www.wysiwygwebbuilder.com

I know that the forms work. I have tested each before I posted them. However, I go down the road about 1-3 months, test the forms and then they fail. I'm more than a little frustrated because I'm working for a client who's loosing potential sales. I don't know anything about PHP but just rely on the forms working as a true wysiwyg experience.

I've rebuilt the forms in question so I don't have the original version to send to you. However, what are some troubleshooting or testing methods I should use to make dang sure that the forms are 100% before publishing? I've gone through this several times in this site.

On a side note, is there ANY way of finding out who has potentially filled out my forms and tried to contact us?

What exactly "does not work"?
Can you please be more specific?

You cannot test a form before publishing because forms only work online.

If something does not work then I recommend to start with the basics.
Create an empty page and a simple form. For example, a form with just one input field. Once you have that working, then you can add more options.

Related FAQ:
https://www.wysiwygwebbuilder.com/forum ... 10&t=32967

This doesn't necessarily answer your question but when I create forms that work and then months or years later they stop working correctly it is usually due to something changed on the server by the host. If the script worked great for 6 months and then stops it's not the script itself. Scripts just dont stop working all of sudden.

is there ANY way of finding out who has potentially filled out my forms and tried to contact us?

If the user hits submit but nothing happens and the script fails and no email generated I'm not aware of a way to find out who filled out the form. I'm not aware this info would be logged anywhere.

However, if the script does work and for some reason the email itself doesn't get sent out (potential issue with the host) or gets sent and blocked, I usually always set up a backup email on the server so when the form submitted it is sent to the owners email preference as well as it goes to this email box on the server. This way if for any reason the outgoing email doesn't make it to the owner, I can still retrieve the email on the server. As long as the script is working, emails sent directly to server email usually have no problems. I've always had luck with this in case one of my clients doesnt receive an email, i can still access it on the server.

I set up a form with just a a fields, turned on form in the layoutgrid. added my email, fail and success pages, changed the title of the message and published to a test site. I emailed myself through the form and it worked fine. I got the email and the details I needed from the form.

A month later, I notice we aren't getting hits from the form, so I test it again and find that it's no longer sending messages. So, I have no idea how long it's failed, THAT it's failed at all, or who has been there.

I'm sorry of this comes across as critical, I'm just very frustrated because I THINK I'm doing the right thing, test, and still fail. I'm using gmail as the account's email client to make it as simple as possible.
I'll set up a thank you card to forward to the person's email as a way of protecting the data. Thank you for that hint.

I think the first thing I would do is set up a email box on the server via cpanel/hpanel (ex: contact@yourwebsite.com). When you create your form, make sure to set it up so that the submitted email goes to: contact@yourwebsite.com AND the gmail account for the owner. Now after you upload the test form and submit it, log into the server and check the email: contact@yourwebsite.com and see if the email was received. If the email does show up on the server then you know the script is working. If the gmail one shows up great, if not then it is either the outgoing email server on the host or it is gmail itself.

Typically, if my clients have gmail, I wont send it to the gmail account as gmail has a tendency to block a lot of stuff. I usually will set up emails on the server and then install on my clients cell/laptop/desktop the info to pull the info straight from the server rather than relying on it going to another 3rd party email client like gmail. The more place the email has to travel thru, the greater chance it gets block along the way.

A month later, I notice we aren't getting hits from the form, so I test it again and find that it's no longer sending messages. So, I have no idea how long it's failed, THAT it's failed at all, or who has been there.

One thing you can be sure of: the form will not change itself. The script will work the same as it did a month ago.
So, if it suddenly stops working then something else must have changed.
Usually (in 100% of all previous cases) this is server related.

I tried to set up the auto reply in order to "send" from the gmail account. However, I checked the "sent" folder and it's not there. Is there another setting I should be using to get that feature to work?

Please see the following url below. Note many hosts/servers block the likes of (free disposalable emails) gmail, hotmail on the grounds they are used to spam so they require that you use the email of the your domain.
Emails are not arriving in my inbox
https://www.wysiwygwebbuilder.com/forum ... 10&t=32967

Web forms will be sent via the php mail on the server, not via gmail. So, you will not see the email in the "sent" folder.

Maybe I misspoke. So, when I set up the auto-reply. I get the message to the requested email address. Both in the form and the autoresponder request.

What I thought would happen is that there would be a recorded "sent" message in the gmail account when the autoreply triggered. But, no such message was recorded. (Trying to make sure I capture the request users email)

That is because the email is not sent via gmail, but via the server.

Right, so is there a way to make that happen so I can capture the email?

If the email is not sent by the server then you will need to contact your webhost.
They should be able to tell you why it failed.
Based on their feedback you can then change the configuration of your form to comply to their requirements/
For example, their server may require to use smtp mail. Or maybe the 'from' address must be within the same domain.