How to Define a Form

Forms are defined using the Create a New Form page, or from one of the Examples pages. Forms can later be modified using the Edit a Form Definition page. This document describes the form definition inputs and options.  (Please read at least the Required Fields section below, but after that you do not need to read and understand all of the other information now, since there are enough default values preset to create a simple but usable form, and when you are on the New Form or Edit Form page, you can click on any input prompt to return to this page for the specific details about that input.  You may wish to proceed to creating a working form and then return to this page for more information about customizing the look of the form.)

The Required Fields

The fields marked with a red asterisk must always be entered when you create a new form.  (From the Create a New Form page, if you enter only these fields then click the "Save Form Definition" button, you will get a standard e-mail feedback form.  From any of the Examples pages, you will get the same form as that example.) Enter the required fields, then proceed to the optional specifications and input field definitions to customize your form, if necessary.
Form ID This is the unique identifier for your form.  It will be part of the URL to get to your form: "http://formmail.to/formID".  Because it will be used in a URL, this field cannot contain any spaces or any "+", "&" or "%" characters.  You can, however, use a "-" or a "_" as a word space, and you can use the "/" character, such as "myname/feedback" to distinguish that form from "myname/order".  The maximum size for this field is 24 characters. 
Password To edit your form definition later, you will need the password entered here.  Enter exactly the same password in each of the two boxes.  (Since you will only see "*" characters when you type in this field, the duplicated entry helps to catch errors.)  The maximum size for this field is 12 characters.
Send to E-mail Enter the e-mail address that is to receive the form data.  You can enter a list of addresses, separated by commas.  The maximum size for this field is 255 characters.

 

