Which is better for Form Handler Component? E-Mail or Database?

Hello,

When using the Form Handler Component, it can be set to either e-mail form data to a specific e-mail address or save form data to a database.

I was just wondering if one is better than the other? Has anyone had any problems?

Has anyone out there ever failed getting an e-mail that was sent? Other than e-mail being sent to Spam?

Can they be used together as a backup to each other to minimize the chances of missing data?

If the e-mail option is chosen, is there a program out there that can access a POP3 account and turn the cumulative e-mails into ASCII text so can make a list of users from the data. I am assuming that specific words like Name and Address can be used to iterate through a long list and compile the data and use the option Fusion gives of default text like none entered.

Thank you for your time, thanks in advance for any help
Philip

You can use both email and a database. The email from the NOF form handler is a little "uninformative" in that you get only the data, but no labels. So you'd get an email like so:

Philip
O'Reilly
212-555-1212
123 Any Street
NY
NY
01112

The database, however, will have a header row. It is stored as a CSV file, or Comma Separated Values. It imports nicely into something like Excel where each data item from the form is in a column, and the top row is your label. So you'd get:

firstname lastname phonenumber street city state zipcode
Philip O'Reilly 212-555-1212 123 Any Street NY NY 01112
Joe Blow 212-555-3456 456 Any Street NY NY 01112

The database can be useful as a backup, or a list of form fillers, especially if it's registrations. When I used to use the NOF formmailer, once the email was confirmed working, I don't think I ever "lost" an email submission.

HTH

Thank you very much for the help.

I apoligize for the stupid question, the last time I did any web stuff was way back with NetObjects Fusion 4 or maybe 5, about 10 years ago. And for some reason I remember there was a problem with the POST method and when I was reading about the Form Handler I was worried that there might still be a problem.

I wonder if Hidden Fields could be used to give the line >Name< Input >NameEnd<? Would it be possible to make a text field on a Form that was zero length and thus not be displayed or otherwise hidden by a picture but copied into e-mail to provide reference?

Thank you again
Philip