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Perl form script returning blanks

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9 replies

by maureen

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I run a simple perl guestbook form script that has been working perfectly for a few years. Lately, however, I've been getting a lot of blank submissions -- so many, in fact, that I don't think they are coming just from folks fooling around.

Previously I noticed that if a user used the "enter" key to move from one field line to the next, it would launch the program. So I added a java script to block the enter key and encourage the use of the tab key.

But I don't think that's the problem.Sometimes the form works just fine, and submissions come through as they should. But then I'll get scores of blanks.

Has anyone experienced anything like this? I am wondering if it might be browser-related? Any ideas?

9 replies

by nikki96

Are you sure your script blocks the enter key from NN6/IE6? The method changed. You need to update your script if you haven't yet. You need to addEventListener to capture the keypress for V6 browsers.

You need to define the keyHandler function (any name), which if you had this working in nn4, you did already.

~nikki~

by maureen

Nikki,

Thanks for your response. Your solution did prevent the form from being launched prematurely in the version 6 browsers.

However, I'm still receiving the blank entries. So now my theory that it was a browser issue appears to be incorrect.

P.S. Your answer wasn't "unacceptable" -- that seems awfully harsh! But I had to choose that term to keep this question open. Sorry.

by parkin_thom

Can you point (us) to the page or paste a sample of the script code?
This is difficult to answer 'blindly'.

by maureen

Thanks to everyone who responded to this problem.

I did eventually find the solution: It turned out that I had inadvertently deleted my "robots.txt" file from my root directory -- and so search engines crawling my site would hit the page with theform, and launch the blank form.

When I put up a new "robots.txt" file to block crawlers from that page, the blanks stopped.

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