How can I (if possible) pre-fill the suggest.php Subject field in a hyperlink?

[JMM]

Hello again, folks,

In my blurb at the top of my Cemeteries page, I have a hyperlink to suggest.php for users to submit any discrepancies that they find.  The code that I currently have for that hyperlink is:

<a href='suggest.php'  class='sidelink' target='_blank'><span style='color:blue;'><b>HERE</b></span></a>

I have seen where mod developers have a special form, where when a user is taken to those forms, the subject field is pre-populated with the name of the mod that the form is for.

Is there a way that I can include, in my above hyperlink, some additional code that would pre-populate the subject field on the suggest.php form with some text?  For example, I would like, when the user clicks on the hyperlink, for the suggest.php form to open with the Subject field pre-filled with something like Cemetery error/discrepancy/suggestion.

Is that possible, and if so, how?

Thanks in advanced.

Regards,
John

[Rob Severijns]

John,

I have all my registered set as "Submitter" this allows them to skip the Suggest form and directly inform the Admin about proposed changes.

There will be a small pencil behind the subjects looking like this:

Clicking the pencil opens a popup:

After "Save changes is clicked the  Admin will recieve a notification via email and in TNG itself (Admin area)

Clicking the review link opens a new tab where you can review the suggested changes.

This works just fine for me and might work for you too.

Downside is that it doesn't work for non-registered users.

Thinking of a mod request that shows the pencil for non-registered users too but I'm not sure yet of the implications regarding the recieving of spam.

 

[JMM]

Hi, Rob,

I see the way your method works, although as you mention it wouldn't work for non-registered users.  In my case, I have only 3 registered users... I don't think I have ever had more than 3 registered users in 19 years of running TNG .

After I made the post, I thought that perhaps I could make a copy of suggest.php, and then in that new suggest page have the subject already filled in.

I went ahead and just tried that, so now when a user clicks on that hyperlink in the blurb at the top of my Cemeteries page, they are taken to THIS page.  I tested it, and it works.  I would've preferred to have accomplished the same thing instead simply within a hyperlink, but until then (or if that is not possible), at least this method works.

If nobody else is aware whether it is possible to include a subject within a hyperlink, I will reach out to Darrin to see if it is possible.

Thanks for taking the time to reply with how you do a similar thing on your site.

Regards,
John

[Rob Severijns]

Hi John,

At least for now you have a work around.

2 hours ago, Rob Severijns said:

Thinking of a mod request that shows the pencil for non-registered users too but I'm not sure yet of the implications regarding the recieving of spam.

I will have a look at the implications regading security/spam before I request for a new mod.

All others are welcome to chime in.

[JMM]

10 minutes ago, JMM said:

I would've preferred to have accomplished the same thing instead simply within a hyperlink

Just a note, when I say from within a hyperlink, what I mean is something like this (the example here of course does not work, but is shown here just to show what I mean):

<a href="suggest.php?subject='Cemetery discrepancy'" class="sidelink" target="_blank"><span style="color:blue;"><b>HERE</b></span></a>

[Ken Roy]

@JMM

John,

You should not have to create your own version of suggest.php.  TNG has supported adding a subject to the suggest.php form URL since either TNG v9 or v10.  The format of the URL is  ?page= 

so in your case it would be something like

<a href="suggest.php?subject=Cemetery+discrepancy"

Edited to add TNG Wiki page reference for the Contact Us Subject Line

[JMM]

Ken,

Thanks for that information.  However, it is not working for me.

But I think I have a bigger issue.  On one of my TNG 14.0.4 test sites, I have NO mods installed, and have made absolutely no modifications myself to any of the files.  When I click on Contact Us, I see this, with a subject line:

On my public site, I uninstalled the 4 mods that touch suggest.php, and I also refreshed suggest.php from my tngfiles1404.zip file, then cleared my browser's cache, and this is what see, without a subject line:

But I know what the problem must be: my template.  When I select a different template, the subject line is displayed.  It's only with my heavily-modified template 2 that the subject line does not appear.  So it would seem that when TNG v9 was introduced, whatever new line of code put that subject line in, I did not port over to my template 2's index file.  Having no idea what that line of code was, I think it's about time that I rebuild my home page from scratch, using the template 2 from TNG 14.0.4 as my base file .

But thanks, Ken, for the information you have provided.  Have yourself a great day.

Regards,
John

[GOGGS]

Hey John, a typical approach to this is to add a querystring to the hyperlink, and then use a the superglobal $_GET variable in the target page to retrieve the info from the querystring.

So a hyperlink: <a href="www.example.com?subject=mysubject">Link</a>

Can be parsed in example.com with $_GET['subject']

And the form field on example.com might look like:

<input type="text" name="page" class="longfield" value="<?php $_GET['subject']; ?>">

Cheers

 

GOGGS