- Apply what we know of HTML forms to build a functional contact form
Business of all types and sizes want to provide multiple ways for their potential customers to contact them. One of the most common ways to do this is on a website is to provide a contact form.
In this lab, we will practice what we've learned about HTML forms by creating a contact form similar to those we see on business websites.
To see and test your form in action, run httpserver or open index.html in a
new browser tab. To test your work, run learn.
Some basic HTML has been provided for this lab, along with HTML comments on what is needed. Follow the provided comments and test messages to see what is needed when creating the form. At completion, your form should have:
- A required text input for a full name with a placeholder, "Enter Name"
- A required email type input for an email address with a placeholder, "Enter Email"
- A tel type input for a telephone number with a placeholder, "Enter Telephone (optional)"
- A text area for a user to include a message with a placeholder, "Enter Message"
- Labels for each text input
- A checkbox with text of your choosing
- A submit button
The required attribute prevents the browser from submitting a form. All
required inputs must be filled in properly, preventing an unneeded page reload.
This functionality is baked into HTML5 for us automatically. All that is
needed is to include the word required as an attribute, without setting it to
any value.
When an input is required, the type attribute (e.g., text vs email) will
determine what the browser checks. In the case of an email, for instance, the
input must match the format of an email address, including the "@".
Forms are an essential way for users to submit data to a website. Some forms, like search bars, only contain a single input field, but we can make them as complex as we need.
We are only focused on building out the front end side of this form. When a form is submitted, it is up to the backend of a website to decide how to handle and store form data when submitted.