Mould

Mould is an all-inclusive form builder and server that uses a custom syntax for succinctly declaring a form.

Mould parses the incoming syntax and generates a form and a server that will serve the form and receive its responses. Responses are saved in a json file and persisted between restarts of the form server.

Usage

go run main.go --input example-form-format.txt
go build server.go
./server
# Listening on port:  :7272
# Visit localhost:7272 in your browser to see the form in action! :)

Flags

Generating the form page has a few options you can provide, other than the form input, such as providing custom html and styles:

go run main.go --help

  -html-footer string
        a single html file containing all of the html that will be presented immediately below the form contents
  -html-header string
        a single html file containing all of the html that will be presented immediately above the form contents
  -input string
        a file containing the form format to generate a form server using
  -stylesheet string
        a single css file containing styles that will be applied to the form (fully replaces mould's default styling)

Change the port the server will run on by passing the --port flag:

go run server.go --help

  -port int
        the port to serve the form server on (default 7272)

Example

form-title          = Nonsensical Form
form-desc           = Hey! Hello! This is a nonsensical form served by <untitled form>
form-bg             = wheat
form-titlecolor     = purple
form-fg             = black
input[Name]         = Preferred moniker
textarea[Address]   = Your fediverse residence, else null
number[Money]#amount = min=1, max=100, value=1
radio[Sky type]     = Sunny, Rainy, Moony

Or generically:

<element>[<title>]#<key> = <content>

• Elements are on the very left of the equals sign. Elements are a mix of html form elements (input, textarea) and elements for controlling themes (form-bg) or page titles (form-title) of the form. This latter group has the prefix form-.
  • Examples: input, radio, textarea, form-title,
  • You can make a form element be required, and blocking submission until filled, by prefixing the element name with an exclamation sign: !textarea
• = <stuff on the right side> contains the content of the specified element. Typically, this will be used as part of the form element’s placeholder
  • In some cases (range, radio) the contents will set options on those elements,
  • in others (form-bg/form-fg) the contents will set colours or the page title (form-title).
• [title] sets the title of the form element label.
  • Example: email[Email address] will create a html input[email] element with an adjacent visible label of Email address
• #key sets an explicit key, which will be used instead of the title for things like keys on the input (useful if you want shorter html ids)

Currently supported html form elements:

• input[text] as input
• textarea as textarea
• input[range] as range
• input[number] as number
• radio buttons as radio
• input[hidden] as hidden
• required elements by prefixing a form element with !
  • example: !input[Your favourite tea] = compulsory tea information here
• input[email] as email
  • the right-hand side of the email element is the regex pattern that validates it
  • `email[Email address] = .@...*
• paragraph elements as form-paragraph
• checkboxes

Basic auth: Password protection

Mould has support for http basic authentication with the form-password and form-user form options. To enable basic auth set at least form-password in the form syntax input (default user: mouldy).

Basic auth should be used in combination with https / TLS secured connections to prevent snooping the set password (http specifies that basic credentials are passed in plaintext with the request).

How does it work?

Messily!

From the input syntax I generate the html page that will be served for the form as well as go code, representing the response model. The generated go code is used to parse responses that the form server receives.

All responses are saved in a local json file every time they come through. Respondents, on submitting, are redirected to a static url containing their responses, should they forget what they responded and want to refresh their memory.

The local json file is used to repopulate the form database between server restarts.

Why did you do this?

Yes, why indeed

Well it’s done now!!!