On 26 Jan 99, Gerry Ott wrote:
> I have installed an Information Request Form on my clients site. He wants
> to verify that certain fields of data are filled out and otherwise reject
> the submittal with a "missing info" comment if they aren't filled out. In
> all the forms tutorials I have bookmarked, the issue of verification is
> not addressed. Is this an html exercise or a server side cgi function?
> In either case, can anyone point me to a site where forms verification is
> covered?
It's a fairly straightforward scripting issue, can be handled in
Javascript, Perl, ColdFusion and no doubt other languages/extensions.
If you use the Matt Wright's venerable formmail.pl to process your
information requests, some basic validation comes built-in (at least
in the version I use, 1.6) -- here's the salient bit:
***
# For each required field defined in the form: #
foreach $require (@Required) {
# If the required field is the email field, the syntax of the email #
# address if checked to make sure it passes a valid syntax. #
if ($require eq 'email' && !&check_email($Config{$require})) {
push(@error,$require);
}
# If it is a regular form field which has not been filled in or #
# filled in with a space, flag it as an error field. #
elsif (!$Form{$require}) {
push(@error,$require);
}
}
# If any error fields have been found, send error message to the user. #
if (@error) { &error('missing_fields', @error) }
}
[snip, various sub-routines follow]
***
As you can see, nothing too complex here. You can also do the same
in Javascript, comme ca. Following is complete code a working form
that will check for a correctly entered e-mail address, and ensure
that the user name field isn't empty. Should work in NS 2+ and MSIE
3+:
***
<html>
<head>
<title>Form Field Validation</title>
<script language="JavaScript1.2">
function isEmail(string) {
if (string.search(/^\w+((-\w+)|(\.\w+))*\@\w+((\.|-)\w+)*\.\w+$/) != -1)
return true;
else
return false;
}
function isProper(string) {
if (string.search(/^\w+( \w+)?$/) != -1)
return true;
else
return false;
}
function isReady(form) {
if (isEmail(form.address.value) == false) {
alert("Please enter a valid email address.");
form.address.focus();
return false;
}
if (isProper(form.username.value) == false) {
alert("Please enter a valid username.");
form.username.focus();
return false;
}
return true;
}
//--></script>
</head>
<body>
<form name="form_name" onsubmit="return isReady(this)">
<table cellpadding=0 cellspacing=5 border=0><tr>
<td align="left">Name:</td><td align="left"><input type="text"
name="username"></td>
</tr><tr>
<td align="left">Email Address:</td><td align="left"><input type="text"
name="address"></td>
</tr><tr>
<td><input type="submit" value="Submit"></td>
</tr></table>
</form>
</body>
</html>
-----------
Brent Eades, Almonte, Ontario
E-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
Web: http://www.almonte.com/
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