HTML authoring - Questions about forms

Author

Questions about forms

Mama Bear

2006-01-16, 3:30 am

I've been using HotDog Professional 6 to write basic web pages
for awhile now. I'm self-taught, have never taken a class or
anything. So I don't even know much about frames yet. Pretty
basic.

But I want to open a business - a small school, and would like to
write a web page with a web form for new students to fill out.

I've figured out how to do the form in HotDog, basically, and
make the page look decent. It's the transmittance that's the
hangup.

It says there are two ways.

First is emailing it to me. I tried that though, and it sends me
a weird file with a garbled up mess, that seems unusable. I can
see the info in there, among the delineation characters but how
to use it?

I need it to send me a nice orderly form that I can save and even
edit if necessary, so I can track my students.

The only other method it talks about, is cgi scripts, pages and
servers, which I know absolutely zip about, I'm lost.

So how can I do this and get my small business started up? Are
there any little freeware or low cost utility programs out there
to help me with this? Add-ons for HotDog maybe? Or something
stand alone that can take that email and make it into a savable,
editable form for me?

--
- Mama Bear

Adrienne Boswell

2006-01-16, 3:30 am

Gazing into my crystal ball I observed Mama Bear <MamaBear@No-Spam.noo>
writing in news:Xns974CD21452195Mama@216.196.97.142:

> I've been using HotDog Professional 6 to write basic web pages
> for awhile now. I'm self-taught, have never taken a class or
> anything. So I don't even know much about frames yet. Pretty
> basic.
>
> But I want to open a business - a small school, and would like to
> write a web page with a web form for new students to fill out.
>
> I've figured out how to do the form in HotDog, basically, and
> make the page look decent. It's the transmittance that's the
> hangup.
>
> It says there are two ways.
>
> First is emailing it to me. I tried that though, and it sends me
> a weird file with a garbled up mess, that seems unusable. I can
> see the info in there, among the delineation characters but how
> to use it?
>
> I need it to send me a nice orderly form that I can save and even
> edit if necessary, so I can track my students.
>
> The only other method it talks about, is cgi scripts, pages and
> servers, which I know absolutely zip about, I'm lost.
>
> So how can I do this and get my small business started up? Are
> there any little freeware or low cost utility programs out there
> to help me with this? Add-ons for HotDog maybe? Or something
> stand alone that can take that email and make it into a savable,
> editable form for me?
>

You definately need something server side to handle the form submission.
Best would be a database that would hold all the information, and you could
run queries against it.

To be perfectly honest with you, you are going to be better off if you hire
someone to do this. If you have the time, then learn one of the server
side languages, ASP, PHP, Perl, etc. You should also learn SQL (Structured
Query Language), which will give you the ability to query and manipulate
the data once you have it. You can go to <http://www.w3schools.com> and
start the tutorials there. Good luck!

--
Adrienne Boswell
http://www.cavalcade-of-coding.info
Please respond to the group so others can share

Mama Bear

2006-01-16, 11:11 pm

Adrienne Boswell <arbpen2003@sbcglobal.net> wrote :

> Gazing into my crystal ball I observed Mama Bear
> <MamaBear@No-Spam.noo> writing in
> news:Xns974CD21452195Mama@216.196.97.142:
>
>
> You definately need something server side to handle the form
> submission. Best would be a database that would hold all the
> information, and you could run queries against it.
>
> To be perfectly honest with you, you are going to be better
> off if you hire someone to do this. If you have the time,
> then learn one of the server side languages, ASP, PHP, Perl,
> etc. You should also learn SQL (Structured Query Language),
> which will give you the ability to query and manipulate the
> data once you have it. You can go to
> <http://www.w3schools.com> and start the tutorials there.
> Good luck!
>

I guess I'd be better off just having them copy the text into an
email and send it back to me with their answers. I'm not
expecting thousands of students or anything, maybe 15-20.

--
- Mama Bear

Adrienne Boswell

2006-01-17, 6:20 am

Gazing into my crystal ball I observed Mama Bear <MamaBear@No-Spam.noo>
writing in news:Xns974DAC5D22747Mama@216.196.97.142:

> Adrienne Boswell <arbpen2003@sbcglobal.net> wrote :
>
>
> I guess I'd be better off just having them copy the text into an
> email and send it back to me with their answers. I'm not
> expecting thousands of students or anything, maybe 15-20.
>
>
>

Actually, no, you really are better off using a database, and letting the
students populate it. Your other option is to use one of the ready made
forms, like <http://www.response-o-matic.com>.

--
Adrienne Boswell
http://www.cavalcade-of-coding.info
Please respond to the group so others can share