[Resolved] email form with automatic response....

ashley526

I am doing a holiday website where kids can come and email santa. I know how to make the form and php file that will take the information off of the form and email it to me, and give a general message. But I am wanting to do something with a bit more, "umph". LOL

I'd ideally like to have the form be:

Name
Naughty or Nice
Wish List for Santa

Then in return I'd love for it to come up with a personilized (from that info) letter from an elf, rudolf, mrs claus... saying something about how things are there and then commenting if they were naughty or nice. So there'd be a naughty letter and a nice letter.

Is that even possible? And how hard do you think it'd be to do?

Thanks so much!

Ashley

Dolemite50

Hi,
Do you already have your form working with the initial email that is sent to "Santa"?

ashley526

Well I only made the form as I didn't wanna do the php if it wasn't going to be anything that I needed, but yes I do know how to do it.

http://holidayletters.org is the website you can see the simple form that I have.

The reason I want it automatic response is because it's gonna be free for kids to use. And I don't have time to email them all back a letter from santa, plus it's cool for them to get it right then.

I'd also love to have the response able to have a picture there too... Let me go ahead and finish the php part, and I will post what I have. 🙂

Ashley

Frederick

You can setup 2 template for the choices of Naughty or Nice. Send these template in a form of HTML to the user.

In your form, change the value of your radio buttons to 1 and 2;

You will also need to add an email field to your form (email_address).

Create 2 pages for your templates using the following method:

<?php
// Example of Template - Call it Nice.php
$message = "<html>\n";
$message .= "<body bgcolor=\"#ffffff\">\n";
$message .= "<table width=\"100%\" border=\"0\" cellspacing=\"0\" cellpadding=\"1\">\n";
$message .= "<tr>\n";
$message .= "<td>Header Image Here</td>\n";
$message .= "</tr>\n";
$message .= "<tr>\n";
$message .= "<td>Users Name: $firstname $lastname</td>\n";
$message .= "</tr>\n";
$message .= "<tr height=\"10\">\n";
$message .= "<td height=\"10\"></td>\n";
$message .= "</tr>\n";
$message .= "<tr>\n";
$message .= "<td>$wishlist</td>\n";
$message .= "</tr>\n";
$message .= "</table>\n";
$message .= "</body>\n";
$message .= "</html>\n";
?>

Method of sending the email in HTML format:

<?php
if ($naughtynice == 1) { include("Naughty_Template.php"); }
else { include("Nice_Template.php"); }

$header    = "From: Santa Claus<$email_address>\n";
$header   .= "MIME-Version: 1.0\n";
$header   .= "Content-Type: text/$type; charset=iso-8859-1\n";
$header   .= "X-Priority: 1\n";
$header   .= "X-Mailer: PHP / ".phpversion()."\n";

$sendto = "$email_address<$firstname $lastname>";

mail($sendto,$subject,$message,$header);

header("Location: Response_Page.php");
?>

ashley526

Oh my gosh wow, what a wealth of info that is!!!!

BRB with my results!! 🙂

THANK YOU!

Ashley

Frederick

Corrected the line

from

$header .= "Content-Type: text/$type; charset=iso-8859-1\n";

$header .= "Content-Type: text/html; charset=iso-8859-1\n";

ashley526

Okay so I am a bit lost already! 😃

Here is what I knew how to do, just to email myself what they submitted:

<?php 
// emailsanta.php --- sends mail, but doesn't say so... 

// stuff from POST array (form)
$firstname=$_POST['firstname']; 
$lastname=$_POST['lastname']; 
$email=$_POST['email'];
$naughtynice=$_POST['naughtynice'];
$wishlist=$_POST['wishlist'];

// the date/time 
$date=date('r', time()); 

$message="First Name: $firstname \n"; 
$message.="Last Name: $lastname \n";
$message.="Email Address: $email \n";
$message.="Naughty or Nice: $naughtynice \n";
$message.="Wish List: $wishlist \n";

$mailheaders="From: $email\r\n";

$success=mail("santa@holidayletters.org", "Letter To Santa", $message, $mailheaders); 

?>

So with those other 2 php files, I am not sure how to tie them into the form. What do I put as the action on the form? Also allong with the nice.php I'd need a naughty.php right (same format)?

ashley526

Okay what goes in the Response_Page.php file? There was an error... 🙁

Not Found
The requested URL /Response_Page.php was not found on this server.

Frederick

The action of your form will point to the process page for your email:
<form action="Email_Process.php" method="post">
Just call your processing page "Email_Process.php" for this exercise.

In your radio buttons, you have name="naughtynice" with a value of 1 and 2.
Before the section where it processes the accual mailing, place the fallowing:

if ($naughtynice == 1) { include("Naughty_Template.php"); } 
else { include("Nice_Template.php"); }

What this does is if the radio button is nice, it includes the exterior file (template) of Nice_Template.php or the other.

