Help with web form things (Indirectly aid my post-secondary funding!)

Ok here's the deal: (I eventually get to the point, so please stick with me)

As I'm entering my final year of highschool soon, I need to start thinking about bursaries and scholarships. I did, and I decided to apply for this one. A few of my neighbours are helping me, but I need some net savvy people to provide some technical help.

The bursary requires you create a plan for a project that will improve the social, economic or environmental fabric of your community. I (and my neighbours) have decided to create a carpooling system; Our neighbour hood is in the country, and it's about a half-hour drive from town. If rides are shared, it would adress the social, economic, and environmental requirements, so I would be garunteed a win XD.

This is where you come in. I need to create an online database of rides. Here's what I'm thinking:

~Users can sign in, view all rides, and sort them by time, # of available seats, location, etc.
~Users can post any rides that they will be able to offer.
~Layout will be simple and easy to use, as most of the people in my neighbourhood are over the age of 45. I'm thinking just plain white background and black text, thats it.

I don't know how to create such a (dynamic) database. I was thinking of creating a forum, but that does not organize itself without administration... What I need is something that doesnt require a human to order the submisions manually. For instance, User A should be able to sign on, and be presented with an option to view all available rides, sorted in various ways. User B should be able to post that he/she is leaving a certain area at "3:50 PM" on saturday. User A would sort the entries by time, and see that User B is leaving at 3:50 on Saturday.

Eventually I will want to incorporate things such as email notification, or even a system that allows you to request a seat in an available ride directly on the site, but for now I just need the basics.

I am not worried about hosting, as I can simply use a crappy angelfire (or equivalent) site and cover it with a .cjb.net mask. That will suffice.

I'm not asking anyone to do this for me, but rather to point me in the right direction. What is this kind of thing called? Can you give me any tips?
Any support from you guys would help me so much, and may even aid my in my post-secondary funding. I need to have this finished by April 30th, so I have to get working maintenant.

Jam it back in, in the dark.

First off, Angelfire wouldn't even cover doing this, unless they provide a database for you to use and some sort of server-side scripting support.

The way I'd do it is using a mix of PHP and MySQL, as this sort of dynamic content could not be done otherwise. Essentially, you'd need the forms to interact with the MySQL database, update records, and select them. The sorting may sound difficult, but it's really not hard. Of course, as I said you would require PHP or some language of that sort (Perl, maybe) to do it. This is a large task, and if you're not familiar with the language I can guarantee you it will confuse the hell out of you.

As far as resources to learn about this type of thing, a lot of what you would need to know comes from php.net and mysql.com. I can't really think of any sites that deal with this in particular, unfortunately.

How ya doing, buddy?

Hmm... I am familiar with html, and I have an equivalent certificate to the CompTIA A+ certification, so learning may not be such a big task as you say. However, you clearly have more experience than I do. Would you still suggest attempting to learn enough to make a basic form?

This thing is sticky, and I don't like it. I don't appreciate it.

PHP is far beyond HTML and A+. HTML is still used to create forms and such (which is arguably not hard), but PHP does much more.

First, you would need to verify the input, then you'd need to do whatever is required--beit querying against MySQL with this data or shooting it off somewhere (for instance, in an email contact form). To put it simply, there is a great deal of logic involved.

A quick way to get a form built is to build a straight form with an action of "form_process.php" or somesuch. Then write a PHP file, with these contents:

PHP Code:

<?php
print "<pre>";
print_r($_POST);
print "</pre>";
?>

Such would give you an idea of how PHP handles input.
From there, you'd need to do whatever is required of the program (not to sound like a broken record, but there's a lot of logic going on). :P

I am a dolphin, do you want me on your body?

Ok... perhaps this is a little over my head. I'm not giving up though.
I was with you untill you started with "A quick way to get a form built is to build a straight form with an action of "form_process.php"......"

Perhaps I will read up on php.net for a bit.

I was speaking idiomatically.

Well, php.net won't help too much with my example.

Let us say you have a simple form:

<html>
<head>
<title>Simple Form</title>
</head>
<body>
<form method="post" action="form_process.php">
Name: <input type="text" name="name" /><br />
Address: <input type="text" name="address" /><br />
Phone: <input type="text" name="phone" /><br />
</form>
</body>
</html>

Emphasis above is what I meant with the comment you cite.

The form_process.php file I mention in Post #3 would print a list of all the input passed through this form. An example of output would be this:

Array
(
    [name] => Joe User
    [addr] => 123 Fake Street
    [phone] => +1.2345678901
)

This is telling you that it recieved a few variables. To get at them, you would need to be familiar with arrays. This is on the basic side of stuff, though.

What kind of toxic man-thing is happening now?

Alright, I'm starting to understand, thanks. What do you suggest I do now? Do you know of any other sites, or would you be willing to help me on this? (I would understand if you weren't, as it is a big job like you said).

FELIPE NO

May I ask what this A+ equivalent may be?

What, you don't want my bikini-clad body?

My school offered a course in Computer Hardware and Operating Systems (ITC), where in which the top grades in the class receives "A+ equivalent certificates". It is not an official certification however, it just means I went through the same course and learned all the same information that a certified A+ technician has.

Jam it back in, in the dark.