my $thisrow;
my @rows;
my %fields = (
   name       => sub { textfield(-name=>$_[0],-size=>50,-maxlength=>80
+) },
   email      => sub { textfield(-name=>$_[0],-size=>50,-maxlength=>80
+) },
   site_name  => sub { textfield(-name=>$_[0],-size=>50,-maxlength=>80
+) },
   descripton => sub { textfield(-name=>$_[0],-size=>50,-maxlength=>80
+) },
   comments   => sub { textarea(-name=>$_[0],-cols=>50,-rows=>10) },
);

foreach my $key (keys %fields) {
   $thisrow = td({-align=>'right',-valign=>'TOP'},$key)
      . td({-align=>'left',-valign=>'TOP'}, $fields{$key}->($key))
   ;
   push(@rows,$thisrow);
}
[download]

p.s. don't forget that hashes are not ordered - you might want to try a list of hashes instead

jeffa

L-LL-L--L-LL-L--L-LL-L--
-R--R-RR-R--R-RR-R--R-RR
B--B--B--B--B--B--B--B--
H---H---H---H---H---H---
(the triplet paradiddle with high-hat)

I can't believe no one has mentioned CGI::Formbuilder yet:

• CGI::Formbuilder Home Page
• CGI::Formbuilder in CPAN

I believe that Nathan Wiger has scratched this itch particularly well, making it very straight forward to do complicated things with CGI forms very simply.

For posperity here is the SYNOPSYS from the documentation

    use CGI::FormBuilder;

    # Let's assume we did a DBI query to get existing values
    my $dbval = $sth->fetchrow_hashref;

    my $form = CGI::FormBuilder->new(
                    method => 'POST',
                    fields => [qw/name email phone gender/],
                    values => $dbval,
                    validate => { email => 'EMAIL', phone => 'PHONE' }
+,
                    required => 'ALL',
                    font => 'arial,helvetica',
               );

    # Change gender field to have options
    $form->field(name => 'gender', options => [qw/Male Female/]);

    if ($form->submitted && $form->validate) {
        my $fields = $form->field;    # get form fields as hashref

        # Do something to update your data (you would write this)
        do_data_update($fields->{name}, $fields->{email},
                       $fields->{phone}, $fields->{gender});

        # Show confirmation screen
        print $form->confirm(header => 1);

        # Email the person a brief confirmation
        $form->mailconfirm(to => $fields->{email});

    } else {
        # Print out the form
        print $form->render(header => 1);
    }
[download]

--
Clayton aka "Tex"

CGI::QuickForm and HTML::FormWizard might be what you are looking for.

cheers

tachyon

s&&rsenoyhcatreve&&&s&n.+t&"$'$`$\"$\&"&ee&&y&srve&&d&&print

Your use of a hash to define your fields leaves a bit of a dilemma: you never know what order they will be in when you invoke keys. This means you have given perl control over the order the fields appear in the form. You'd be better off using an array.

Instead of storing the field type, store a code reference to a subroutine that can generate that type of tag. The sub can take arguments to control creation of the input field.

use CGI qw(:standard);

sub TEXTFIELD {
    my ($name,$siz,$max)=@_;
    $siz ||= 50;
    $max ||= 80;
    return textfield(-name=>$name,-size=>$siz,-maxlength=>$max);
}

sub TEXTAREA { ...generate a textarea... };
sub SUBMIT { ...generate a submit button... };

my @fields = (
    { type=>\&TEXTFIELD, args=>['name'] },
    { type=>\&TEXTFIELD, args=>['email'] },
    { type=>\&TEXTFIELD, args=>['site name'] },
    { type=>\&TEXTFIELD, args=>['description'] },
    { type=>\TEXTAREA, args=>['comments'] },
);

my @rows;
for (@fields) {
    my $control = $_->{type}->(@{$_->{args}});
    push @rows,td({-align=>left,-valign=>TOP},$control);
}
[download]

---
print map { my ($m)=1<<hex($_)&11?' ':'';
$m.=substr('AHJPacehklnorstu',hex($_),1) }
split //,'2fde0abe76c36c914586c';
[download]

“Every bit of code is either naturally related to the problem at hand, or else it's an accidental side effect of the fact that you happened to solve the problem using a digital computer.”
M-J D

-- Randal L. Schwartz, Perl hacker
Be sure to read my standard disclaimer if this is a reply.

Thanks merlyn, that's just the kind of thing I was aiming for (though I don't need more than one page).

Just for the benefit of other monks, merlyn's column includes this:

sub DEFAULT_FIELD { textfield(shift, "", 60) }
[download]

as the way fields are produced unless specifically over-ridden, and the tables are produced like this:

print table({ Border => 1, Cellpadding => 5 },
    map { Tr(
        th($_->[1]),
        td(($_->[2] || \&DEFAULT_FIELD)->($_->[0]))
    )} @info
);
[download]

where the details of the form are in the @info array.

Update: you know what's occurring to me? The details of the form (arrays of arrays for the most part) could easily be stored in XML -- I'm sure if the column were written today that might have come up.
--


“Every bit of code is either naturally related to the problem at hand, or else it's an accidental side effect of the fact that you happened to solve the problem using a digital computer.”
M-J D