Contact Form - Parked Domain

[porkweez]

This weekend I bought a shorter domain name, so I could park it via CPanel. Today, it works great and will make it easier for folks to remember our URL. However, in testing I went to the Contact Us page, filled in required fields and hit Submit; and the following error appeared.

The form was not submitted for the following reasons:
You are coming from an unauthorized domain.
Please click here to return to the form and try again.

Is there something else I need to do? That Contact Form works perfectly from the original domain (lifesongretreatministries.org) but not from the new parked domain (lifesongretreat.org).

[Alan B]

Does the contact form send mail from a sender address of one of your domains? (The FROM address.) You need to first create that address, as it is required that mail can be sent only from an address that exists on the server. If you have not done so, create that address as a forwarder or mail account.

Once you have done that, test again. If it still doesn't work, you can post here again. There are some special issues about how parked domains' mail works. I can check my notes.


If lifesongretreat.org is intended to now be your main public domain, I suggest that you reverse your thinking: use lifesongretreat.org as the cPanel account, and park or redirect lifesongretreatministries.org to it for anyone still using the old domain.

Also, if you want the public to learn lifesongretreat.org, I suggest that you Redirect lifesongretreatministries.org rather than Park it. It's more logical.

[porkweez]

No, the contact form asks the sender to key in their email address. The only address inherent to the form is the 'to' address, so all are sent to admin@lifesongretreatministries.org. I can't imagine that would need to change.
I like your idea about using the new one as the main CPanel account, but I'm not sure how to do that. The main CPanel account is the free one that came from WHB, and the new one was purchased at namecheap. I'm not sure how to flip-flop them. Any hints?

[Alan B]

No, the contact form asks the sender to key in their email address. The only address inherent to the form is the 'to' address, so all are sent to admin@lifesongretreatministries.org. I can't imagine that would need to change.

There would, I think, still be a sender address even if you don't see it in the form. Check the backend code for the mailer. By the way, what form mailer are you using? Many are insecure. I will offer tips to help you avoid creating a security issue.

Choose a script that is known to be secure. This script at nms sourceforge is secure, and is fairly easy to learn to configure: http://www.scriptarchive.com/nms.html.

You should not enable recipient addresses to be specified from hidden fields within the html form. Specify the recipient e-mail addresses only within the script itself. Putting them in the form is not secure.

The script should include a specification for valid referrer addresses or domains. Referrers from anywhere else should be rejected.

Do not name the script anything obvious: don't use words such as "formmail", "form" or "mail". If it has already been named something obvious, rename it immediately. Name it "macktruck" or "halibut" or something else each client coins for himself.

I like your idea about using the new one as the main CPanel account, but I'm not sure how to do that. The main CPanel account is the free one that came from WHB, and the new one was purchased at namecheap. I'm not sure how to flip-flop them. Any hints?

You are confusing domain registration and domain/web hosting. You don't need to change anything on the domain registration side.

Are you on regular shared hosting or a reseller account? If on shared hosting, you would need to ask WHB Support if they can change your cPanel account from lifesongretreatministries.org to lifesongretreat.org. If you have a reseller account, you'll be able to do everything yourself.

[porkweez]

I use RVSitebuilder from the CPanel interface. The Contact Us page offers an online form builder. I still can't find a sender address apart from what the end-user enters in the form, but I'll keep looking.

I do appreciate your help and advice.

[Alan B]

There must be a PHP or CGI file somewhere that contains the script. I've never used RVSitebuilder so I don't know what script it uses.

[porkweez]

You're right. I found a php file that listed [referrers]. When I added the parked domain to that, it worked! I guess that was automatically generated when I first created the form somehow.
Thanks.