metafeedback:
WWW Feedback Mail Program

metafeedback is a script which allows anyone to set up their own feedback form--an HTML form that sends e-mail to someone. All you need to do is write a form with the right names for a few fields. No programming is required. The system is very flexible, so your forms can have as many or few fields as you want.

Step by Step

1. Create a form in an HTML file

First, you must make an HTML file specifying what your form will look like. Your file can contain anything you want, as long as the form is specified correctly. If you've never made an HTML form, you should read some of the documentation in this index.

Recall that forms are specified as
<FORM ACTION="URL"> ... </FORM>

To use metafeedback, specify http://www.k-state.edu/cgi-bin/metafeedback/ as the URL. This means that, when the form is submitted, it will be sent to the metafeedback program.

After the ACTION line, you need to tell metafeedback where to send e-mail to. You do this by placing a hidden field in the form, like this:
<INPUT TYPE="hidden" NAME="to" VALUE="my-name@wherever.whatever.edu">

When you submit the form, its contents will thus be sent to my-name@wherever.whatever.edu. You would use your own e-mail address, of course.

Next, specify the rest of the form. There are four fields that you should include:

• So you know who is sending mail to you, you should include fields named "from" and "name". These should be filled in by an e-mail address and a "real name", respectively.
• It's a good idea to specify a subject for the e-mail, so you can distinguish among all of the mail that you get; use a field named "subject". If you want the person filling out the form to specify the subject, make this a regular input field; if you want all of the mail coming from this form to have the same subject, make the field "hidden" in the same way as the "to" field and specify the subject in the VALUE part.
• Finally, you probably want to have a large text box for comments. This field, which will make up the body of the e-mail message, should be named "comments".

Remember that somewhere in the form, you need to have a button to submit the form, like this:
<INPUT TYPE="submit" VALUE="Send this to me">

2. Put the HTML file on an accessible web server

Your file should be located somewhere where it can be accessed from the Web. You can put it in with all of your other HTML documents; it doesn't have to be anywhere special.

3. Go to the file (directly, or make a link)

The HTML file has a URL just like everything else on the Web. In your Web browser, you can go to the URL directly, or you can make a link to it from some other HTML file.

4. Fill out the form

Try out your new form! Fill in the fields and press the "submit" button. You should receive mail in a few minutes. Note that, if you filled in the "from" field correctly, you can simply use the "reply" function of your mail-reading program to respond to the e-mail.

Other options

There are a few other options that you can specify that change the way that metafeedback works.

• The most important feature is that you can add any fields you want to the form. Any input fields in the form will be added to the e-mail that gets sent. For example, if I wanted to ask age of the person filling out the form, I could add a field like this:
  <INPUT TYPE="text" NAME="age">
  The input to this "age" field would be mailed to me along with the rest of the form.

  These additional fields will be printed in order of their names in your mail. You may also specify what order they are in: just put numbers at the beginning of the field names. They will be printed without the numbers in your mail. For example, if a form has fields named "1date", "2weekday", and "3time", the fields would be printed out in the order "Date", "Weekday", and then "Time".

• To get more information about the computer and browser that were used to fill out the form, put
  <INPUT TYPE="hidden" NAME="printHostInfo">
  in your form. If you often need this information, it's easier to get the information automatically than to rely on the user (who is often wrong, anyway).

• Sometimes your mail program may hide the name and e-mail address of the person who sent the mail to you. If you want to make these easier to see, put the fields
  <INPUT TYPE="hidden" NAME="printName">
<INPUT TYPE="hidden" NAME="printEmail">
  in your form. In the body of your mail you will see the name and/or e-mail address of the person who filled out the form.

• Normally, after sending the e-mail to you, metafeedback shows the user a standard message saying that the comments have been successfully sent. If you'd like to customize this message, you may give metafeedback the URL of a file to show instead:
  <INPUT TYPE="hidden" NAME="nextURL" VALUE="your URL here">

Example

The Caltech WWW Feedback Form is an example of a form that uses metafeedback. To see how the form was written, go to that page and use the "View Source" command of your browser.

An example of e-mail that was sent to me is:

>From httpuser Fri Mar 10 17:52:58 1995
Return-Path: <httpuser>
Received: from broccoli.cco.caltech.edu by piccolo.cco.caltech.edu with ESMTP
        (8.6.7/DEI:4.41) id RAA20081; Fri, 10 Mar 1995 17:52:53 -0800
From: httpuser
Received: by broccoli.cco.caltech.edu
        (8.6.7/UGCS:4.41) id RAA17364; Fri, 10 Mar 1995 17:52:52 -0800
Date: Fri, 10 Mar 1995 17:52:52 -0800
Message-Id: <199503110152.RAA17364@broccoli.cco.caltech.edu>
To: www@cco.caltech.edu
Subject: Test of metafeedback
Reply-To: trp@yoyodyne.com (Thomas Pynchon)

Remote host: blend.ugcs.caltech.edu (131.215.134.139)
Browser:     Mozilla/1.0N (X11; HP-UX A.09.01 9000/715)

Name: Thomas Pychon
E-Mail: trp@yoyodyne.com
Position: Staff
Department: Electrical Engineering

Wow! It actually works!

This is amazing!

Questions?

If you have any questions or comments about metafeedback, please e-mail webmaster@k-state.edu