Re: Creating a simple feedback form
Just to put all this in context - I've had a paying customer with two websites with contact email addresses directly on the html page. The customer hasn't made any complaint about spam but has said that they now get the majority of their customer contacts via email through the website.
So it's not always a disasterous thing to do. My advice would be not to worry about it until it really becomes a problem. My principle worry would be formmail hacks being used to redistribute spam, rather than incoming spam that can be filterred.
I have customers with flash sites and flash forms that don't get spam either. I wouldn't advise adding a flash form to a html page specifically for this problem.
Paul
Re: Creating a simple feedback form
Hi,
If I make a website with Xara, I create non Xara page using any web creation tool and place a form on that page and link them. I'm using this form software (not free) very easy to implement and customize. You design your form and copy and paste the html code into your page and upload it.
If you make this page secure (ssl certificate) you'll get very little spam.
Tom
Re: Creating a simple feedback form
Check with your Web Hosting company. They often supply email scripts that appear quite secure, far more say than MattsScripts. I've never had a problem using the Web Host cgiemail that I prefer to use for my clients and I've scores of scripts.
Re: Creating a simple feedback form
AFAIK, Matt's has a reputation for not being a secure solution. I've using the FormM@iler script from dbMasters (http://www.dbmasters.net/index.php?id=4) for several years now. It's been very reliable and works very well in most respects. It's actually running something like 10 forms on our site. (8 are accessible only through landing pages.) The email addresses are still secure even though we have been getting spambot form entries on the main contact form.
So far, I haven't successfully implemented the anti-spam features, although I'm in contact with people for whom they work well. It's probably something simple, and I just haven't found it yet.
Meanwhile, I'm giving the Tectite form a whirl. Thanks, ckh, for posting the link.
Re: Creating a simple feedback form
No problem, amore. What I like about the tectite script is when set up properly, it doesn't reveal any email addresses and provides many other features. I've never had a spam problem with it since starting to use it.
One of the main problems with an unfiltered form is an unfiltered email address or subject text box can be used to 'header inject' which can cause the form to be used to send out spam to a list of email addresses that were injected. That is many times worse than just getting the spam sent to yourself, which a captcha can be used to minimize that.
Hosts won't shut you down if the form is used to send spam to yourself, but, if it can be used to send spam to other email addresses, then they may very well shut you down, suspend your account, etc. until the problem is fixed.
Not sure if it was mentioned here, but, it was mentioned to use your email address instead of a form and was also mentioned that bots can pick up the email addresses. A solution to that is to make your email address an image and display it, not text or clickable link that brings up your email client. Just display the image which they would have to write down or remember. If made clickable, the link could be harvested also.
Re: Creating a simple feedback form
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Risto
Sorry John, I'm having a crappy day and I took it out here, where I shouldn't have. I normally pray for telemarketers but they have stopped calling... :( I didn't put it very nicely. However, my point stands, if you have a solution, why not supply it? :confused:
Risto
Scripts are not that hard, but I do not know what information he is trying to collect, what type of server and and where the mail.pl is located. Without that information it is hard to create a form which will help him. There are plenty of form-mail type scripts out there to read and learn from.
Re: Creating a simple feedback form
Scripts are not that hard if you know what you are doing. To someone who is not familiar with them, they may as well be in a foreign language.
Re: Creating a simple feedback form
Quote:
Originally Posted by
ss-kalm
Scripts are not that hard if you know what you are doing. To someone who is not familiar with them, they may as well be in a foreign language.
From my experience, that's an accurate description. :D
BTW, the Tectite script seems to be working very well so far.
Re: Creating a simple feedback form
If you're just starting out, take a look at this: http://www.wysiwygwebbuilder.com/
It's easy, it's a massive $39 and forms are a doddle! The other extensions are pretty cool and you can use Xara to enhance your graphics.
Dreamweaver... costs the earth, Netobjects... bought it but just cannot get on with it, CoffeeCup... love it to death but maybe not for beginners unless you use Coffeecup VSD... their form designer is brilliant. I've integrated it into a XX4 site but it's a messy way of doing things.
Re: Creating a simple feedback form
Two more easy options for scripts:
www.tools4php.com
http://www.bebosoft.com/products/formstogo/index.php
Of the two, tools4php looks like the better solution for newbies and non-coders.
BTW, I tried CoffeeCup's form creation app a few years ago. It worked nicely on its own, but I couldn't successfully integrate it with the version of NetObjects I was using at the time. In that case, it turned out that I was better off creating the form in NetObjects because I could make it look like the rest of the website. Sorry to hear that CoffeeCup may not be a solution for Xtreme sites.
Sidenote: I'm very fond of NetObjects, especially version 11. What works for one brain doesn't necessarily work for another. :D