Forms In Html

HTML Forms are required, when you want to collect some data from the site visitor. For example, during user registration you would like to collect information such as name, email address, credit card, etc.
A form will take input from the site visitor and then will post it to a back-end application such as CGI, ASP Script or PHP script etc. The back-end application will perform required processing on the passed data based on defined business logic inside the application.
There are various form elements available like text fields, textarea fields, drop-down menus, radio buttons, checkboxes, etc.

The HTML <form> tag is used to create an HTML form and it has following syntax

<form action = "Script URL" method = "GET|POST">
   form elements like input, textarea etc.
</form>

Form Attributes

Apart from common attributes, following is a list of the most frequently used form attributes

Sr.No	Attribute & Description
1	action Backend script ready to process your passed data.
2	method Method to be used to upload data. The most frequently used are GET and POST methods.
3	target Specify the target window or frame where the result of the script will be displayed. It takes values like _blank, _self, _parent etc.
4	enctype You can use the enctype attribute to specify how the browser encodes the data before it sends it to the server. Possible values are − application/x-www-form-urlencoded − This is the standard method most forms use in simple scenarios. mutlipart/form-data − This is used when you want to upload binary data in the form of files like image, word file etc.

Note − You can refer to Perl & CGI for a detail on how form data upload works.

HTML Form Controls

There are different types of form controls that you can use to collect data using HTML form −

Text Input Controls
Checkboxes Controls
Radio Box Controls
Select Box Controls
File Select boxes
Hidden Controls
Clickable Buttons
Submit and Reset Button

Text Input Controls

There are three types of text input used on forms −

Single-line text input controls − This control is used for items that require only one line of user input, such as search boxes or names. They are created using HTML <input> tag.

Password input controls − This is also a single-line text input but it masks the character as soon as a user enters it. They are also created using HTMl tag.

Multi-line text input controls − This is used when the user is required to give details that may be longer than a single sentence. Multi-line input controls are created using HTML <textarea> tag.

Checkbox Control

Checkboxes are used when more than one option is required to be selected. They are also created using HTML <input> tag but type attribute is set to checkbox..

Example

Here is an example HTML code for a form with two checkboxes −

<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>

   <head>
      <title>Checkbox Control</title>
   </head>
	
   <body>
      <form>
         <input type = "checkbox" name = "maths" value = "on"> Maths
         <input type = "checkbox" name = "physics" value = "on"> Physics
      </form>
   </body>
	
</html>

This will produce the following result −

Output

Checkbox Control

Radio Button Control

Radio buttons are used when out of many options, just one option is required to be selected. They are also created using HTML <input> tag but type attribute is set to radio.

Example

Here is example HTML code for a form with two radio buttons −

<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>

   <head>
      <title>Radio Box Control
   </head>

   <body>
      <form>
         <input type = "radio" name = "subject" value = "maths"> Maths
         <input type = "radio" name = "subject" value = "physics"> Physics
      </form>
   </body>

</html>

This will produce the following result −

Output

Radio Box Control

Select Box Control

A select box, also called drop down box which provides option to list down various options in the form of drop down list, from where a user can select one or more options.

Example

Here is example HTML code for a form with one drop down box

<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>

   <head>
      <title>Select Box Control
   </head>
	
   <body>
      <form>
         <select name = "dropdown">
            <option value = "Maths" selected>Maths
            <option value = "Physics">Physics
         </select>
      </form>
   </body>
	
</html>

This will produce the following result −

Output

Select Box Control

File Upload Box

If you want to allow a user to upload a file to your web site, you will need to use a file upload box, also known as a file select box. This is also created using the <input> element but type attribute is set to file.

Example

Here is example HTML code for a form with one file upload box −

<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>

   <head>
      <title>File Upload Box</title>
   </head>

   <body>
      <form>
         <input type = "file" name = "fileupload" accept = "image/*" />
      </form>
   </body>
	
</html>

This will produce the following result −

Output

File Upload Box

Button Controls

There are various ways in HTML to create clickable buttons. You can also create a clickable button using <input>tag by setting its type attribute to button. The type attribute can take the following values −

Sr.No	Type & Description
1	submit This creates a button that automatically submits a form.
2	reset This creates a button that automatically resets form controls to their initial values.
3	button This creates a button that is used to trigger a client-side script when the user clicks that button.
4	image This creates a clickable button but we can use an image as background of the button.

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