Tuesday, November 21. 2006

Version 1.8 Serendipity Contact Form Event Plugin

Over the last couple of days I've had the great pleasure of experimenting with version 1.8 of the contact form plugin for Serendipity, which has been recently updated by Matthew Groeninger to include the ability to alter the default textboxes by simply checking a box 'Use the Dynamic .tpl?', and then entering your chosen fields into a text box, clicking save, and voila, your site instantly displays your new fields.

What I love about this is that users of Serendipity no longer need to edit the actual php file to get the result they want. Specifically, small business users are now able to change the contact form so that their form includes input boxes for phone numbers, addresses, gender, even checkboxes to subscribe to a mailing list.

The following snippets can be used to configure the new dynamic contact form, all you need to do is copy and paste them directly into the 'form field string' text box. The lower case (r) means that these are required fields. Enjoy!

Basic contact form with first name (r), last name (r), email (r), homepage, and message.
require;First Name;text :require;Surname;text :require;Email;text :Homepage;text :Message;textarea;

Ideally suited for a small business or entrepreneur where the site visitor simply wants to make contact. They are asked for first name (r), last name (r), company, telephone number (r), email (r), homepage and message.
require;First Name;text :require;Surname;text :Company;text :require;Tel;text :require;Email;text :Homepage;text :Message;textarea;

This one might be more useful for generating sales leads where the client needs a followup phone call to set an appointment, and includes first name (r), last name (r), gender being Mr, Mrs or Miss, company, telephone number (r), mobile (r), email (r), homepage, and message.
require;First Name ;text:require;Surname;text :Title;radio;Mr,Mr|Mrs,Mrs|Miss,Miss :Company;text :require;Tel;text :Mobile;text :require;Email;text :Homepage;text :Message;textarea;

I hope these help, good luck.
If you enjoyed this post, make sure you subscribe to my RSS feed.
Posted by Carl in Using Serendipity at 21:48   Comments (8)

Trackbacks
Trackback specific URI for this entry

No Trackbacks

Comments

  1. Robert Lender said,

    Wednesday, November 22. 2006 at 15:56 (Reply)

    Thank you very much for this entry. I didn´t know that the plugin has this possibilities now.

  2. Matthew said,

    Monday, November 27. 2006 at 10:24 (Reply)

    Thanks for writing that up Carl!

  3. Robert Lender said,

    Monday, November 27. 2006 at 12:03 (Reply)

    Is there a whole list of options? I didn´t find any hint (in the information text in the plugin) how to deal with "password" etc.

  4. Carl said,

    Monday, November 27. 2006 at 20:25 (Reply)

    To use the plugin you first need to select yes in the radio box for 'Use the Dynamic tpl?', then click save and the page will refresh with all the dynamic settings.

    The password field could be used like this

    required;password;password:

  5. Matthew said,

    Tuesday, November 28. 2006 at 18:10 (Reply)

    I should clarify, the password field does not link to any specific password; it can't be used to control submission of the form.

    It is just a way to have users input data that is hidden from the screen.

  6. Carl said,

    Monday, November 27. 2006 at 11:51 (Reply)

    Thanks to you both for your comments. I think Matthew's changes to the contact form are a very significant step forward for Serendipity, and they need to be promoted.

    @Matt, any chance of adding a select field for users to configure? This way small business owners etc could add a slect drop down to their contact form which would allow site visitors to request information on particular product catalogues etc.

  7. Matthew said,

    Tuesday, November 28. 2006 at 18:12 (Reply)

    A select shouldn't be too hard, especially since I have radio and checkbox working. I'll have to fiddle with it, but I will shoot for getting it updated later this week (and adding the default options you suggested).

  8. Matthew said,

    Tuesday, November 28. 2006 at 19:30 (Reply)

    Carl, you will probably see it in the forums, but I just put in an update. This should handle selects and it has the different default settings you suggested.

Add Comment

Standard emoticons like :-) and ;-) are converted to images.
E-Mail addresses will not be displayed and will only be used for E-Mail notifications

To prevent automated Bots from commentspamming, please enter the string you see in the image below in the appropriate input box. Your comment will only be submitted if the strings match. Please ensure that your browser supports and accepts cookies, or your comment cannot be verified correctly.
CAPTCHA