Optional Specifications

Some defaults will already set for some of these specifications, so you do not need to change these unless you want a customized look or a specialized form.  Many of these specifications allow you to enter HTML "code". If you are not familiar with HTML but would like more control over form customization, you can find HTML information on the Web, such as this online HTML tutorial.
Form Title The text entered here will be used as the HTML title for the page.  Browsers will put this text in the window title bar.  If you do not define any Top HTML, then this title will also be displayed at the top of the form as a default heading for the form.  The maximum size for this field is 80 characters.
Page <BODY You can enter any desired HTML <BODY> tag attributes in this field, such as BACKGROUND or BGCOLOR, TEXT, LINK, and VLINK to control colors of the main page, i.e. any HTML outside of the form.  Tip: The color you set here with a BACKGROUND or BGCOLOR attribute will be the color of the main page around the form, but you can set the background of the form itself to a different color with a BGCOLOR attribute for the Form <TABLE specification, below. Likewise, the TEXT color that you set here controls the color of page text except for the form prompts, which can be set to a different color in the <FONT specification, below.  The maximum size for this field is 100 characters.
<FONT This specification allows you to specify the font attributes for the form text. For example, you can set the FACE attribute, such as "Courier New", "Times New Roman", "Comic sans MS".  The user's browser may or may not have the specified font installed; it's generally best to use only the standard fonts shipped with Windows.  You can give a list of fonts, separated by commas, and the browser will use the first one it finds installed.  Another common attribute to set is COLOR.  You can use certain HTML standard names, such as "RED" and "BLUE", or you can use the HTML numeric RGB specification, such as #000000 for black, #FF0000 for red, etc.  The maximum size for this field is 80 characters.
Top HTML You can enter additional HTML that will be displayed at the top of your form page.  This might be an HTML heading (using <H1> through <H5> tags), a simple text greeting, an <IMG SRC="(url)"> tag to display your logo, a short description of the purpose of the form, links to your other pages or contacts, etc.  There are certain internal variables that can be used in the Top HTML field, which will be replaced with their "current value" whenever the form is used. For example, %%today%% is replaced with the current date, and %%time%% is replaced with the current time.  (Internal variables can also be passed as hidden form input Values.)
Form <TABLE Your form will be generated as an HTML <TABLE>, and in this field you can specify optional <TABLE> parameters such as BGCOLOR, CELLPADDING, CELLSPACING, and BORDER.  Tip: The color you set here with a BGCOLOR attribute can be different from the background of the page that's set in the Page <BODY specification, above.  The maximum size for this field is 80 characters.
Center form? If you click in this box (which inserts a checkmark in the box), then the form table will be centered on the page.  (This is simply a convenience; you could instead use a <CENTER> attribute in the Top HTML or an ALIGN=center attribute in the Form <TABLE to do the same thing.)
Box around form? If you click in this box (which inserts a checkmark in the box), then the form table will be displayed inside of a box.  (This box is created with an outer HTML table around the form with a border, with only one row and one column, i.e., the form itself).  You can set the Width and the Color of the box's border. The Width must be a number specifying the border's width in pixels, and the Color can be any standard HTML color representation (i.e., a standard color name, or a "#" character followed by six hex-digits, two each for the red, green, and blue components).  The Padding setting specifies the number of pixels around the main form table, separating that table from the box's border, so larger Padding numbers effectively make this outer box bigger relative to the form table itself by putting more empty space around that table.
Prompt <TD In the generated HTML table for the form input fields, the Prompt field identifiers will be placed inside HTML <TD> and </TD> tags.  You can use this "Prompt <TD" field to specify optional attributes such as ALIGN, VALIGN, and BGCOLOR.  These attributes will be used for all Prompts on the form.  Tip: The color you set here with a BGCOLOR attribute can be different from the background of the page that's set in the Page <BODY specification, and also different from the form <TABLE BGCOLOR specification above, to make the background color used for just the prompts different from either of those colors.  The maximum size for this field is 80 characters.
Prompt above inputs? If you click in this box (which inserts a checkmark in the box), then the field prompts will be placed above the input boxes, instead of to the left.  (If you select this option, you will probably want to set the Prompt TD attribute to ALIGN=LEFT instead of right, so the prompts and the input boxes will all begin on the left side of the form.)
Section <TD You can divide your form into different sections using a special type of field: the "Section bar" Data Type.  These section bars will be placed in special table <TD> tags, and you can use this field to control the attributes of those <TD> tags.  For example, the default specification sets a background color of blue, and specifies an alignment of "center" for the section bar text, so you can change those for your form if you like.  (There is also a COLSPAN=2 attribute that you should not change because there are always two columns in the form table and the section bar should span them both.)  The maximum size for this field is 80 characters.
Section <FONT This field defines the FONT attributes to use for the text in section bars (see above).  For example, the default specification sets the font face to be the same as the default font face for prompts, and sets a color of white (which is readable for the default section bar background color is set to blue).  The maximum size for this field is 80 characters.
Use reCAPTCHA? If you click in this box (which inserts a checkmark in the box), then the form will include a "CAPTCHA" input box to prevent "spambots" from submitting your form.  This will be a small box immediately above the the Submit button, showing two distorted words which the user will be required to read and enter to successfully submit the form.  The words are distorted to prevent programs from easily interpreting them, so this is a test to insure that a human is submitting the form.  FormMailTo uses the CAPTCHA provided by http://recaptcha.net, which is considered to be the most secure.  If you check this box, you can also select one of the Languages supported by reCAPTCHA from the drop-down list and one of the Themes (color schemes).
Submit Button This text will appear in the "submit" button at the bottom of the form.  The maximum size for this field is 20 characters.
Bottom HTML You can enter additional HTML that will be displayed at the bottom of your form page.  There are certain internal variables that can be used in the Bottom HTML field, which will be replaced with their "current value" whenever the form is used. For example, %%today%% is replaced with the current date, and %%time%% is replaced with the current time.  (Internal variables can also be passed as hidden form input Values.)
'Sent' Message This HTML will be displayed on the page following a successful form submission, before transfering to the "Transfer to URL". The maximum size for this field is 255 characters. Values
Transfer to URL You can use this URL to send a user to another Web page after submitting your form (back to your home page, for example). This can be any valid "http://..." up to a maximum size of 100 characters.
Attach CSV file? This option specifies that you would like to have a CSV ("comma-separated value") file containing the form data attached to the e-mailed message. CSV files can be opened directly as Excel spreadsheets or imported into MS-Access database tables, so they have become a "pseudo-standard" format for transmitting data in text files, which many other applications can take as input. There are two options available here, depending on whether or not you want the file to have a "column header" line. When the option for "Yes, with column headers" is selected, the CSV file attached to the e-mailed message will begin with a line listing the names of your input fields, followed by a line containing the user's entered data. If the "Yes, with no column headers" option is selected, just the data line will be in the file. Note that there are certain variations to the "pseudo-standard" CSV format, and the specific format used here is that all fields are contained inside of double-quotes characters (") and separated by comma characters, and any double-quote characters in the actual data will be replaced by a pair of double-quotes. If you have multiple-line (textarea) input boxes in your form, then the data fields for those boxes may contain new-line characters, so the file may actually have multiple lines for the single "data row". However, since those fields are still contained in double-quote marks, both Excel and MS-Access will recognize those as single fields and span the multiple lines up to the ending quotes. (Other applications may vary.) Note that when you elect either CSV attachment option, you will still get the standard e-mail message, with the input field names and entered data, and the CSV file is just added as an attachment. The file name for the CSV file will be your form name followed by an underscore character (_), then 14 digits representing a timestamp (4-digit year, followed by 2 digits each for month, day, hour, minute, and seconds, PST), followed by a dot and a uniqueness digit (in case you have two forms submitted in the same second), followed by the file type extension of ".csv". Windows-based mail readers will typically recognize the ".csv" extension by using Excel to open the attached file, unless you choose to save it to disk.
SafeMail.To Method This option only appears for registered SafeMail.To forms. SafeMail.To messages can be sent using four different methods: 1) as HTML messages with an embedded JavaScript decryption function; 2) as encrypted Zip file attachments that can be opened and decrypted with a Zip file utility such as PKZIP or WinZip; 3) as encrypted Zip file attachments containing CSV files with column headers; or 4)as encrypted Zip file attachments containing CSV files without column headers. (The last two methods are similar to the CSV attachments described above for standard forms, except that the CSV files will be inside encrypted Zip files. That is, when you use PKZIP or WinZip file to open the attachment, you will see a .csv file inside, and that file can be unzipped with the form password.) Select the method you with to use by clicking one of these buttons. The default is to use the "HTML w/ JavaScript" option, which is actually the safer method, but if you find that your e-mail reader cannot recognize HTML messages or that it does not support JavaScript, you can try one of the Zip file attachment methods. (But note that your e-mail reader may simply have JavaScript disabled, and you may be able to enable it. Please see this help page for instructions for enabling JavaScript in some common e-mail readers.) Also, please see the "Important Notes" at the bottom of the SafeMail.To home page.

