Manual Formhaldre

FormHandler 3
manual
FH3 v1.2.12

created 19-03-2010

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FormHandler manual - http://www.formhandler.net

1 - Getting Started
In this chapter I will tell about FormHandler. What is formhandler, how did it become like it now is and how it works. Just keep reading!

1.1 Introduction
FormHandler is a PHP written "module" which allows you to create dynamic forms in an easyway. So easy that you can build a fully working form, including field validations, within 10 lines!

Why is FormHandler Built? Around 2002 Teye Heimans, 21 years came to the conclusion that at least 40% of his webapplications applications consists of forms. To write all these forms is an irritating and time-taking job. That's why He made the FormHandler. In the beginning it was a simple classwhich could generate some fields. After sharing it with some friends he decided to put it on the internet. Version 1 is downloaded over 5000 times and version 3 over 15000 time (Version 2 was never launched, it was too complex). In 2007 Teye decided he didn't have the time to maintain this package and placed a news item about selling the package on this site. Since a lot of our projects are dependingon FH3, we wanted to ensure FormHandler stayed in good hands so PHP-GLOBE became owner of this package. Some advantages of FormHandler With FormHandler you can:
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Very easy to generate a form Easy to save/edit data from a database Easy to validate the values You can use templates! The form is generated by the XHTML 1.0 standard Possibility to change to style of the formPossibility to add CSS / Javascript to the fields There can be generated special fields (like datefields) It's very easy to upload files Possibility to generate an online text editor! It's completely FREE!

Sounds good huh? So, what are the requirements? To use the FormHandler you must have a webserver with PHP version 4.0.6 or higher installed. To use some fields the visitor needs to have abrowser which supports JavaScript. If you want to use the database options of the class, you need a database.
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FormHandler manual - http://www.formhandler.net

How does the FormHandler actually work? The FormHandler generates a form and shows this to the visitor. After the visitor has filled in his "data" the form is sent (to itself). The class validates the values (ifwanted, with your own validate function). When all the data is correct, the data is saved (if wanted) and your 'commit after form' function is called. In this function you can do whatever you want...

1.2 What Is FormHandler

1.3 History
The first version of FormHandler was made during Teye's first internship for school. He was doing an education for system/network manager, but during hisinternship computer systems did not catch his interests. However, PHP took. Programming took. The company where he was doing his internship wanted a stock-manage program. And so he begun... Soon he found out that making forms in PHP and HTML is a very time taking job. You can imagine that a stock-manage program consists out 50% of forms. So, time to take some action: The first version of FormHandler wasbuild. This version has grown but it's structure is still the same. It is still used in the stock-manage program (still in the download section (dutch!)). Over time FormHandler has been completly rewritten multiple times. Version 1 (which consisted out of one file) was so succesful that he decided to publish it on the internet. He recieved many requests and FH1 grew fast. However, it became tobig for one file (in his opinion). He started to write a new version, but it was so complicated that it never was published. He was not happy with version 2 so he decided to make a new version. Version 3 was born. The structure is much better and he was very happy with it. In 2007 Teye decided he didn't have the time to maintain this package and placed a news item about selling the package on this...