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form

 form

👉 In the current template in index.html, delete 'hello world' and add a<form> tag to add a form inside the <body>.


  <form>

    

  </form>



Don't worry. It is suppose to be empty when you hit run. Let's fix that.


method & action

👉 First, we'll add a post method which packages the data in the form and sends it to the web server. (Like packaging something in an envelope and sending it through the postal service back to your web server...well kinda).


I'll also add an action. This specifies where to send the data. Later on, we'll write some 'process' code in Flask to deal with the data that arrives from the form, so that's the address we'll give now. Don't forget the forward slash.


<form method = "post" action = "/process">

    

</form>



Getting Input

👉 Inside the form, we'll use the <input> tag to get the user's name. Input tags have several types that specify the sort of data they will collect. In this one, we'll use text. Every input tag must be given an identifier by setting the name property inside the tag.


<form method = "post" action = "/process">

    <p>Name: <input type="text" name="username"> </p>

</form>



Refresh and we will see the first input box and text label on our page:  

 


Different Types of Text Box
Here are a few examples of different types of text boxes you can use:

<form>
    <p>Name: <input type="text" name="username"> </p>
    <p>Email: <input type="Email" name="email"> </p>
    <p>Website: <input type="url" name="website"> </p>
    <p>Age: <input type="number" name="age"> </p>
    <p><input type="hidden" name="userID" value="232"> </p>
    
  </form>


hidden is particularly useful when you have some information that is relevant to the form or back end processing (like user ID), but that the user doesn't necessarily need to see.

Buttons
👉 Next up, we need a 'submit' button. And the tag, like most HTML tags, is blindingly obvious. Go on, see if you can spot it in the code below:

<form>
    <p>Name: <input type="text" name="username"> </p>
    <p>Email: <input type="Email" name="email"> </p>
    <p>Website: <input type="url" name="website"> </p>
    <p>Age: <input type="number" name="age"> </p>
    <p><input type="hidden" name="userID" value="232"></p>
  <button type="submit">Save Data</button>
    
  </form>


Again, there are different types of button that you can specify.

Our page is now looking a bit like this:   
   


Required
Putting the required attribute inside an input tag makes it, erm, well, required. ie the user can't leave it blank:

<p>Name: <input type="text" name="username" required> </p>


Drop down... drop down!
👉 To create a drop down menu, you use the <select> tag, which works a bit like an unordered list. Each option in the menu is surrounded by <option> tags. I've added a drop down to my form here:

<form>
    <p>Name: <input type="text" name="username" required> </p>
    <p>Email: <input type="Email" name="email"> </p>
    <p>Website: <input type="url" name="website"> </p>
    <p>Age: <input type="number" name="age"> </p>
    <input type="hidden" name="userID" value="232"> </p>
    <p>
      Fave Baldy: 
      <select name="baldies">
        <option>David</option>
        <option>Jean Luc Picard</option>
        <option>Yul Brynner</option>
      </select>
    </p>
    <button type="submit">Save Data</button>
  </form>


This gives me a lovely little drop down like this:   

  

Value
However, there's a problem. I haven't told the form how to identify and store the choice. To do this, I have to give each option a value.

<p>
  Fave Baldy: 
  <select name="baldies">
    <option value = "david">David</option>
    <option value = "jean luc">Jean Luc Picard</option>
    <option value = "yul">Yul Brynner</option>
  </select>
</p>










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