Website development...

[MJCfromCT]

Hi All,

After fiddling around with HTML a bit, I decided to start a site with CGI...this is my first time doing this so i am a very big n00b when it comes to this...

here's the link to the site...

www.wpi.edu/~mattc

*hopefully it is still up when you are reading this, i've been having such a hard time with unix permissions...*

Ok, but anyways, there is supposed to be a feature where a person creates a username, and it e-mails them w/their password so they can log in....

...however, the school server I am hosting it on doesn't allow the site itself to send e-mails out automatically...is there any way i can tie this function into one of my pop3 e-mail accounts i personally have? I would create a new e-mail addy with my adelphia.net account and use it for this function, only if i knew it could be accomplished...any ideas? Thanks in advance

[ahurtt]

You said, "I would create a new e-mail addy with my adelphia.net account and use it for this function"

What would you be trying to accomplish by doing this? You want to send an email to yourself? Creating an email address for yourself would allow you to receive an email at that address but how would it allow you to send one to somebody else? You probably will not be able to use adelphia.net's sendmail (or whatever mail server they use) unless you are currently logged into adelphia.net's network. If you try, you will probably receive a response saying something to the effect of, "this server does not relay." Your service provider would be negligent if they allowed public access to their mail servers for the purpose of sending emails anonymously.

[MJCfromCT]

That hits the nail on the head...

What i'd ideally like to happen is this:

When a user creates an account on my site, the site itself would be able to send them their password via an e-mail account I already have. Something to automate this process. Right now if a user signs up, I first have to realize they signed up by checking the memberlist, change their randomly created pass. to something generic *e.g. "test"*, and let them know. From there, they can log in and change it to w/e they want.

How do other, larger websites that require e-mailing of a password accomplish this?

If that can't be accomplished, I will have to find a way to modify the code to create a generic pass. in the first place, skipping the e-mail stage altogether, and allowing the user to just go and change their pass. themselves, w/o any intervention on my part.

However, for someone new to CGI and Perl that might prove daunting. :)

[MJCfromCT]

*edit*

The problem seems to be "bypassed" for now...I've made it so it generates a random password for new users and displays it to them, tells them to log in and change it to whatever they want...this way i don't have to fiddle around with getting the e-mail part of it up and running.

[MJCfromCT]

Another question:

I have a poll on my site, and it is supposed to keeps a log of the last person who voted, to prevent poll spamming. What I would like to do is make it so this log file records every user's IP who votes in the poll, not just the last user. If you need any of the code uploaded just ask and i'll do that. Thanks :)