Hey friends, I only know the basics of html, css, and javascript. I just finished my first ever professional website for a client. I have a page with a form for a job application and a couple other text fields for messaging and quotes the user can send to the business owner. I want to know what i need to learn or what to do to send any of this information in a nice format to the website owner through email? Any pointers?
I think, client-side that is impossible. Never heard that JS could have an access to post agent. Server-side this is no problem, e.g. PHP IMAP extension.
Who’s server would i be using? I have no understanding of server-side anything as well as PHP. I’m not technical at all. I’ve just been learning through tutorials.
Forms were among the earliest versions of HTML. Originally, the way forms worked is that when the form’s submit button (input type=“submit”) is pushed a script (the form’s action) would execute in the server (called a CGI script) that would process the data and create another HTML page to show the results. The CGI technology in fact is what server-side software such as PHP uses; a PHP page essentially executes as a form being processed.
So you are thinking, well how does that help me? Look again at the HTML form tag. You can specify a PHP page as the action. The data from the form is passed to the PHP page as $_POST data.
This website has many resources available for how to use PHP for this; you should look for what is available. For a simple one-page explanation see PHP 7 Form Handling.
PHP has a mail function built into it but if you search these forums you will find that many developers have problems with it. It is better to use an extension to send email.
You will need a server for sending mail and other parameters. The other parameters depend on the server you use.
Thank you for the explanation:) Would you say learning this php method would be the easiest way for someone like me? Also what do you think about node.js?
Agree with SamuelCalifornia. PHP is easiest application for web-development. And it’s clear more and more simple than node.js.
Personally I consider C# to be the best language that is commonly used in servers. PHP’s original design was not done by a professional or even an experienced person in the field of language design. I think it is a mess. JavaScript was also not originally designed for many of the uses it is being used for.
I favor much of the Microsoft technologies less than I do C# and C# is available in many environments that are not Microsoft technologies. I do not know the details however.
I assume however that PHP is more convenient for you. So I will state explicitly that learning PHP is good, at least it gets you started. I just wish I could provide guidance to help you avoid using PHP in unhealthy manners. I do not know what book to advise for learning PHP but I suggest one that introduces Object Oriented design and programming using PHP. For learning PHP I suggest avoiding books that dwell on HTML and CSS. I think it is better to learn HTML and CSS from books on those specific subjects.
Well The original language I started with was c# I only built a calculator though then switched to front-end languages
PHP is very popular. My bias makes it difficult for me to say PHP is good but you should continue with it if you want to. There will be plenty of work for you when you seek employment, and that is very important. Go ahead and start with PHP if you want to; you will get plenty of support here.
I don’t understand what you mean by front-end languages. The advantage of C# is that it is designed for use in desktop, smartphone, tablet and other environments, much like Java is. And for web pages the C# environment is provided by ASP.Net (that can be used by other languages) whereas for PHP the compiler and the execution environment are combined.
Hopefuly you will get an opportunity to try C# too. C# can be used in Apache (Linux) systems, as indicated in c# - Porting ASP.NET application to Mono/Apache under Linux - Stack Overflow.
Yes. The setup is minimal (compared to something like Node) and almost all shared hosting packets come with PHP pre-installed and configured.
Where is the website currently? You need a server to make it available on the web. Ideally this server would have PHP running and with the aid of a small PHP script, you could send email from your client’s website.
The details of how to send email depends on the host you are using and/or the host of the email server for the email address you are sending from. You need to find the instructions provided by the host(s). They typically have sample code.
Perhaps the simplest way to do this is through Google Forms if you have a Google account.
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