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A
form, in the everyday world as well as on the Web, is a type of struc-
tured communication. When you apply for a driver’s license, you’re
not told to randomly write down personal information; you’re asked
to fill out a form that asks for specific information, one piece at a time, in a
specific manner. Web-based forms are just as precise, if not more so.
Dreamweaver has a robust and superior implementation of HTML forms—
from the dedicated Forms category in the Insert panel to various form-specific
Properties panels. In addition to their importance as communication tools
connecting the browsing public to Web server applications, forms are an inte-
gral part of building some of Dreamweaver’s own objects. Forms also serve
as major tools for Web developers because they can be altered on-the-fly; it’s
possible, for example, for a selection in one drop-down list to determine the
contents of another. The dynamic aspects of forms are covered in Chapter 23.
Dreamweaver also includes another robust method of implementing forms:
Spry. Once you understand how to set up a form and how the various form
elements are applied, you learn how Spry form widgets are put to use in
Chapter 17.
In this chapter, you learn how forms are structured and then created within
Dreamweaver. Each form object is explored in detail—text fields, radio but-
tons, checkboxes, menus, list boxes, command buttons, hidden ...