This is the error msg I receive when I try to run mymail.pl (NMS formmail) file.

The server encountered an internal error or misconfiguration and was unable to complete your request.
Please contact the server administrator, webmaster@travellingtutors.com and inform them of the time the error occurred, and anything you might have done that may have caused the error.

More information about this error may be available in the server error log.


Additionally, a 404 Not Found error was encountered while trying to use an ErrorDocument to handle the request.


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Apache/1.3.33 Server at www.travellingtutors.com Port 80

Thanks for the "how-to".  It was very helpful.

I hope it's ok to post a suggestion here.  It may seem obvious but given I haven't done this stuff in a LONG time, it would have been helpful to me.  Some people will use this with NO form/perl experience at all.

In step #4 you should change the value="user@yourdomain.com" to value=""

Given the pattern you established previously, that code block should either be exactly right, or you should specifically state what to change it to, or it should fall under the rule you set at the beginning with respect to inserting email and domain names.

Thanks again for the help.  Sure hope it's ok to add this.  I could understand your frustration with people asking for help in this thread when you've said don't several times.

DB

Thanks for this! I know zero Perl and just as much PHP so this is quite handy. And I feel good knowing that it's safe to use. Not to mention it'll be handy not being added to any spam lists via email link harvesters. Here's where and how I used it:

http://plugintolinux.ca/contactus.shtml

And the thank you page is here:

http://plugintolinux.ca/thankyou.shtml

The only thing that confused me is that I kept getting email from nobody @ prospero.lunarpages.com and that's when I realized that the email line in step four didn't replace the line in step 3. I thought it did, except that hidden had to be changed to textbox (thought that was a mistake). Usually I can follow directions well, but sometimes I overthink things!

I don't believe that the NMS FormMail can retrieve email addresses from a database or text file to use for the recipient.

That would probably take tweaking of the inner workings of the code from someone who knows perl.

Thanks for this -- very clear, worked right away -- so much better than my attempt to set up tfmail!

Ahh, I normally don't indicate that in the tutorial, because the cgi-bin has the permissions already set by default. The only way it would not be set correctly is if you created your own cgi-bin or if it was changed/reset incorrectly 

In any case, the permissions on the cgi-bin is good to double-check, just in case     

What you could do is to use a graphic image with a simulated captcha code and make the input a required field.

Even though the captcha code will always remain the same, that will at least hinder the bots from attacking you, because something still has to be typed in manually (unless they have configured a way to enter data for ANY required field , I'm not a Spammer, so I don't know how they setup those bot thingys ).

If your Spammers, however, are manually filling out your form to spam you (not via bots), then this won't work, I'm afraid.

If you do give this a try, please post back here if that works for you, because in the past we always just told people to switch to a php method, so if it works, then it's at least an alternative with those who want to keep using the NMS FormMail script.