient Field:

Description: This form field allows you to specify to whom you wish for your form results to be mailed. Most likely you will want to configure this option as a hidden form field with a value equal to that of your email address. 

Syntax: <input type=hidden name="recipient" value="email@yourdomain.com">

Subject Field:

Description: The subject field will allow you to specify the subject that you wish to appear in the email that is sent to you after this form has been filled out. If you do not have this option turned on, then the script will default to a message subject: "WWW Form Submission".

Syntax: If you wish to choose what the subject is:

<input type=hidden name="subject" value="Your Subject">

To allow the user to choose a subject:

<input type=text name="subject">

Email Field:

Description: This form field will allow the user to specify their return email address. If you want to be able to return e-mail to your user, I strongly suggest that you include this form field and allow them to fill it in. This will be put into the From: field of the message you receive. If you want to require an email address with valid syntax, add this field name to the 'required' field. 

Syntax: <input type=text name="email">

Realname Field:

Description: The realname form field will allow the user to input their real name. This field is useful for identification purposes and will also be put into the From: line of your message header.

Syntax: <input type=text name="realname">

Redirect Field:

Description: If you wish to redirect the user to a different URL, rather than having them see the default response to the fill-out form, you can use this hidden variable to send them to a pre-made HTML page. 

Syntax: To choose the URL they will end up at: 

<input type=hidden name="redirect" value="http://yourdomain.com/anyfile.html">

To allow them to specify a URL they wish to travel to once the form is filled out: 

<input type=text name="redirect">

Required Field:

Description: You can require certain fields in your form to be filled in before the user can successfully submit the form. Simply place all field names that you want to be mandatory into this field, separated by commas. If the required fields are not fill ed in, the user will be notified of what they need to fill in, and a link back to the form they just submitted will be provided.

To use a customized error page, see "missing_fields_redirect"

Syntax: If you want to require that they fill in the email and phone fields in your form, so that you can reach them once you have received the mail, use the syntax like:

<input type=hidden name="required" value="email, phone">

Env_report Field:

Description: Allows you to have Environment variables included in the email message you receive after a user has filled out your form. Useful if you wish to know what browser they were using, what domain they were coming from or any other attributes assoc iated with environment variables. The following is a short list of valid environment variables that might be useful:

REMOTE_HOST - Sends the host name making the request.
REMOTE_ADDR - Sends the IP address of the remote host.
HTTP_USER_AGENT - The browser the client is using.

(Note: In our case, both REMOTE_HOST and REMOTE_ADDR are the same, since our servers don't do the reverse DNS look up needed to generate the true REMOTE_HOST string).

Syntax: If you wanted to find all the above variables, you would put the following into your form:

<input type=hidden name="env_report" value="REMOTE_HOST,REMOTE_ADDR,HTTP_USER_AGENT">

Sort Field:

Description: This field allows you to choose the order in which you wish for your variables to appear in the email form that FormMail generates. You can choose to have the field sorted alphabetically or specify a set order in which you want the fields to appear in your mail message. By leaving this field out, the order will simply default to the order in which the browsers send the information to the script (which is usually the exact same order as they appeared in the form).

When sorting by a set order of fields, you should include the phrase "order:" as the first part of your value for the sort field, and then follow that with the field names you want to be listed in the email message, separated by commas.

Syntax: To sort alphabetically:

<input type=hidden name="sort" value="alphabetic">

To sort by a set field order:

<input type=hidden name="sort" value="order:name1,name2,etc...">

Print_config Field:

Description: print_config allows you to specify which of the config variables you would like to have printed in your e-mail message. By default, no config fields are printed to your email. This is because the important form fields, like email, subject, et c. are included in the header of the message. However some users have asked for this option so they can have these fields printed in the body of the message. The config fields that you wish to have printed should be in the value attribute of your input ta g separated by commas.

Syntax: If you want to print the email and subject fields in the body of your message, you would place the following form tag:

<input type=hidden name="print config" value="email, subject">

Print_blank_fields Field:

Description: print_blank_fields allows you to request that all form fields are printed in the return HTML, regardless of whether or not they were filled in. FormMail defaults to turning this off, so that unused form fields aren't emailed.

Syntax: <input type=hidden name="print_blank_fields" value="1">

Title Field:

Description: This form field allows you to specify the title and header that will appear on the resulting page if you do not specify a redirect URL.

Syntax: If you wanted a title of 'Feedback Form Results':

<input type=hidden name="title" value="Feedback Form Results"> 

Return_link_url Field:

Description: This field allows you to specify a URL that will appear, as return_link_title, on the following report page. This field will not be used if you have the redirect field set, but it is useful if you allow the user to receive the report on the f ollowing page, but want to offer them a way to get back to your main page. 

Syntax: <input type=hidden name="return_link_url" value="http://yourdomain.com/index.htm">

Return_link_title:

Description: This is the title that will be used to link the user back to the page you specify with return_link_url. The two fields will be shown on the resulting form page as: 

Back to Main Page

Syntax: <input type=hidden name="return_link_title" value="Back to Main Page">