 

Input Fields

This section defines the data input fields that will appear on your form, and which will be e-mailed to you.  There are no fixed size limits for these fields, except that the total field definition size (i.e., all field values plus delimiter characters) cannot exceed 32 KB.

There are three buttons on the left side of each field entry that you can used to manipulate the list of field entries.  The button with the "^" character can be used to move a field up in the list, so it can be used to reorder the fields that you have already entered.  The button with the "x" character can be used to delete a field entry.  The button with the ">" character can be used to insert a new field into the list: The field at the selected location and all fields below it will be moved down one position, and a blank entry line will be inserted at that location.

Prompt This text will be placed in front of the input box to identify the data requested from the user.  This field can contain HTML tags. 

The Prompt is not required (for example, you might omit it from the second line of a two-line address), but if you omit the Prompt, you must provide a Field Name. 

If the first character of a Prompt is a "+" character, then the defined field will be placed on the same line of the form as the previous field.  For example, if you wanted three fields, City, State, and Zip on one line, then the Prompts for the three fields would be "City", "+ State", and "+ Zip".

Field Name This Field Name will be used in the generated HTML as the NAME="..." parameter of the <INPUT> tag.  The Field Name (rather than the Prompt) will also be used to identify the data in the e-mail message.  That is, the e-mail you receive will have a line labeled "Field Name:", followed by the user's data, for each field that you define on the form.

The Field Name is not required if a Prompt is specified.  In this case, the Prompt text will also be used as the Field Name.

Cols The number entered into the Cols (columns) field will specify the number of characters (i.e., the SIZE="..." parameter) for the HTML <INPUT> box.  (If you do not enter a number, the default will be 32 characters.)

