mailform- beginner- what am I doing wrong?

I did some reading here:

http://formmail.dreamhost.com/

And on various sites on the internet. I am still very new to this "form" stuff. However on my site, this is what I am wanting:

A form a person can fill out that will go to me containing the following information:

name, email, various options with radio buttons and a couple lpaces to input general text. I just want it real simple.. but then maybe this is complicated. Here is the code I have so far: (experimenting)

<form action="http://formmail.dreamhost.com/cgi-bin/formmail.cgi" method="POST">
<input type=hidden name="recipient" value="editor@crochetgarden.com">
Email Address: <input type=text name="email">
Name: <input type=text name="realname">
<input type=hidden name="redirect" value="http://www.crochetgarden.com/htest.html">
<input type=hidden name="required" value="email,realname">
<input type=hidden name="missing_fields_redirect" value="http://www.crochetgarden.com">
<input type=hidden name="return_link_title" value="Back to my site.">
<input type="radio" name="sepia" value="Sepia" />Sepia

<input type="radio" name="vingette" value="halo" />halo

<input type="submit" name="B1" value="submit" />
<button type="submit">Send info</button>


<input type="reset" name="B1" value="Reset" />

</form>

When I put it up... I fill in info for a test yet I do not get an email! I have the rquired line in there that dreamhost says I need. What am I doing wrong?

Looks fine to me..

Are you checking the 'editor@crochetgarden.com' address or is it setup properly?

I just sent a couple of test messages to it.

Thank you for checking it out for me.. Looks like I just got 1, arrived at 5:54 central time. I wonder why my others did not go through, or your other one.. (if you had sent 2). Odd..!

I thought perhaps I was missing something big... I have never done anything with forms whatsoever before.. thank you for taking the time to test it for me :)

Edited by Lilyrain on 02/03/06 09:08 PM (server time).

Alrighty.. since yours came through.. I went and did 2 more tests on it myself.. yet still no email... anyone know the reason for this?

I don't think the webform mail worked.

I sent three. one from my private email, two from the form - I'd say you just got the one from my private email...

Hmmm... let me ponder for a sec.

The first thing I suggest trying, is to clean up your form. You have named both the submit and reset buttons with the same name, plus you have 2 submit items on the same form. I suspect either of these could cause the cgi handler to choke. Try this form instead:

<form action="http://formmail.dreamhost.com/cgi-bin/formmail.cgi" method="POST">
<input type=hidden name="recipient" value="editor@crochetgarden.com">
Email Address: <input type=text name="email">
Name: <input type=text name="realname">
<input type=hidden name="redirect" value="http://www.crochetgarden.com/htest.html">
<input type=hidden name="required" value="email,realname">
<input type=hidden name="missing_fields_redirect" value="http://www.crochetgarden.com">
<input type=hidden name="return_link_title" value="Back to my site.">

<input type="radio" name="sepia" value="Sepia" />Sepia
<input type="radio" name="vingette" value="halo" />halo

<input type="submit" name="submitButton" value="Send Info" />
<input type="reset" name="resetButton" value="Reset" />
</form>

***********

You're also using two radio button blocks, with only one item in each. If you want them to be mutually exclusive you must name them the same. If either of them may or may not be selected, you should probably use type="checkbox" instead. If you don't, there is no way to deselect an item you clicked by mistake.

BC Tech
Team Shocker

Hope you don't mind, but I went ahead and built you an example of what I would use. I remember when I was first learning about web development. It seemed like a very big hump at first, until I got some traction through the help of others.

I laid out the form using some best practice stuff that I like to do. CSS for the the text and link formatting, JS alerts for empty fields to catch users before submitting, changes to the buttons used, and some reformatting of your layout.

You can take a look at my functional example here: http://benconley.net/htest.html

It submits to you, and redirects back to your site. If you like it you can just view the source, copy it to your own text file, and use it as a reference as you get more experienced with web pages.

Good luck, and I'll try to offer suggestions when I can, if you have any questions.

BC Tech
Team Shocker

Button values on forms are only sent for the button that is pressed, so you can have as many as you want on the form without issues for server site processing.

wow.... I just looked at the source code for all that.. I though t I was starting to get a little bit of handle on basic html...

The good thing is.. the my code cleaned up works..! I am going to study your code and see what I can learn from it... Wow.. I have a LOT to learn...

That is good to know also about how many buttons I can have... I am still not sure exactly what it was I did wrong... but at least it now works. Hopefully now when i ad dinto it now I don't mess it up again!

Thank you so much for taking the time to help me out- both of you!!! i am starting to feel better that I may actually succeed in becoming more fluent in coding webpages...

If I have any questoons or problems I shall post again...! Thank you again so much...

Edited by Lilyrain on 02/03/06 09:23 PM (server time).