This plugin hasn’t been tested with the latest 3 major releases of WordPress. It may no longer be maintained or supported and may have compatibility issues when used with more recent versions of WordPress.

ExpressDB Shortcode

Description

The ExpressDB Shortcode plugin lets you easily add data capture forms that work with the ExpressDB cloud database service.

In WordPress, a shortcode is a placeholder for a bit of content that will be generated dynamically. The ExpressDB Shortcode plugin takes the data fields you specify and creates the HTML for your form. Fields are rendered in the order text, textarea, and then checkboxes. The plugin provides some default styling, but web designers can also modify the styling to be applied by adding their own Cascading Style Sheets code.

See the screenshots tab for examples and read the tutorial.

The idea behind this plugin is to automate the creation of the form in much the same way ExpressDB automates the creation of an online database. ExpressDB is a product of Caspio Inc., the cloud database company. ExpressDB offers a 30-day free trial, allowing you to experiment before you buy. Once you create your account, ExpressDB provides a simple 2-step process for creating a database, which will then capture any data you post to it — without making you fuss with database configuration or database table design. You can also elect to receive an email notification whenever someone fills out your form.

Why use ExpressDB with WordPress? There are plenty of other WordPress plugins for contact forms and other types of forms. Some just send you an email notification, while others log the form submission to same database that powers your WordPress blog. But as a cloud database service, ExpressDB offers some key advantages:

  • ExpressDB is simpler than any other web forms and data capture solution you will find.
  • The ExpressDB service is operated by Caspio in professionally run Internet data centers. Because online database services are Caspio’s sole focus, the service is highly reliable, maintaining over 99.99% uptime for the past 5 years+.
  • ExpressDB is scalable, running on a load-balanced cluster of database services. If you are running a small business website, you may have your own server (but probably only one) and more likely are actually be sharing a server with several other websites. If you are lucky enough to generate a large response to a marketing offer, you can be confident that ExpressDB will log all the customer inquiries, whereas a form that posts to your own server could easily overload the database.
  • If you need more sophisticate online database services, you can graduate to [http://www.caspio.com](Caspio Bridge), which provides visual web-based tools for creating databases, forms, reports, charts, graphs, and other interactive database apps.

Sign up at ExpressDB.com

Screenshots

  • A web customer contact form generated by the shortcode.
  • Within the WordPress editor, you add the names of the text, textarea, and checkboxes fields you want included. The only other required parameter is the form action attribute you get from ExpressDB.
  • ExpressDB provides a simple 2-step process for naming the database that will capture form submissions. The web-based wizard then generates an activation key you can copy and paste into the shortcode.

Installation

If you have previously installed a WordPress plugin, you will find this installation fairly straightforward:

  1. Download the ExpressDB Shortcode plugin archive and extract the files
  2. Copy the resulting expressdb-shortcode directory into /wp-content/plugins/
  3. Activate the plugin through the ‘Plugins’ menu of WordPress

FAQ

Where do I get support and other information about ExpressDB

Updates about the plugin will be posted to the ExpressDB Blog

ExpressDB service itself is so simple and easy-to-use, you probably won’t need “technical support” in the traditional sense. Regardless, we are always excited to help, discuss ideas, and consult with you!

See the support page for details.

Reviews

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Contributors & Developers

“ExpressDB Shortcode” is open source software. The following people have contributed to this plugin.

Contributors

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Interested in development?

Browse the code, check out the SVN repository, or subscribe to the development log by RSS.

Changelog

1.0

Initial public release, March 2011