VN Business Webhosting: Troubleshooting FormMail Problems
Click here return to the previous page.
There are two parts to sending mail from your website through the popular FormMail program. The main part is the FormMail program itself. Written in Perl, it is both powerful and flexible ... yet it cannot do anything until you create an HTML page to provide the information that it needs to do it`s job. Below you will find some "tried and true" troubleshooting tips that will very often help you solve your problems. If for any reason you are still unable to correct your problems after following all of the steps below -- please contact our technical support department either via email or by telephone at 800.835.5710 as we would be more than happy to assist you in any way possible.
1) Do you still have Voicenet's default "formmail.pl" It sounds trite, but it happens more than you might think! Many people may accidentally delete their formmail.pl files without noticing, or have tried to modify the one that Voicenet had already provided with all of the correct information in it. This is not a big problem -- simply contact Voicenet Technical Support by email or by telephone at 800.835.5710 and we would be more than happy to replace it for you.
2) Make sure that your HTML code is correct. The basic format for your HTML page is as follows:
<form method="POST" action="/cgi-bin/formmail.pl"> <!How and where to send the data>
<input type="hidden" name="recipient" value="YOU@DOMAIN.COM"> <!Define the recipient>
Field:<input type="text" name="email" size="20"> <!Field to Submit>
Message:<input type="text" name="messagetext" size ="50"> <!Another Field to submit>
<input type="submit" name="Submit" value="Send"> <!Submit the data to formmail.pl>
</form> <!Close the form that was started on line 1>
|
You can even copy and paste the above code into your own FormMail test HTML file and try it out for yourself. ( Make sure to use your email address in the recipient field ) If it works on your site, then it means that everything on the server is functioning properly -- you need to take a good look at your existing HTML code as that is most likely the source of the problem.
There is a complete list of other form fields (and their correct syntax) that you can send to formmail.pl located here.
3) Read the error messages. If you get a "Error 404 - Page Cannot be Displayed" and you are not receiving any emails then the chances are that you are not calling your actual FormMail perl/cgi script correctly. If you are getting a 404 error AND the emails are going through, it most likely means that you are not calling the correct "redirect" page. Take a look in your "cgi-bin" with your FTP client and find where the formmail.pl resides and double-check that it is reflected correctly from within your HTML "<form action>". If you have a UNIX hosted website, check and see if the capitalization of your "formmail.pl" file is reflected correctly as well. Also, please make sure that your formmail.pl is in your cgi-bin. Your cgi-bin is the only place that scripts can be executed.
If your HTML page is calling the formmail.pl script correctly, and you are getting an specific error that is generated by the formmail.pl script, this usually means one of two things -- your HTML page is either sending an incorrect form field OR your formmail.pl script has been edited manually and is erroneous. If you have not edited your actual formmail.pl file please click here for a complete list of form fields and their HTML syntax. If you have manually edited your formmail.pl and you don`t know how to fix it -- you only have one choice. Please email or call Voicenet Technical Support at 800.835.5710 and ask that we restore your default formmail.pl file. If you want to keep the file that you modified, please rename it to something other than formmail.pl before it gets replaced.
*** If you are recieving an error message generated by the formmail script itself which says "Bad Referrer", please contact Voicenet Technical Support.
4) Check your "FormMail.log" file. If you have a Windows NT/2000 hosted site with Voicenet, you will have a "formmail.log" file located within your "_vti_log" directory. This logfile contains very helpful error messages which will point you in the right direction. If you do not have a vti_log/FormMail.log file and you website resides on a Windows NT/2000 Webserver, this usually means that you need to contact Voicenet Technical Support in order to have the permissions of your directory structure checked and fixed. Don't worry, this is a very simple task which only takes a few minutes and our technicians who are available 24 hours a day, 365 days a year would more than happy to assist you. This can be accomplished by either filling out a trouble report here or by calling us toll-free at 800.835.5710. This type of issue is isolated to Windows NT/200 servers and UNIX hosted customers need not worry about this.
5) It looks like everything goes through fine, but I don`t get any emails?!?! Understandably, this can sometimes be the most frustrating kind of error. Don't fret because most of the time you will find the answer to be one of two simple issues: either your mailbox is full, or there is a permissions problem (Windows NT/2000 only). Check and see if you can send mail to your recipient from another email address, or even to itself! If no mail is being recieved by this mailbox, then you`ve found your problem. If the mailbox is working properly and everything else seems to be correct, please contact our technical support department either by email or by telephone at 800.835.5710
