Multiple Field Calculations

I believe I already know the answer to this question, but just in case I am missing something I will ask anyway.

Here is the scenario:

A simple payment form for an event/meeting. Members pay one price, nonmembers another. Aside from the registration fee, there is also an optional dinner/banquet again with different prices for members and nonmembers.

Attendees may also register their spouse at the same price they register at. So for a member, their spouse can attend the meeting and the banquet at the same discounted price they receive. Non member spouses of course pay the same non member price.

Now to the form, since there is a multi-price scheme, the form amount is zero and the total will be calculated based on the pricing choices.

The member/nonmember registration fee is a radio button group, same for the banquet and same for each spouse option, so the fees part looks like this:

Registration: member $35 / nonmember $40
Register Spouse: No (1) / Yes (2)

Banquet: member $30 / nonmember $35
Spouse Banquet: No (1) / Yes (2)

The numbers in parenthesis are the values associated with the values associated with the No and Yes radio button options.

Now based on other information in the forum, I have gotten this scenario to work with on impediment. I can calculate the correct fess by setting up the values for the radio buttons and selecting No for the Fee Field option. Then using a text field entering the bracketed field names in the Fee Formula box although the caveat is you MUST also enter the [FIELD_VALUE] tag as part of the calculation. So for the registration calculation it looks like this:

[PF_REG_TYPE]*[PF_REG_SPOUSE]+[FIELD_VALUE]

Since we don't want the [FIELD_VALUE] to add anything to the fee, the default for the text field is set to 0 and the Fee Value is also set to 0.

That all works with one problem, the text field used to calculate the value has to be displayed and if it is displayed the value can be overridden. There is no way to hide and protect the field that I can see so as to prevent a registrant from potentially changing the text box value. If you uncheck the Show field option it isn't displayed and doesn't preform the needed calculation. There is also no way without a hack of some sort to even disable entry for the field. At least then you could hide it with css styling.

If there is a way around this I would sure like to know.

It's a shame really, this little application has great potential for simple forms like this without all the overhead and complexity of a full blow forms component. There is much to like about it, but there are some serious deficiencies that keep it an "ok" component rather than a very good or great component.

Thanks.

Hi

Could you please send me the link to the form so that it will be easier to understand the issue you are having ? If you can submit a support ticket sending me administrator account of your site so that I can check your setting, that is even better .

I am sure that we can solve this problem together .

Regards,

Tuan

Greetings Tuan,

Thank you for the reply.

I don't know that there is anything really to fix. It is more a matter of my expectations than a flaw in the product. I have been through the code rather extensively and it is working as designed near as I can tell. My observations would probably fall more into the category of enhancements and whether they would be worth spending time on depends on what and where you would like to position your product. Personally I see where there could be a good market for something that is more than the current product, but less complicated and involved than RSForms Pro, Chronoforms, etc.

The reason why I bought Payment Forms was because I needed a simple form to interface with PayPal that worked within the Joomla framework. I have RSForms Pro, but the PayPal interface is very limiting in the way a person can select products (in this case meeting registrations) and options that can be selected. It is a very powerful package for building forms, but sometimes you don't want or need all of that power.

After going through your code I have decided to use the form fee calculation script feature since I know php well enough, I was hoping to avoid having to do something like that, but it will work.

I do believe that providing a way to do what I was trying to do would be a useful enhancement and not too difficult to implement based on reviewing your code. I think you use this code as the basis for some of your other products and if that is the case more than PF would benefit. I have other enhancement suggestions, but again they would depend on what you wanted to do with the product whether they would be of any value. I won't make that presumption for you.

If you would like to discuss it further we should probably take it off line. I don't think some of the internals of PF should be discussed on a public forum.

Regards,

Hi wes1155 (sorry, I don't know your name, so I use your username)

If you have suggestions to improve the product, I am very happy to listen. You can submit a support ticket, or email me to contact@joomdonation.com or talk to me via Skype, YM, MSN or Gtalk . You can see my contact information at joomdonation.com/index.php?option=com_co...ntact&id=1&Itemid=18

Regards,

Tuan

Hi Tuan,

I'd be happy to discuss possible enchantments with you. Right at the moment I am exceedingly busy and can work around the issues with the payment calculations, etc. When things slow down a bit I will open a ticket and we can go from there. I want to be sure I will have the time to work with you so as not to waste your time.

Regards,

Will