This number only controls the displayed width of the input box; it does not limit the number of characters entered by the user.  Input boxes will scroll to the right if the user continues typing.  (However, there is a maximum size of 8K bytes for any input field.)

The Cols field is ignored for fields with a Data Type of "Select list", "Select multi", "Check box", "Hidden", or "No input".  (The width of pull-down selection boxes is automatically determined by browsers from the size of the largest list item.)  For Radio button data types, the Cols field can be used to control the placement of the selection boxes: If Cols is set to "1", then the Radio buttons will be displayed in a single vertical column.  If Cols is set to "2" or more, then that number of buttons will be displayed on each line.  To put all Radio buttons on a single line, set Cols to be equal to or greater than the number of button selections. (The default Cols size of 32 will generally put all buttons on the same line.)

Rows If a number is entered in the Rows field, then the input box will be an HTML <TEXTAREA> (a multiple line entry area) instead of a single line <INPUT> box, and the number of lines displayed will be the given number.  The Rows default is "1" (i.e., a standard <INPUT> box).

A <TEXTAREA> option of WRAP="virtual" will be set, which will cause automatic "word wrapping" to the next line at the right side of the box.  The Rows only specifies the number of lines to be displayed in the box.  The user can continue typing past the last displayed line, and there will be a vertical scrolling bar on the right side of the <TEXTAREA>.

Data Type This pull-down selection specifies either the type of HTML input box or the type of data allowed in the field.  Click on the arrow key beside the box to see the list of Data Types, then click on the desired type to select it:
  • Text - Ordinary text field, with no validations applied.  (This is the default type if no Data Type is selected.)

  • Alphabetic - Only alphabetic characters (A to Z or a to z) or spaces are allowed (e.g., useful for names).

  • Alphanumeric - Only alphabetic characters (A to Z or a to z), or numbers (0 to 9), or spaces are allowed.

  • Integer # - A "whole number" (i.e., no decimal point), with an optional "+" or "-" as the first character to indicate the positive or negative sign of the number.

  • Floating #.# - A number with an optional decimal point and one or more digits following the decimal point.  (An integer may also be entered in this type of field.)  The number may also have a "+" or "-" sign indicator.

  • 1/100s #.00 - Either an integer or a number with exactly two digits following a decimal point.  (This data type can be used for dollars input, for example.)  The number may also have a "+" or "-" sign indicator.

  • E-mail addr - A standard e-mail address in the form of "account@domainname.hld" (where ".hld" is any "high level domain" such as ".com" or ".net").

  • Credit card # - A Visa, Master Card, American Express, Discover, or Diner's Club/Carte Blanche credit card number. The number may include spaces and "-" characters, but they are not required. You should make the input field at least 20 columns. Verifies the number format by checking the prefix, number of digits, and the "Luhn mod(10) check-digit". (NOTE: Only the validity of the card number format is checked, not the status of the credit card account.

  • Validate s/ - A text input which is to be validated using the "regular expression" contained in the Value column.  With this data type, the Value column does not contain a field initialization text.  Instead, it should contain a regular expression pattern which will be used to validate the user's input.  If the regular expression pattern is not found in the input, the user will receive an error page with the message, "(user's actual input) is not a valid entry for (Prompt)", and the entry will need to be corrected before the form will be posted.;

  • Check box - An HTML <INPUT TYPE="checkbox"> field.  When the user clicks in this box, a check mark will appear in the box.  In the Value field, you can specify the value (such as "Yes") that will be sent with the form data if the user checks the box.  This value will also be shown immediately to the right of the Check box.  You can also specify a Value in the format of "value=label" (for example, "1=Yes"; the "value" will be the text value sent with the form, but the "label" will be the text shown to the right of the Check box.  If you do not specify any Value, the default value sent with the form will be "on".  If the user does not check a Check box, no data at all is sent for that field.

  • Checked box - Same as above, except that the box is initialized as CHECKED and the user can click the box to unset it.

