I sat all day today in an Advanced FrontPage2000 class and they made form submission seem so easy. However, they never totally explained the process.

The host I use gives the following instructions:

<< Our UNIX web servers have the capability to run CGI scripts in your very own "cgi-local" directory. Put your CGI programs in the cgi-bin directory. When calling the programs from the web page, you must use the alias for the cgi-bin directory. The alias is "cgi-[yourdomain]". If your domain is example.com, then the alias is cgi-example. Note that ".com" is not included. So the action line from your form page would look like action="/cgi-example/program".

Put your CGI programs anywhere outside of the cgi-bin directory. In this case, the program name must end in ".cgi".>>

Huh?! Nothing seems to work; I don't even know where the info goes or how to retrieve it.

Here is a link to my, ah, handiwork. ;-)

http://www.arborsnews.com/submission_form.htm

(Also got this address once but I have no idea where it came from: http://www.arborsnews.com/_vti_bin/shtml.exe/submission_form.htm)

Sorry if my inquiry seems so complicated...but it is.

Any help would be so very much appreciated. Thank you.

Gail

Also you have apop up window about information being sent thru a secure server? Lying to your visitors is not a way to gain trust - it needs a https in the URL to be secure...

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Gil Harvey
The Host Factory
Resellers are our speciality
"Is there another word for synonym?"

<<Where the instructions say - action="/cgi-example/program - you need to replace the word "program" with the cgi program you are using to parse the form - like maybe "formmail.pl"?

Also you have a pop up window about information being sent thru a secure server? Lying to your visitors is not a way to gain trust - it needs a https in the URL to be secure...>>

How do I find out what cgi-progrm I am using? I am not even sure what this is.

About the pop-up menu, the instructor told us whenever we use a cgi-bin provided by the host it is secure. He even helped me word the text for the pop-up menu. Did he misinform me?

The page is simply posted for testing. There is only one non-obvious link to the page from the website and it will remain that way until I get this all figured out.

What I can be accused of, I am sure, is that I do not really know what I am doing. Obviously hat they taught in the course is an oversimplification and far away from what I am encountering.

I'm just trying to stuggle through this rather than give up.

Any additional help will be much appreciated.

Much appreciation, Gail

Here is the reply I received from my host when seeking help from them:

<<As this relates to the web site design issue, we are unable to provide support for this. We can however inform you that your cgi call is incorrect. >>

gail

quote:

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Originally posted by Gail:
Thanks for the input Gil,

<<Where the instructions say - action="/cgi-example/program - you need to replace the word "program" with the cgi program you are using to parse the form - like maybe "formmail.pl"?

Also you have a pop up window about information being sent thru a secure server? Lying to your visitors is not a way to gain trust - it needs a https in the URL to be secure...>>

How do I find out what cgi-progrm I am using? I am not even sure what this is.

---

quote:

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About the pop-up menu, the instructor told us whenever we use a cgi-bin provided by the host it is secure. He even helped me word the text for the pop-up menu. Did he misinform me?

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Yep!! Hope you didn't pay for this "class"

quote:

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What I can be accused of, I am sure, is that I do not really know what I am doing. Obviously hat they taught in the course is an oversimplification and far away from what I am encountering.

I'm just trying to stuggle through this rather than give up.

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I'm sorry - the only thing I can suggest is getting a good book on HTML & CGI and wading thru it.

------------------
Gil Harvey
The Host Factory
Resellers are our speciality
"Is there another word for synonym?"

OK, thanks anyway.

gail

Is there a reason why you're not using the FP form handler ... does your host have FP extensions? If so, the easiest way to get the form working is to use the FP form handler if you're not familiar with installing scripts.

It looks like your form is trying to use formmail.pl to process your script. Did you place that script in your cgi-bin? It needs to have the proper permissions and be configured correctly for your server, which means the path to perl needs to be set within the script as well as the path to sendmail. This is information that your host needs to provide you with.

Your instructor gave you bad information about secure servers.

Email me if you need help with your script.

quote:

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Originally posted by ginnie:
Gail,

Email me if you need help with your script.

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ginnie,

*Thank you* so very much for the offer to contact you by email. I will.

During the past three years I've volunteered almost 1000 hours to develop and maintain the website for the arborsnews.com. I was seeking help in this forum so I could add a form to the site. Certainly not as easy as I was lead to believe in class.

Your kind offer is appreciated!

gail