Custom Forms

With these settings, you can:

Create custom forms for your catalog
View and manage form submissions

Create forms for users to fill out right within Aspen! Forms are great for collecting feedback, allowing patrons to sign up for book or mailing lists, or even signing up for events. Not only can you link directly to a form page, you can also embed forms within custom pages.

Create a New Form

1. From Aspen Administration, navigate to Web Builder → Custom Forms.

2. Click Add New.

3. Give your form a Title.

4. Enter a URL Alias. This will become part of the URL to access the form. For example, if you assign the URL alias "/feedback" the URL to access the form directly will be https://[yourcatalogurl]/feedback

5. Require Login: checking this will require users to sign into their accounts before filling out the form.

6. Introductory Text: Enter any text you would like to appear at the top of the form page. This could explain the purpose of your form and/or provide any additional instructions.

7. Fields: In this section, you will add the fields for your form. Click Add New to add fields.

8. For each field added, assign a Label.

Character limits for each Label field are set to 255 characters

9. Next, each field will allow you to choose a field type. These field types are:

Text Field: Short text area for information such as names.

Text Area: Longer text fields for comments/feedback.

Checkbox: Adds a single checkbox. For example, "Click here to sign up for our newsletter."

Select List: Lets the user select an option from a dropdown list. To create this, add your options in the Select List Values field, each option separated with commas and no spaces.

Date: Allows users to type in the date or select a date from a Calendar view.

Email Address: Text field for an email address. Will check that the text is in a valid email format.

URL: Text field for a URL. Will check that the text entered is in a valid URL format.

10. Enter an optional Description. Text entered in the Description fields will become tooltips that users can hover over on each form field to see more information.

11. If creating a Select List field, enter in your desired options separated with commas and no spaces.

12. Enter in a Default Value if you'd like one of the fields to be pre-populated with certain text. This text will remain in the field unless a user deletes it and writes in their own.

13. Click the Required checkbox next to any form fields that should be required in order to submit the form.

See the below example of sample form fields.

14. Email Results To: If you want to receive notifications of form submissions, enter in the email addresses of the desired recipients. If entering in multiple email addresses, separate each address with a semicolon and no spaces. When users submit a form response, the email addresses listed will receive an email with the user's form responses.

15. Include Introductory Text in Email: Check this box if you want to include the Introductory Text (see #6 above) in the email. An example of when this would be useful is if you are creating an agreement form annd you are wanting to save/print the full form.

16. Submission Result Text: This text will appear to users after successfully submitting the form.

17. Select the library this form should apply to, then save your changes at the bottom. Users will not be able to access your form if no libraries are selected here.

18. To view or link to your form, append the form's URL alias to the end of your main catalog URL.

Updated 2023-03-29 km bws

View and Manage Form Submissions

To view form submissions:

Go to Web Builder → Custom Forms, then click the form you'd like to view.
Click View Submissions.

On this screen you'll be able to see any submissions this form has received. Each submission will list the library the form was submitted from, the username (if applicable), the date submitted, and whether the submission has been marked as "Read."
Click Edit next to a submission to view the details.
On this screen, you'll be able to see the user's answers for this form submission.
Check Mark as Read to mark this submission as "Read." This can help you keep track of which submissions have been viewed/processed.
Click Delete to completely delete the form submission.
If you would like to receive email notifications whenever a form is submitted, edit the form and enter in the email address(es) you'd like to receive notifications.