  • Radio - A Radio "button" is actually a related set of check boxes, only one of which can be selected at a time.  If the user clicks any of the unselected boxes, the selection marker will move to that box.  The set of available Radio button selections must be specified in the Value field.  In the Value field, the set of button values must be separated by the "|" vertical bar character, such as "One | Two | Three".  Like the Check box values, you can use the "value=label" format if you want the value sent with the form to be different from the text shown on the form for each button, such as "1=One | 2=Two | 3=Three". The Cols field can be used to control the placement of the selection boxes: If Cols is set to "1", then the Radio buttons will be displayed in a single vertical column.  If Cols is set to "2" or more, then that number of buttons will be displayed on each line.  To put all Radio buttons on a single line, set Cols to be equal to or greater than the number of button selections. (The default Cols size of 32 will generally put all buttons on the same line.)

  • Select list - This Data Type creates a pull-down selection list, like the Data Type list itself.  The list of available selections must be specified in the Value field.  In the Value field, the selection list items must be separated by the "|" vertical bar character, such as "Item One | Item Two | Item Three".  Like the Check box values, you can use the "value=label" format if you want the value sent with the form to be different from the text shown in the pull-down list, such as "1=Item One | 2=Item Two | 3=Item Three".

  • Select multi - Same as above, except that multiple selections are allowed if the user holds down the "Ctrl" key while making selections.  (Holding down the "Shift" key while clicking on any two items selects all the items between those two.)

  • Password - This is a "text" type of field, except that the user's input is not displayed in the box.  Instead, a "*" character is shown for each character entered.

  • Hidden - Hidden fields are not displayed on the form, but they are sent with the form data that you will receive by e-mail.  The value sent with the form will be the Value field entry, so a hidden field should always be given a Value.  This type of input is most useful when the Value is one of the internal variables, such as "%%remote_host%%" to capture the user's host system or "%%http_referer%%" to capture the URL of the Web page that linked to the form.  The Prompt and Note fields are ignored for hidden fields.

  • Text, no edit - The Prompt, Value, and Note fields can be used to specify text that will be displayed. The Value text will be shown in the same table column as the input boxes, but the text will not be editable.  (This might be used, for example, to simply help clarify or to identify the data requested in the following field.)

  • No input - This selection means that no input field at all will be generated. However, the Prompt and the Note fields will be output.  Therefore, you can use the Prompt or the Note fields to add a comment or a section "header" in the middle of the form, with no input box on that line.

  • Section bar - This selection will insert a special table row that can be used to divide the form into different sections.  The section bar text (i.e. the section title) will be the Prompt text only; the Value and Note fields are ignored.  The background color and other attributes for this section bar can be set with the Section TD specification, and the font for the section bar text can be set with the Section FONT.  (The default for these will make the section bar white text on a blue background bar.) 
Req * Click this check box if you want the field to be a required entry.  A red asterisk will appear in front of the input box on the form.  If the user omits a required field, an error page with the message, "(Prompt) must be entered" will be shown and the user will need to go back and enter something in the field.  Tip: If you have any required fields, you may wish to include some text in either the Top HTML or the Bottom HTML to alert users that the red asterisk indicates a required field. 
Value This field can be used, as a convenience to the form user, to specify an initial value for a text field. The user can change this value if desired.  The Value field also has special usage for certain Data Types, as detailed for those types.  (For example, this is where you provide the list of values for a "Select list" or "Radio" type.)
Note Any text entered in the Note field will be displayed on the righthand side of the input box.  Use this field to note any special requirements or comments about the input field.  For example, you might put "Required" as the Note for required fields, or you might document the expected format for special fields such as telephone numbers or Social Security numbers.  This field can contain HTML tags.

