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Getting Help on FormSmarts

At FormSmarts, we are pleased to let you use our web form platform absolutely free. However, whenever we have to help you in person, we ask you to spend a few minutes writing a review on one the following websites, before we take some of our time to help you.

• write a review on CGI Resource Index
• write a review on HotScripts

About Writing Reviews

We ask you to write reviews that are useful to readers, not spam. If you’re using FormSmarts, there must be reasons: talking about features you like about FormSmarts is probably a good start.

Contact Us When Done

Once you’re done, contact us.

Posted on Apr 16th, 2008 in form builder.
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Form Processor Upgrade: More Interactivity for Web Form Users and More

We’ll be upgrading at the end of the week some key components of FormSmarts. The changes will affect both form users and form owners.

More Interactivity for Web Form Users

• form users can modify any invalid data they may have submitted in the same page, rather than having to press the back button
• form users can modify submitted data even when form data is not cached by the browser, or if JavaScript is disabled
• we’ve added features to improve the experience of visually-impaired users equipped with screenreaders

Changes in Email Notification of Form Results

• new email subject format [Form #123] My Form Name #456
• the first part [Form #123] is fixed so that you can use it to create a filter within your mail client
• emails now include a unique transaction ID, e.g. #456 that can be used, for example, as an order number for order forms (form users are shown the transaction ID on the confirmation page)
• whenever your form contains an email field, you can now reply to sender hitting the reply button in your email client
• because of the previous point, we no longer show your pass-phrase in every email

Posted on Apr 15th, 2008 in form handler.
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Tags: email notification, form submission, web forms

Any Feature Suggestions for FormSmarts?

We’ve added a feature suggestion form. You can vote for features requested by others and suggest new ones. Now is the time to have your say.

In average, we release a new version of FormSmarts form builder or form processing engine weekly.

Posted on Mar 31st, 2008 in form builder.
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Tags: upcoming

New Web Form Creator Demo Video Available

We’ve added a new demonstration video to help new FormSmarts users get started. The video is on YouTube, and a higher quality version is available for download form the Internet Archive.

Posted on Mar 25th, 2008 in form builder.
1 Comment
Tags: howto, HTML form, video tutorial

FormSmarts Form Creator Now Supports All HTML Form Field Types

We are pleased to announce that FormSmarts now supports the full range of HTML form input fields. Users can now update their web forms and create new ones using Drop Down Lists, Radio Buttons, and Checkboxes.

We are in the process of updating relevant documentation on the site.

Update: see how to choose the correct form input field.

Posted on Mar 22nd, 2008 in form builder.
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Tags: form design, upcoming

Tips for Web Form Users with Non-English Language Websites

Many users in non-English speaking countries now use FormSmarts, so we thought we would post a few recommendations for them.

When building your forms with the form creator, use the text data type for any fields that may contain non-English characters, such as the accented characters found in many European languages (All data types now support all languages/character sets).
Note that non-European languages like Arabic, Chinese, Hebrew, Japanese and Russian are not supported at this time.

As you know, FormSmarts form handler is not a simple form to email processor script like FormMail. Each and every web form submission is analyzed in real time, and the user may be asked to complete a challenge if we suspect a form spam attempt. Although anyone capable of reading elementary English should be able to understand what is expected from him/her in that context, this is something you may have to take into account when designing your web forms. You could for example warn users in the form filling instructions.

If you need help, we provide limited support in French, German, and Chinese (as well as English, of course.) You can write us in any of those languages, but we will only reply in English.

Posted on Mar 11th, 2008 in form handler.
2 Comments
Tags: howto, international, web forms

Displaying Your Own Logo on Your Forms

FormSmarts users can now display their own logo in the top left corner of their forms.

Note that because each logo must be reviewed manually, we ask you to spend a few minutes to help us publicize FormSmarts before we take some of our time to validate your logo. Alternatively, you may get your logo validated for a small fee of US$ 5 per logo submitted. You may help us by:

• writing reviews about us on relevant sites and blogs (e.g. Scripts.com, HotScripts)
• posting a video on YouTube showing how to use FormSmarts (gets you free validation of all of your logos)

Once done, ask us to validate your logo.

Posted on Feb 16th, 2008 in form builder.
2 Comments
Tags: upcoming, web forms

Will FormSmarts Remain Free?

A few people asked if FormSmarts will remain free. Although we may some day offer FormSmarts as commercial service with SLA and additional features, the basic service will remain free.

Note that we will need to charge a one-off fee for some services. For example, we will soon allow users to upload a custom website logo to appear on their web forms. Each image will require human validation, so we’ll need to charge a small fee for this. We will however lift the fee for users who have referred friends/site visitors to FormSmarts, wrote reviews about us on relevant sites, posted a video about using FormSmarts on Youtube, etc.

Posted on Jan 24th, 2008 in HTML form.
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Tags: web forms

Show a Form Owner Name on Your Forms

Increase user confidence by letting us verify you own the websites you are using with FormSmarts. FormSmarts will then display a verified form owner name in the top-right corner of all your forms.

To verify your sites, sign in to FormSmarts, and choose the Verified Websites option in the Settings tab. The form owner name can currently only be a verified web hostname. We will soon also support verified personal or company names. More details here.

Posted on Jan 12th, 2008 in HTML form.
4 Comments
Tags: privacy, upcoming, web forms

Are Forms Protected by a CAPTCHA?

We often get questions asking whether FormSmarts web forms are protected against automated submissions by a CAPTCHA. A CAPTCHA is a challenge-response test used to determine whether the user is human.

Yes, we do use CAPTCHA tests, but not every time a form is submitted. Instead, the form handler decides each time whether or not to require a CAPTCHA test (and other verifications), based on unobtrusive analysis by our form spam blocker of the information submitted.

This saves time to every one, and reduces form abandonment.

Asking the user to complete a CAPTCHA test for every form submission affects form usability and accessibility.

Posted on Jan 11th, 2008 in form builder, form spam.
2 Comments
Tags: captcha, form spam, form submission, usability, web forms

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