Just trying to make a simple form

Please help

[justamom]

I'm trying to make a simple html form on my site for article submission so I can try to slow down some of the spam I am getting. But the form shows up but doesn't work! when you click submit you get a 404 page. What am I doing wrong?

Heres the code:

<FORM METHOD="POST" ACTION="<FORM METHOD="POST" ACTION="mailto:articles@my email address">
<TEXTAREA NAME="article submission" ROWS=10 COLS=80>
</text><INPUT TYPE="submit">
<INPUT TYPE="reset"></FORM>
</body>

[mack]

<form method="POST" action="mailto:[e-mail]">
<p align="center"><textarea name="articlesubmission" cols="80" rows="10"></textarea></p>
<p align="center"><input type="submit" value="Submit" name="sub"><INPUT TYPE="reset">
</p>
</form>

the above should work

[ScottM]

This 'sorta' works...

<form method="POST" action="mailto:[e-mail]">
<p>
<input type="text" name="T1" size="20"><input type="submit" value="Submit"><input type="reset" value="Reset"></p>
</form>

[justamom]

Mack, I used your code, but when you click submit it brings up a blank email without the text you put in the form box? Thanks!

[mack]

justamom,
When you receive the blank email the message from the form should be included in an email attatchment.

[justamom]

aha! let me try that :D

[ShawnR]

Hi JustAMom

By now you have probably figured out that your only problems were superfluous <FORM METHOD="POST" ACTION=", and you closed your <textarea> tag with </text> instead of </textarea>. However, you want to "...slow down some of the spam ...". Unfortunately using a form with a mailto: action won't help in that department, and as you have discovered for yourself, has other draw-backs which vary according to the browser, such as:

• Not working at all if the browser doesn't support mailto as a form action
  
• Bringing up an email message body in some browsers which can confuse visitors
  
• Bringing up a warning message in some browsers to alert visitors that the information is being sent in an email which may not be secure
  
• Information not properly placed in the email message body with some browsers
  
• Security issues, which probably won't concern you given the nature of the information you are receiving
  
• Data arriving in a format which may be hard to read, and is not standard, given the variability of the browsers.

  And of course,
  

• Revealing your email address to spambots
  

How is your site being hosted? If you have access to any server side processing or CGI it would be better to use that to receive your forms and have the server process email it on to you. Most of the cheap hosting companies offer a range of cgi applications, including cgi scripts to receive form information, or alternatively, there are many freeware/shareware scripts you could download.

Of course, there are other ways to get around spam as well...

Shawn

[justamom]

ShawnR thank you! I had a friend log into my cp and set up the CGI thing for me. (can't wait to learn to do it myself) It works great and suddenly my 100 emails of spam a day are down to 2-4! :D

[grahamstewart]

If you use a good mail service then it will give you the option to 'bounce' messages. This is like a 'Return to Sender' in real life, and it often gets you off the spammers list.

I can recommend a good webmail service that has this feature - send me a StickyMail.

Also don't ever reply to spam, even to get yourself removed from the list. Once they know your address is genuine they will sell it on to other spammers.

[ShawnR]

"...suddenly my 100 emails of spam a day are down to 2-4..."

That surprises me, unless you are using a new email address, and have abandoned the old one. Even though the CGI solution doesn't reveal your email address, chances are that the address that the spam-bots collected over the past months are still in their databases, so I would have expected it to take months before your spam level dwindles down.

Shawn

[tedster]

I agree ShawnR. Maybe the latest scheme is a near-real-time spamming machine: harvest the address and fire off the USCE seconds later.