 

Two Special Input Fields You Can Use

There are two special input fields that you may want to define for your form:

Subject If you define a field with a Field Name of "Subject", then that field will be used as the Subject line of the e-mailed message. On the page to create a new form, there is an initial entry for Field Name "Subject" with a Value of "Form %%form%%". The %%form%% will be replaced with your form ID. You can change this Value if you wish to have a different Subject line for the e-mail. The initial Data Type for this field is set to "Hidden", so the user will not see (and therefore cannot change) the e-mail's Subject. If you want to make this field as an ordinary text input field that your users can enter, change the Data Type to "Text". Another useful option, especially for general "feedback" or query forms, is to make the Subject a pull-down list of choices that the user can select. To do that, set the Data Type to "Select list", then enter a bar-delimited list of choices in the Value column, such as "Question | Comment | Problem Report". Or you could set the Data Type to "Radio" and enter a bar-delimited list of choices in the Value column, and those choices will be shown as HTML "radio" style checkboxes (i.e., only one can be selected at a time).
From If you define a field with a Field Name of "From", then that input will be used as the Reply-To e-mail header, which most mail reader software will recognize as the destination e-mail address for the "Reply" function. (The e-mail messages are actually sent to you with a From address of user@FormMailTo.com, which cannot be used as a Reply address to reach your user, but the Reply-To e-mail header allows the replies to go to a different address.) You should set the Data Type for this field to be "E-mail addr" and you may want to make it a required entry.

 

The "Save Form Definition" Button

When you have completed your form definition, click this button to save it. If there are any errors in the definition, you will receive an error message page.  All detected errors will be shown, so that you can go "Back" and correct all of them in one pass.

If the form definition is successfully saved, you will receive a page noting the URL and a "Click here to try it" link.  Click that link to view and check your form.
 

Editing a Form Definition

When you enter a Form ID and Password on the "Edit a Form Definition" page, you will see a page like the original "Create a New Form" page, but with your form definition filled in.  Make any desired changes and click the "Update Form Definition" button.
 

"Regular Expression" Field Validation

The Data Type "Validate s/" allows you to specify special input validations.  This is done by entering a UNIX-style "regular expression" pattern in the Value field.  If the user's input does not match the regular expression pattern, then an error message will be returned, "(user's actual input) is not a valid entry for (Prompt)", and the user will need to go "Back" and correct the entry.

Regular expressions use "meta-characters" to specify the format of the input.  The regular expression "meta-characters" that are supported are:

^ Beginning of string (i.e. the following pattern must match the string starting at character number 1).
$ End of string (i.e. the preceding match must be at the end of string's value).
. Match any single character.
* Match zero or more occurrences of the preceding character or [...] character class.
? Match zero or one occurrence of the preceding character or [...] character class.
+ Match one or more occurrence of the preceding character or [...] character class.
[...] Match a single character to any one of the characters in the specified list (a "character class"), such as [ABC].
[a-z] Match a single character to any one of the characters between the two characters separated by "-", e.g. [0-9] would be any digit, or [A-Z] would be any uppercase alphabetic. You can include several pairs in the same list, such as [a-zA-Z0-9] to match any alpha-numeric character. You can mix character ranges with lists, such as [ABC0-9] to match "A", "B", "C", or any digit.
[^...] Match any character that is not specified in the list for the character class, such as [^a-zA-Z0-9] to match any non-alpha-numeric character.
{n} Match the preceding character or character class exactly "n" times, e.g. [0-9]{8} would match exactly eight digits.
{n,} Match the preceding character or character class "n" times or more, such as [0-9]{8,} to match eight or more digits.
{n,m} Match the preceding character or character class at least "n" times but no more than "m" times, such as [0-9]{8,10} to match eight, nine, or ten digits.
| Pattern "or" separator. Match either the preceding pattern completely or the following pattern completely. May be used multiple times.
\t The ASCII tab character.
\r The ASCII carriage-return character.
\n The ASCII linefeed ("new line") character.
\ "Escape", take the next character "literally" as part of the pattern, not as a special character. For example, \* means the asterisk is in the pattern to be matched, instead of the meaning shown above. Use \\ to specify the backslash itself.

Pattern Examples:

A Social Security number has a particular format: three digits, a hyphen, two more digits, another hyphen, then four digits.  This format can be validated with this regular expression: 

    ^[0-9]{3}-[0-9]{2}-[0-9]{4}$
The "^" as the first character means that the remainder of the pattern must match starting with the first character of the input data.  (Otherwise, a pattern can be matched anywhere within the input.)  Most of your "Validate s/" patterns will probably require the "^" character (and the end-of-string "$" character) to avoid extraneous data before or after the matched pattern.

