I got my CGI form send working!

[thewayne]

If you're not a web geek, the following will probably be supremely uninteresting.

I was working on my GPS Potty web site, specifically the rest area submission page tonight in class. I've never done anything with CGI and forms before, and I got it working! It was easier than I expected. The Dreamweaver form designer did a very easy job of making the form itself, including setting maximum field lengths and combo boxes. Then setting up everything for the CGI was pretty simple. You create a template file linked to the field names on the HTML page that is saved as a text file. In the HTML page, at the start of the form declaration, you point to your web site's CGI directory and the name of your form script, mine is a script called CGIEMAIL developed (or at least archived) at MIT, that declaration also points to the template file. Finally, the code for the Submit button (I think) references a function in the script through value="Send e-mail", but that name might vary depending upon the CGI script.

Anyway, what I ended up with as an email that looks like the following:

Your Name? Wayne
Your Email Address? xxxxx@yahoo.com
State? nm
Highway/Interstate Name? x
Direction of Travel? North
Nearest Mile Marker before Rest Area: y
Latitude? x
degrees? q
direction? North
Longitude? q
degrees? q
direction? West
Name of Facility? q
Facility Type? Full Service
General Description? q

So now I need to start working on a PHP/database interface so that (1) people can upload sites directly into a temporary database that I can review directly online then copy them into the live table, and (2) generate the site lists directly from a database table. I also want to have a couple of code routines that convert latitude/longitude into a different format so that I can directly link them to Google Maps so that a user can directly see where any given rest area is. Another routine that I want is one that would directly produce a file that you could upload straight into your GPS that would have your waypoints right there for you. And finally, a program that would maintain a user login/preferences system, not unlike the Geocaching site. I imagine that I'll learn how to implement the third item as I pursue the database integration issue.

The thing that sucks is that I still have my hosting service issue hanging over my head. I submitted a post to Slashdot asking for hosting suggestions as I have not yet found a really good comparison of hosting services online, but my submission has been marked as pending for over a week. I have a feeling that I'll end up with DreamHost, but I'm not looking forward to it as they're more than twice what I was paying at Scottsdale Hosting.

Comments

[fastlearner.livejournal.com]

Was there something about GoDaddy that was problematic for you? I've got about a half-dozen sites hosted there and am perfectly happy with them.

[thewayne.livejournal.com]

GoDaddy is currently my registrar for all of my domains except gpspotty.com, I think that's four or five domains. They yanked a domain that ran a security blog that exposed a hole in MySpace's setup: MySpace complained to GoDaddy, the blog's registrar (I don't know if they hosted the blog site) and with 45 seconds after the warning email went out from GoDaddy the site was gone. AFAIK, no contact was made between MySpace and the blog's operator. He had no chance to discuss it with anyone, and GoDaddy's TOS is that "we can yank your domain for any reason at all".

I don't like that.

(see http://nodaddy.com/ and the Slashdot thread.)

So I registered gpspotty.com on http://www.nearlyfreespeech.net/, they're highly regarded in the geek community, inexpensive, and have interesting policies. I prefer to keep my domain registration and hosting separate, and though NearlyFreeSpeech seems to have a good hosting service, I'm not certain their features meet my needs. And with Scottsdale Hosting not talking about their future, I'm left to fend for myself and my best interests.

My problem with GoDaddy is purely philosophical. Eventually I'll migrate all my domains to NFS.

I briefly considered using GoDaddy for hosting, but Scottsdale Hosting's prices were flat-out amazing, and I've had excellent service from them for two years. But now there's too much uncertainty, and my hosting contract is up in about two weeks.

[fastlearner.livejournal.com]

I seemed to recall there being something you didn't like about them, I guess that was it. :)

Let me know what you end up with and how it works out, I'm always on the lookout for a good host.

[silveradept]

Excellent work. Hopefully the PHP is easier than the CGI. (In my case, I'd have to do it all in Rails, since that's the only language I know)

[thewayne.livejournal.com]

I don't know if my current host supports Rails, I believe that the most likely candidate for my new hosting business does support Rails. But for that matter, I don't know Rails at all! It is one of the many technologies that I really ought to learn.

[silveradept]

If you're okay with learning lots of conventions, having somewhat cryptic error messages, and trusting that "things get done" if you follow the conventions, without having to write everything yourself (although you can, if you want), then Ruby on Rails might be a good fit. It's nice for me because I can look at my source code and understand it without too much jargon or cryptic statements getting in the way.