Forms
You can create forms to accept information from the site visitor and have that information sent to you by email, saved in a spreadsheet, or both.
Creating a form
- Choose the 'Form Builder' option from the Applications section of the main menu.
- Click on the 'New form…' link.
- Enter the following information:
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- Form Name: This is the title of the form as it will appear to the user.
- Form Type: Select how you want to receive the form results.
- Email Recipient: Required if you selected email delivery in the previous question.
- Form Template: Choose the overall form design from templates provided by your web designer (optional).
- Form Field Template: Choose the default design for each field (optional).
- Thankyou Page: Choose the page that the user is taken to after successfully completing the form (optional).
- Help Page: Choose a page that the user can visit for help (optional).
- Submit Button Text: The text that will appear on the form's submit button (optional).
- Submit Button Image: An image to use instead of a textual submit button (optional).
- Display Form Reset Button: If selected, a reset button is added to the form.
- Reset Button Text: The text that will appear on the form's reset button (optional).
- Reset Button Image: An image to use instead of a textual reset button (optional).
- Click on 'Submit and Edit Fields'.
- Click on '[Add Field]'.
- Enter the following information for the new field:
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- Field Title: This is the title of the field as it will appear to the user.
- Field Type: Choose the type of field from the following options:
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- Text box
- Drop-down list: The user may only choose from a list of options you provide.
- Radio buttons: The user may only choose from a list of options you provide. All options are displayed with a button next to each one.
- Checkbox: The user has a yes/no option.
- Password: A text box the user types into. The text entered is not shown.
- Double password match: Two password boxes. The user must type the same password twice and the fields must match before the form can be submitted.
- Double text match. Two text boxes. The user must type the same text twice and the fields must match before the form can be submitted.
- Upload. The user may attach a file from their computer, which is attached to the form results email. The upload is ignored if the form is not sent by email.
- Label: Only the field title is displayed – no user input is required for this field.
- Description: Text that appears next to the field on-screen.
- Display Order: A number determining where in the form this field appears. Lower numbers appear at the top of the form.
- Default Value: The initial value of the field.
- Characters Allowed: The maximum number of characters that can be typed into the field. An entry of 0 (zero) allows an unlimited number of characters.
- Display Width: The size of the field on-screen.
- This field must always be completed: If selected, the form cannot be submitted until this field has been completed.
- Validation Type: Choose one of the options to determine how the users input is checked before the form is submitted.
- Drop-down List/Radio Button Options: Only required for drop-down list or radio button fields. Each entry in this box will be shown as an option for the field. Each entry should be on a separate line. You may have two parts on each line separated by two equal signs (==). The first part is the text as displayed to the user. The second part is the text that will be sent by email or stored in the spreadsheet. For example: Non-smoking room==nonsmoke – the user will see the text "Non-smoking room" but the email/spreadsheet will contain the text "Nonsmoke".
- Field is Hidden: If selected, the field will not appear in the form. Use this option to temporarily remove a field without deleting it.
- Checkbox Value: Only required for a checkbox field. If the checkbox is selected by the user, the text in this field is sent back as the answer. If this field is not supplied, the checkbox returns the word 'Checked'.
- To save the changes to the field, press 'Submit'. A preview of the form is displayed. The definition for any field may be altered or the field can be removed by clicking on the '[Edit/Delete]' link next to the field.
- You may add another field by clicking on '[Add field]' again. Use the 'Display Order' option to set where the field appears.
Adding a form to a page
- Edit the page content and place the cursor at the insert point.
- Click on the
button. - Choose 'Form' from the drop-down list of elements and click on 'Select'.
- Select the form required from the drop-down list and click on 'Select'.
- A preview of the form is displayed.
- Click on 'OK' to add the form to the page.
See the topic on adding Content Wizards to content for more details.
Adding a form to an event listing
Select the form required from the drop-down list of forms on the 'Update Event' page. Only a single form can be used for each event.
Downloading form data
If you chose 'spreadsheet' as the form type, you can fetch the current form results from the web server by going to the forms list and clicking on 'Download Results'. The data can be downloaded as a Comma Separated Values (CSV) file or an XML file. The XML format is superior. Most spreadsheet programs such as Microsoft Excel can open either type of file.
If you load the XML version into Excel, the default option to open the file "As an XML table" is sufficient. You may delete any of the extra columns labelled "fieldid" if you wish.
The XML data on the server can be edited within the CMS admin area, to remove unwanted results or mark a form submission as having been reviewed. Click 'Display/Edit Results' next to a form definition.
Using button images
Button images should be prepared in advanced by your web designer and stored in the '/images/formbuilder' folder of the website.