Emailing Contact Form Data

[Timothy Smith]

I am creating a simple form for on a non profit web page. I want the user/donor to be able to simply click send and have the site/form send an email to the non-profit. I do not want an email client open up on the users screen. I just want it to send an email behind the scenes.

I was hoping to do this on a simple static web site (html/css/js). Every example I come across wants me to use some sort of php or other backend server.

This is want I am currently using

  <form method="GET" action="mailto:[email protected]" enctype="text/plain">
    <div>Subject</div>
    <input type="text" name="subject" />

    <div>Name</div>
    <input name="Name" />

    <div>E-Mail</div>
    <input name="E-Mail Address" />

    <div>Message</div>
    <textarea name="Message"></textarea>

    <br/>
    <input type="submit" value="Send" />

    <input type="hidden" name="body" />
  </form>

…

var form = document.getElementsByTagName('form')[0];
form.addEventListener('submit',contact,false);
function contact(e) {
  // Prevent Default Form Submission
  e.preventDefault();

  var target = e.target || e.srcElement;
  var i = 0;
  var message = '';

  // Loop Through All Input Fields
  for(i = 0; i < target.length; ++i) {
     // Check to make sure it's a value. Don't need to include Buttons
     if(target[i].type != 'text' && target[i].type != 'textarea') {
            // Skip to next input since this one doesn't match our rules
        continue;
     }

     // Add Input Name and value followed by a line break
     message += target[i].name + ': ' + target[i].value + "\r\n";
  }
  // Modify the hidden body input field that is required for the mailto: scheme
  target.elements["body"].value = message;

  // Submit the form since we previously stopped it. May cause recursive loop in some browsers? Should research this.
  this.submit();

}

This works but opens an email client on the users side and obviously does not hide the mailto email address.

Is there a better solution for this with say wordpress or ruby on rails without the need to use mandrill, email chimp, constant contact, etc?

Is there a FREE custom solution to this… using a gmail account perhapses?

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