Spammers seek out forms on the web and attempt to transmit all manner of junk mail, including ads for porn and Viagra. Doug's forms generally prevent form spam without using cryptic CAPTCHA images to display phrases as distorted images, which are difficult to read.

The key to generating new web forms is to first define a database table in great detail. When that is complete, then there are several programming methods employed to generate the HTML FORM element and the PHP code required to evaluate or validate user input.

Form development can be time consuming and often worth $100 for the effort required to place a form online. Doug has probably programmed hundreds of web forms for various purposes. Submitted data is typically validated, stored in a MySQL™ database for future reference, and emailed to the website owner.

The Contact form for this content management system is rigged so that when someone uses it, the site owner receives an email message with the form input, plus the link used by the sender to reach the website. The incoming link is not always known when a visitor reaches the site. This occurs when the user typed the URL directly into their web browser's address bar or when the user clicked a bookmark. Often, it turns out the user reached the site by first conducting a search at Google, in which case this link will be appended to the end of the email message sent by the Contact form.

See the PHP Programmer page for additional information.