Designing an Intranet Site Options Rating

[EDW]

Hello Guys,

I'm a web designer (upcoming) and need some help in that regard.

I am designing a small intranet site for my department in school, a little something to help with info flow.

I've got the pages constructed, I've got a server purchased and installed Windows Server 2003 on it, got a router as well to disseminate the signals. I need help in configuring the server to host my pages, ofcourse such that when a user types in the URL, it directs the user to the index.html page in the directory of my site.

Additionally, I need help in handling the form results, I would have opted for the eMail feature but this intranet is going to be completely offline so I need a mechanism where the results of the form would be written to a file somewhere on the server (or any other method of form capturing that doesn't require internet connectivity).

Any help on this, tip or link to help on the net would be greatly appreciated, thanks!

[Darin McGrew]

Please see the FAQ entry How do I use forms?

[EDW]

Thanks Darin. But what I see there requires CGI meaning online connectivity. This intranet is NOT going to be online. Wouldn't there be some way I could configure the forms such that their results are written directly to a file on the server (maybe a .csv file or .txt or anything)???

[Darin McGrew]

But what I see there requires CGI meaning online connectivity. This intranet is NOT going to be online.

By "online" do you mean "open to the public internet"? Because you don't need to open your intranet to the public internet to use CGI or other server-side programs. I've used plenty of server-side programs that were accessible on an intranet, but not accessible from the public internet.

Wouldn't there be some way I could configure the forms such that their results are written directly to a file on the server (maybe a .csv file or .txt or anything)???

Yes. The browser submits the form data to a server-side program, and the server-side program has access to the filesystem. Browsers don't let web pages access the filesystem.

[EDW]

Yeah Darin, that's just the sort of thing I want: The form results written directly to a file which I can always retrieve and review.. How can I make this happen?? Thanks for the help so far..

[pandy]

The keyword is "server-side program". What server-side languages can you use, if any? If you don't have anyone who can write a script for you, you can find ready-made ones at for example http://hotscripts.com . Choose your language - > Scripts & programs -> Form-processors.

[EDW]

Thanks Pandy,
Been throught the site U recommended & checked others too, didn't see anything that could do what I wanted but I know they're out there though. Maybe you could help point me to one??
Also, saw that I would need perl to be running on the server (the shebang in the CGI script would need to refer to a perl path on the server), exactly how can I do this? Been to perl.com but sae lots of stuffs and versions, which do I choose and exactly how do I set it up?
Apart from this CGI and perl stuff, is there no other way I can write form results to any file I can retrieve from my Intranet server? I'm a newbie @ these stuffs, hence the questions.
Help would be really appreciated, thanks..

[pandy]

You need some language on the server, not necessarly Perl. You'd have to ask the person responsible for the server at your school if there is something available for you to use or if they are willing to install something.

[EDW]

I am the person that's gonna be repsonsible for the server, I'm the one building it! How can I get perl installed & running on the server?? I think Perl's the language I want!

[Darin McGrew]

What OS are you running on the server?

[EDW]

Windows Server 2003.

[pandy]

Can't vouch for this page, just the first that came up in Google.
http://www.visualwin.com/Perl/

[EDW]

Thanks Pandy, that should get me started.
The challenge now is getting the CGI script to write my form results to a file on the server. Seems every script I see out there does only eMailing which isn't what I want now. Can any one help please?? Thanks..

[pandy]

Found one sure and several possible on the first page already.
http://www.hotscripts.com/category/cgi-per...orm-processors/

[EDW]

Thanks Mate, but I was right on that page two days ago; the links aint working properly, either it doesn't link to the publisher's site or the script costs a hell lot... Any alternatives?? Thanks for your help so far..

[pandy]

Oh? This one is listed in the middle of the page somewhere. It's free and all the links work. If it's any good I don't know.
http://www.hotscripts.com/listing/form2file-free/

[EDW]

Thanks once again Pandy, you've really been so kind. The script's good BUT accepts data from ONE form field ONLY and that's bad in this scenario cos my form's got like 8 fields..

[pandy]

It said "any number of fields", but it looks like that's only true for the paid version. Oh well, there's bound to be others.

[EDW]

Yeah ryt. Thanks a lot Pandy, for everything..

[pandy]

Did you find one? Otherewise I'm sure you can get someone to write it up for you. It isn't anything major. If you don't have luck here you could try http://www.codingforums.com/ . They used to be friendly there, at least in the programming section, but that's years ago so it could have changed. Or you could pay a few bobs.