Online Form - saves entry to database - emails user receipt

**Spennyboy** · 16th January 2009

Hey guys,

I want a form on a page (on its own) where i can fill in information of a few fields - then when that form is submitted i want it to save it either a) in a access database b) just as a .txt file. on the server.

I then want a generated receipt with that info sent to an email address specified.

What am i look at code/script wise?

ta.

**BBK** · 16th January 2009

Have to ask spenny, but why access or text? Does your host offer php? If they do, then this is like 10 minutes work.

**Spennyboy** · 16th January 2009

Originally Posted by BBK

Have to ask spenny, but why access or text? Does your host offer php? If they do, then this is like 10 minutes work.

cos im a n00b and know no better.

Im basically trying to learn HTML and as a first little project want to make a little form that does like above.

Tell me more about the PHP route... ?

**Over Carl** · 16th January 2009

If you do wanna go down the access route - I think you need to look up ms adodb objects or something like that. I remember years ago having to use a slightly different version that connected to an oracle database as part of a uni project.

**DejaVu** · 15th March 2009

PHP runs in conjunction with an online database called MySQL (which is where all the data will be saved). You can then pull the information from the MySQL database and create the reciept information. Which can then be automatically emailed to the customer.

This is relatively easy practice for a good website designer and shouldnt take too long.

All e-commerce systems should automatically set this up for you. OS-Commerce I know for one does... Looking there, if you understand basic PHP, you can probably reverse engineer the same sort of thing (it can be quite involved though).

**StephenDon24** · 15th March 2009

Don't go down the access route - real nightmare and very very limited in functionality. As said above with php/mysql this is easy and you can download prewritten scripts to do the email stuff for you. Google Natemail and phpmailer for examples of such scripts.

If you know sql then putting that in to php to gather from a form is a walk in the park. .

Code:

$val1 = $_POST['form_val1'];
$val2 = $_POST['form_val2'];
$val3 = $_POST['form_val3'];
mysql_query("INSERT INTO table_name (field1, field2, field3) 
VALUES ('$val1', '$val2', '$val3')");

etc etc

**rIKmAN** · 15th March 2009

You can also use PHP to send the email, and the data either direct from the form or pulled from the MySQL database, or both, depending what you want.

**DejaVu** · 15th March 2009

Looks like Stephen could well be your man on this Spenny!

**stixson** · 21st March 2009

the asp side of things is piece of wee. Access is an ok database for small stuff such as invoices/addresses etc. Can also send an email too...

**BBK** · 21st March 2009

Bloody hell, 2 months later and it gets dragged back up. How odd!

**stixson** · 21st March 2009

apologies BBK. Next time i will look at the date of the thread and then determine if i can actually help someone with something i do know...

**BBK** · 21st March 2009

LOL not you m8, I blame Deja Vu, but with his username maybe we shouldn't be too surprised

**DejaVu** · 22nd March 2009

My bad...

Least there's some better information here now for future visitors, who will also bring it back from the depths, if they search proper!

Better still -
http://docstore.mik.ua/orelly/webprog/webdb/ch12_02.htm
Solved!