Following the "^" is a "character class" of "[0-9]", which means to match any character between "0" and "9", inclusive, which is to say any digit character.  Following the "[0-9]" is "{3}" which means that the preceding character (or in this case, a character class) is to be matched exactly three times.  Following that is a literal hyphen ("-"), with no following qualifiers, so this means that a single hyphen must be present.  The remainder of the pattern specifies that there should be exactly two more digits, followed by another hyphen, followed by exactly four digits.  The "$" sign at the end means that the end of the data is expected immediately following the last four digits.  Like the "^" at the beginning, this prevents any extraneous data in addition to the matched pattern. 

As a more complicated example, a standard US phone number has a three-digit area code, a three-digit exchange code, then four digits.  But several different conventions are used for the format of a phone number, such as optional parentheses around the area code and hyphens or spaces between the groups.  The following pattern will match any of the typical formats, while failing to match an invalid phone number: 

    ^(?[0-9]{3})?[- ]?[0-9]{3}[- ]?[0-9]{4}$
Again, the "^" as the first character means that the remainder of the pattern must match starting with the first character of the input data.  The next character, "(" is immediately followed by a "?" which specifies zero or one occurrence of the character (i.e., it is an optional character).  Next, "[0-9]{3}" means that exactly three digits should be present.  Then there is another optional ")".  Following that, the specification "[- ]?" means that a single hyphen or space may or may not be present.  Similarly, the rest of the pattern specifies a three-digit group followed by a four-digit group, perhaps with a hyphen or space between them.  And again, the last character of the pattern, "$", means that the end of the input data is expected after the four-digit group, so this pattern will not match if extra characters or digits are entered.

The pattern above will match any of the following phone number formats: (719) 555-1212, (719)555-1212, (719) 555 1212, 719-555-1212, 719 555-1212, 719 555 1212, 719 5551212, or 7195551212.

The "$" end-of-string meta-character can be used by itself as a valid pattern for an optional field.  (That is, an empty field will immediately match the end-of-data meta-character.)  If a field is optional but must have a certain pattern if it is entered, you can use the "$" followed by the "|" ("OR bar") separator, followed by the required pattern.  For example, this pattern will allow an empty field but will validate that, if given, the input includes only "alphanumeric" characters (i.e., upper or lower case alphabetics or numeric digits): 

    $|^[a-zA-Z0-9]*$

 

Internal Variables

There are some special variables that you can use in your form to dynamically insert values that are known to the FormMail.To program. These variables can be used in the Top HTML field to be displayed at the top of the page, or they may be used in a Value specification to initialize a form input field.  (If you want to pass one of these variables with your e-mail message, but don't want the form user to see them, set the Data Type to "Hidden".) The Top HTML and the Value column are the only places these will work.

%%today%%Current date in the format "Month DD, YYYY", where "Month" is the full name of the current month, "DD" is the one- or two-digit day of the month, and "YYYY" is the four-digit year
%%date_short%%Current date in the format MM-DD-YYYY, where "MM" is the number of the current month, "DD" is the number of the day, and "YYYY" is the four-digit year
%%date_ymd%%Current date in the format YYYYMMDD, where "YYYY" is the four-digit year, "MM" is the number of the current month, and "DD" is the number of the day
%%year%%Current year, four digits
%%month%%Current month, one or two digits. (Use %%format("0#", %%month%%) to force two digits)
%%day%%Day number in current month, one or two digits (Use %%format("0#", %%day%%) to force two digits)
%%monthname%%Full name of current month (e.g., "September")
%%weekday%%Full name of current day of week (e.g., "Monday")
%%time%%Current 12-hour clock time on the FormMail.To system, in the format HH:MMam or HH:MMpm, where "HH" is the hour and "MM" is the minute
%%time24%%Current 24-hour clock time in the format HH:MM, where "HH" is the hour and "MM" is the minute
%%http_referer%%The URL of the document that was used to link to the form
%%remote_host%%Host that the user is running on (may be a node name, but commonly is just the numeric Internet address; no "reverse DNS lookup" is done)
%%remote_addr%%Internet numeric address (nnn.nnn.nnn.nnn) that the user is running on

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