In those templates, you will place some place your variables:
$firstname
$lastname
$wishlist

In your mail() function, change from:

$success=mail("santa@holidayletters.org", "Letter To Santa", $message, $mailheaders);

$success = @mail("santa@holidayletters.org", "Letter To Santa", $message, $mailheaders);

With the error message:
Not Found
The requested URL /Response_Page.php was not found on this server.
That is coming from the header() action of:

header("Location: Response_Page.php");

for the redirecting the user to a page to inform them that the email has been sent. Just create a page called Response_Page.php.

ashley526

Okay... so would this be right? I am doing two emails... one to me to tell me what they sent, then the one that goes to them. Or even if I could just get a carbon copy of what was sent to them would be awesome.

  <?php  

// emailsanta.php --- sends mail, but doesn't say so... 

// stuff from POST array (form) 
$firstname=$_POST['firstname'];  

$lastname=$_POST['lastname'];  

$email=$_POST['email']; 
$naughtynice=$_POST['naughtynice']; 
$wishlist=$_POST['wishlist']; 

if ($naughtynice == 1) { include("naughty.php"); }  

else { include("nice.php"); }


// the date/time 
$date=date('r', time());  

$message="First Name: $firstname \n";  

$message.="Last Name: $lastname \n"; 
$message.="Email Address: $email \n"; 
$message.="Naughty or Nice: $naughtynice \n"; 
$message.="Wish List: $wishlist \n"; 

$mailheaders="From: $email\r\n"; 

$success = @mail("santa@holidayletters.org", "Dear Santa", $message, $mailheaders);


$header    = "From: Santa Claus<$email_address>\n"; 
$header   .= "MIME-Version: 1.0\n"; 
$header   .= "Content-Type: text/html; charset=iso-8859-1\n"; 
$header   .= "X-Priority: 1\n"; 
$header   .= "X-Mailer: PHP / ".phpversion()."\n"; 

$sendto = "$email_address<$firstname $lastname>"; 

mail($sendto,$subject,$message,$header); 
?>

I know this has to be totally wrong... since it's doubling up on the proccesses.

Thanks for all the help!

Frederick

I like what you are doing for the kids, if you send me some images and the email information , I will put this together for you.

My email is: user13823@qwest.net

ashley526

Awesome, I will work on the images tonight a bit and email them to you! 🙂 The automatic response will more then likely be from the elves or Mrs. Claus saying how Santa is busy so they are sending a greeting to them, who knows maybe santa will.... LOL The other ones, that I will be charging for aren't this... those are going to be printed and sent through the mail. However I wanted their to be another option for those who couldn't afford it. 😃

Again thank you so much, it's WAY help then I ever expected!

Frederick

You can see from this example page I made that you can have, I can make the templates for you after you get the images.

Try out both the Naughty choice and submit then back space and try Nice choice to see the difference. Check your email to view both.

http://206.124.138.203/st/Email_Letter.php

ashley526

Oh my gosh those are so cute!! I even love the pics! haha

I am so excited 🙂

ashley526

Okay well mine isn't working! OF COURSE!!! 😃

Anyone see any issues with this or why it wouldn't work?

<?php  

// emailsanta.php --- sends mail, but doesn't say so... 

// stuff from POST array (form) 
$firstname=$_POST['firstname'];  

$lastname=$_POST['lastname'];  

$email=$_POST['email']; 
$naughtynice=$_POST['naughtynice']; 
$wishlist=$_POST['wishlist']; 

if ($naughtynice == 1) { include("naughty.php"); }  

else { include("nice.php"); }

$header    = "From: Santa Claus<$email_address>\n"; 
$header   .= "MIME-Version: 1.0\n"; 
$header   .= "Content-Type: text/html; charset=iso-8859-1\n"; 
$header   .= "X-Priority: 1\n"; 
$header   .= "X-Mailer: PHP / ".phpversion()."\n"; 

$sendto = "$firstname $lastname <$email>";

mail($sendto,"santa@holidayletters.org",$subject,$message,$header); 
?>

Frederick

mail() function should be like this:

mail("$sendto,santa@holidayletters.org",$subject,$message,$header);

ashley526

Okay well that DID send me email.. but it didn't pick up on the naughty/nice.php files... lol

Aren't I a pain? 😉

ashley526

Still not working. 🙁 Is there anyway to leave out the two mailing functions, just send me a mail with the stuff people sent, then echo it to a page with the response? I want it to fill out the preset form with the information they just entered. Either way would be fine, but I just can't get the other to work. 🙁

Thanks for all the help!

ashley526

It's just the most beautiful thing I have seen and I am so proud of it, Thank you so much for all your hard work in putting this together for me. I know all the kids young and old who use this will be so thrilled by the results!!!!!!!

Everyone if you want to see his lovely email from santa script you can try it out here.... It's the best! THANK YOU!!!!

http://holidayletters.org

Ashley