User Guide

40 Chapter 4 Retrieving and Formatting Data

Using Forms to Specify the Data to Retrieve

In the examples in previous chapters, you have retrieved all of the records from a

table. However, there are many instances when you want to retrieve data based on

certain criteria. For example, you might want to see records for everyone in a

particular department, everyone in a particular town whose last name is Smith, or

books by a certain author.

You can use forms in ColdFusion applications to allow users to specify what data

they want to retrieve in a query. When you submit a form, you pass the variables to

an associated page, called an action page, where some type of processing takes

place.

Note

Because forms are standard HTML, the syntax and examples that follow provide you

with just enough detail to begin using ColdFusion.

form tag syntax

Use the following syntax for the create a form tag:

...

</form>

You can override the server request timeout (set on the ColdFusion Administrator

Server Settings page) by adding a RequestTimeout parameter to the action page

URL. The following example specifies a request timeout of two minutes:

Attribute Description

action

Specifies an action page to which you pass form variables for

processing.

method

Specifies how the variables are submitted from the browser to the

action page on the server. All ColdFusion forms must be submitted

with an attribute setting of method=“post”