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Developing 120 question form
#1

[eluser]Bruce Brown[/eluser]
I'm converting my Dad/Brothers's legal form service from running on a customized VPASP shopping cart (ASP solution) to Expression Engine. The site requires the user to answer about 120 question, click submit --pay, and then an email is sent to a document processing dept with the data to create a legal form.

The forms as they exist in the old site work with a MSSQL database with multiple related tables. For example the form asks a parent to name his/her children, with the info of the children in a separate related one-to-many table.

We're looking to create the forms for use in the EE site. We're seeing that we can probably do it with EE, but my developer, new to EE but very good at PHP seems to be not very excited about the solution of writing custom PHP to store the data in weblogs. I've asked over on the EE forums if there is any benefit to CI in this instance, especially given the implenting EE 2.0/CodeIgniter synchronization. I'd like to program our solution with that in mind.

I'm probably way too vague here. But, do any of you think that creation an extensive form is the type of app that Code Igniter is better at than EE? Are there good reasons to go with Code Igniter for this?

Bruce
#2

[eluser]Michael Wales[/eluser]
For just a form - I think CI is much more suited for this task, simply because you don't have to work around all of the fluff and practices EE has coming along with it.

It would really depend on how closely this form will be tied into the rest of the site (I assume there's more to it than just this form - otherwise, why is EE even a consideration).

I would like to tell you to go one way or the other, but I really can't. When EE 2.0 is released it will be based off of CodeIgniter - if integration between this form and the rest of your site is what you want I can't think of a better platform than EE 2.0. You'll have all of your Content Management within EE and the ability to "break-off" using the same codebase (CodeIgniter) to develop the independent form application.
#3

[eluser]Bruce Brown[/eluser]
Michael,

The form really is somewhat independent as an application from the rest of the site. We are using EE as a content management system, and will be using the forums for customer support, and wiki to publish legal info, but, the form doesn't need to interact with the site.

I'd like to have a single log-in, but, am willing to wait for EE 2.0 for that.

Would you suggest I put the tables related to the form in the EE database, or have a separate CI database?
#4

[eluser]Majd Taby[/eluser]
take a look at the CodeExtinguisher preview (in my signature), it's _really_ easy to create forms like that and manage them, authentication is optional.
#5

[eluser]Mirage[/eluser]
Bruce -

If you decided that EE is appropriate for most of your site, then I'd do the following:

- write your site in EE
- create a URL leading to a sub directory which indexes a CI application
- create the form in EE and point it's action to the subdirectory
- process your form in CI
- redirect back to EE

The [potentially] biggest hurdle is integrating the view templates, but it's a small price to pay. With EE2.0 on the horizon built on top CI it'd make little sense to me doing heavy lifting like this in an EE module.

Just my $0.02...
#6

[eluser]Bruce Brown[/eluser]
Very helpful guidance, thanks. I'll talk to my developer on Monday ---tomorrow I'll get CI loaded on the site and see if we can begin learning enough CI to get this done. I'm just a web designer (used to be a network guy). But I really think the developer I'm working with has the talent to figure this out and do it. I'm pretty excited about the whole thing.

Bruce
#7

[eluser]Mirage[/eluser]
Cool. Let me know if you need help.
#8

[eluser]Bruce Brown[/eluser]
Jtaby,

Just finished looking at Code Extinguisher. Seems just perfect for my project and I'm going to load it up. Thank you for the reference.

Bruce
#9

[eluser]Majd Taby[/eluser]
i'm glad you think so, if you come across any issues (from the admittedly lacking documentation), don't hesitate to ask in the ignited code forum thread.
#10

[eluser]Bruce Brown[/eluser]
In codexcontroller.php, I modified:
Code:
$this->codextemplates->css('template-css',$this->config->item('codex_asset_folder').$this->template.'..ci/apps/codex/assests/css/codex_'.$this->template.'.css');
in two locations as above.

Didn't seem to work in applying in css. I'm above my head a bit in the fix, as I've yet to learn CI.

Thanks,

Bruce




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