FP: How to Use Hidden Fields in a Form With FrontPage

ID: Q183784

The information in this article applies to:

Microsoft FrontPage 97 for Windows with Bonus Pack
Microsoft FrontPage for Windows 1.1
Microsoft FrontPage for the Power Macintosh, version 1.0

SUMMARY

This article describes how to use hidden fields in your forms.

MORE INFORMATION

The Save Results Form Handler and the Registration Form Handler are both examples of form handlers. When a form is submitted in the browser, the values of each form field are passed to the form handler (specified by the action attribute of the <form> tag). For example, if your form field is a text box, the value sent to the form handler is the text entered in the text box.

The values of each of the form fields between the <form> and </form> tags will be sent to the form handler. Not all form fields are visible however. Some form fields are hidden. Even so you can assign values to these hidden form fields and pass the values to the form handler.

This can be especially useful when you have multiple forms saving results to a common e-mail address or results file. You could use a hidden field on each form that identifies the form by a unique number or name. The hidden fields in the form results would then indicate from which form the results came.

To create hidden fields in your forms, follow these steps:

Open the page that contains your form in FrontPage Editor.

Right-click (Windows) or press CONTROL and click (Macintosh) a form field and then click Form Properties on the menu that appears.

Click Add.
1. In the Name box, type the name of the new hidden field.
2. In the Value box, type the value to be sent to the form handler.

Click OK.

On the File menu, click Save.

Using Hidden Form Fields with the Save Results Form Handler

When using hidden forms with the Save Results Form Handler, the values of hidden fields will be saved to the results file (or e-mail message) the same way that values of other fields are.

Hidden fields will be listed first in the results file (or e-mail message) in the order in which they appear in the Hidden Fields dialog box (Click Advanced in the Form Properties dialog box). When using a custom confirmation page, use the hidden field name in the Confirmation Fields section. >

Using Hidden Form Fields with the Discussion Form Handler

When using hidden forms with the Discussion Form Handler, the values of hidden fields are saved to the article the same way that the subject and contents fields are saved. Though when viewing the article, the hidden fields will be displayed at the top of the article above all other fields.

Using Hidden Form Fields with the Registration Form Handler

You must take a few extra steps in order to save hidden fields using the Registration Form Handler:

Right-click the form and then click Form Properties on the menu that appears.

In the Form Properties dialog box, click Settings, and then click the Advanced tab.

In the Form Fields To Include box, type the hidden fields you want to save.

Click OK in the Settings for Registration Form Handler dialog box.

Click OK in the Form Properties dialog box.

For additional information, please see the following articles in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:

Q143092 FP: How to Create a Registration Web

Q179188 FP98: [FrontPage Save Results Component] Shows Instead of Form

Q143090 FP: Overview of WebBot Components

Q177092 FP97: Overview of FrontPage Discussion Web Architecture

Q182123 FP: No Access to Form Properties by Right-Clicking Form Field

Q183049 FP98: Save Results Form Handler and Year 2000 Compliance Field

Additional query words: 97

Keywords : kbdta fpedit
Version : MACINTOSH:1.0; WINDOWS:1.1,97
Platform : MACINTOSH WINDOWS
Issue type : kbhowto