How to Add a "Contact Me" Form to your Blog (or Website) without exposing your Email Address

A long time ago, it was common practice to simply put your email address on the web using a mailto url link. Unfortunately, this practice results in a ton of spam coming your way courtesy of spambots.

A Potted History of Methods

Over the years, a lot of different methods for getting around this problem have become available. These include the low tech methods, such as having text which reads "send email to myaccount at hotmail dot com" and needs to be reinterpreted by the reader.

The use of escape codes (try http://www.mways.co.uk/prog/hidemail.php for an example), and several other ways of encoding the address in javascript.

No method has been more successful than simply giving people a blank form to write their email in. Now, in Lotus Notes/Domino, this is simplicity itself but when it comes to html, you need to write a bit of code - and even then, you need to be careful not to expose anything on the web.

Getting External Help

It makes no sense to reinvent the wheel when there's a free service available.

Kontactr (http://kontactr.com/index.php) is a service which allows you to pop up a form on your site for email. You receive the email within minutes and the only caveat that I've found so far is that they include a small advert at the end of the email being sent to you. The users of your site don't get presented with Ads.

Procedure (for Blogger)

Go to the Kontactr site and register.
Open your blog and click Layout, then Page Elements then Click Add a Gadget.

Google will pop up a dialog box for you to select the appropriate gadget. Choose the HTML/Javascript Gadget. (note: If you haven't had a browse through these gadgets, you really should - there's some fantastic stuff there).
You will now be prompted to put some code into the box. Switch back to the tab that you have Kontactr open on and choose either the embed widget or the buttons code. You may need to experiment to see which code works best for your site.

As a general rule, the Embed widgets are best used in the middle of the page while the buttons are best in a navigation menu.
Copy the code from Kontactr and paste it into your google gadget.
From here on, it's just a matter of clicking Save a few times..
You might want to preview your blog before saving it though - and you might want to consider dragging your new gadget around to a more suitable place on the page.

That's it.

These gadgets never cease to amaze me.

Comments

How to Change Your Notification Options for New Lotus Notes Mail in version 8.x

Don't worry, I'm not patronizing you (my readers), I just decided to re-document this for one of our internal users and thought you might want to be able to use it in your own user documentation. WHAT IS THIS DOCUMENT ABOUT? Some people who don't get a lot of mail, like to be notified when such an event occurs. Notification can be; via a sound via a pop-up box via the system tray (where the computer clock is) The pop up box looks like this; Other people, who like myself, get too much mail would rather not be notified. The aim of this document is to tell you how (and where) to turn these options on and off. CHANGING YOUR SETTINGS To change your settings from the Notes 8.x client; On the Menu, click File , then Preferences... On the left hand side , click on the little plus sign to the left of Mail to expand the options. Click on the option marked Sending and Receiving . In the middle section, under receiving, you can control your notifications. If you untick the box mark...

How to Create a Bootable DVD Using Nero Burning ROM 9

I often need to create bootable CDs and DVDs but it's weird because I frequently end up buring myself a new coaster instead. It's not that the process is difficult, just that nero has a few too many options and I forget which ones to choose and end up picking the wrong one. I figured that the best way to avoid this mistake in future would be to write the steps down. Procedure Insert CD or DVD into your DVD Burner. Start Nero Burning ROM 9 Choose DVD-ROM (Boot) or CD-ROM (Boot) depending on what you're creating You'll be prompted for a disk image source. Choose a Nero Source - you'll usually find them somewhere like this... C:\Program Files\Nero\Nero9\Nero Burning Rom\DOSBootImage.ima Leave the Boot Locale as English - unless you really need a different keyboard layout Tick the box marked [X] Enable Expert Settings Choose Hard Drive Emulation and leave any other settings as they are. Click the button marked New Add any files you want but don't try to add operati...

How to Create an Auto-Response Mail Message in Lotus Notes 8.5.3+

Why would you do this? Suppose that you have an externally accessible generic email address for your company; support@mycompany.com or info@mycompany.com. You might expose this to the web and allow people to send messages to you. Setting up an auto-response email will tell the senders that their message reached its destination and that it will be dealt with accordingly. It's also good practice to include links to FAQs or other useful information. Why 8.5.3 The techniques we'll be using here work in older versions of Notes but some of the options seem to have moved around in 8.5.3. I figured it was a good time to show you where they've moved to. The Procedure Start Domino Designer and open the Mail file to be modified. A really quick way to do this is to right-click on the application tab and choose "Open in Designer". In the Left hand panel of designer, expand Code and then double-click Agents. A new window should appear. Click the action ...

Real World Computing

Search This Blog