WordPress Plugin: Contact Coldform

Updated January 27, 2020 • 160 comments

Welcome to the homepage for Contact Coldform, a secure, lightweight, flexible contact form with plenty of options and squeaky clean markup. Coldform blocks spam while making it easy for your visitors to contact you from your WordPress-powered website. The comprehensive Settings Page makes it easy to take full control with plenty of options and several built-in themes for styling the form. Coldform delivers everything you need and nothing you don’t — no frills, no gimmicks, just pure contact-form satisfaction. Now available at the WP Plugin Directory!

Update!

Contact Coldform had a good run (10 years!), but it’s time for something far better: Contact Form X. CFX is superior to Contact Coldform in every way. Contact Form X gives you all the same features of Contact Coldform, plus you also get a recent-email dashboard widget, GDPR options, inline docs, Google reCaptcha, and of course the contact form itself is all Ajax-powered and super awesome.

Contact Coldform = 2008–2018.
Contact Form X = 2018 & beyond..

I encourage all users of Contact Coldform to upgrade Contact Coldform to Contact Form X. You can learn more and download the plugin at the WP Plugin Directory. And yes, I use Contact Form X for my own contact form here at Perishable Press. </update>

Overview

Plug-&-play: display Coldform anywhere
Sweet emails: Coldform sends descriptive, well-formatted messages
Safe and secure: Coldform blocks spam and filters malicious content
Ultra-clean code: lightweight, standards-compliant, semantic, valid
Fully customizable: easy to configure and style via Coldform Settings

Features

Slick, toggle settings panels make it easy to customize Coldform
Style Coldform using built-in coldskins or upload some custom CSS
Provides template tag to display Coldform anywhere in your theme
Provides shortcode to display Coldform on any post or page
Displays customizable confirmation message to the sender

Coldskins available here »

Anti-spam & Security

Captcha: Coldform includes challenge question/answer
Bot trap: hidden input field further reduces automated spam
Secure form processing protects against bad bots and malicious input
User-friendly error messages help users complete all required fields

Customize Everything

Includes option to enable users to receive carbon copies
Coldform message includes IP, host, agent, and other user details
Customize form-field captions, error messages, and success message
Includes three built-in themes “coldskins” to style, or
Style the Coldform with your own custom CSS
Option to add a custom prefix to the subject line
Option to disable the captcha for registered users

Clean Codes

Coldform brings delicious code on every front:

Squeaky-clean PHP: every line like a fine wine
Crispy-clean markup: valid, semantic source code with proper formatting
Shiny-clean emails: Coldform delivers descriptive, well-formatted content
Better performance: conditional loading of stylesheet only when needed

More Features

Works perfectly without JavaScript.
Option to load CSS only when Coldform is displayed
Option to reset default settings
Options to customize many aspects of the form
Options to customize success, error, and spam messages
Option to enable and disable CSS styles

Installation and Usage:

Typical plugin install: upload, activate, and customize in the WP Admin.

Unzip and upload the entire directory to your “plugins” folder and activate
Use the shortcode to display Coldform on any post or page, or:
Use the template tag to display the Coldform anywhere in your theme.
Visit the Coldform Settings to configure your options and more info.

Shortcode

[coldform]

Template tag

<?php if (function_exists('contact_coldform_public')) contact_coldform_public(); ?>

For more information, visit the Coldform Settings page and readme.txt file.

Coldform Screenshots

Download

As explained at the beginning of this post, I am retiring Contact Coldform. The plugin will be updated through 2018 or so, and will encourage all Coldform users to upgrade to the far superior Contact Form X. Check it out and download via the WordPress.org Plugin Directory:

Download Contact Form X »

About the Author

Jeff Starr = Fullstack Developer. Book Author. Teacher. Human Being.

160 responses to “WordPress Plugin: Contact Coldform”

Alejandro 2009/03/11 2:00 am

Hi! Thanks for creating the plugin ContactColdFom is very good!

I just wanted to know if it is possible to “expand” the space for the “antispam question, for if it is too long after sending the data (in the plugin options) is cut, then do not understand (is cut).

In short, what we need is to “expand” the capacity of the form of options, which puts the antispam question and asked to write a longer time.

Thanks, sorry for my bad English.

Jeff Starr 2009/03/11 7:54 am • Post Author

@Alejandro: I am not sure if I understand you completely here.. could you maybe send a screenshot with some further explanation. I will do my best to help you!

K 2009/04/03 5:59 am

Hi,

ever thought about putting the single fields into -tags, so you could float them easier?

thanks!

K 2009/04/03 6:05 am

Hi again,

sorry for writing multiple comments in such a short time.

after looking over your code, i want to say: it’s pretty clear and good (as far as i understand it ;)

one thing that will prevent me from ever updating your plugin again: i have to hack so many things in the code (every english text, automatic mail content, form-size and, as alejandro asked: maxlength, etc.). everything works more than just fine and is pretty easy to use. as i expected. if you allow me to make a suggestion for future updates: moving more and more stuff from code to admin-options and a seperated style-sheet (maybe admin option to switch between style-sheets #1-#3).

thanks anyway for this plugin. :)

Herr Kaiser 2009/04/04 4:48 am

Is there a way to add your form with a php-function to a template?

thanks a lot!

Jeff Starr 2009/04/06 12:31 pm • Post Author

@K: Everything is completely customizable via CSS. See my custom Coldskins for more information on how to float and style the various form fields.

@Herr Kaiser: Not sure, I haven’t tried it! :P Let me know if you get something worked out. Cheers!

K 2009/04/07 1:57 am

hm. I tried simply calling it via it’s function-name. didn’t work. maybe i have to insert it into some hook. i don’t know. but due to the fact, that i couldn’t hide it and found dagon-form with a php-function in it’s doku, i switched. nothing personal. just the time :)

thanks for your plugin anyway. i’ll use it somewhere else. it’s still good :D

Mohammad 2009/04/15 5:28 am

Hi Jeff,

Thanks for the great plugin,

I have a little problem though;

It’s installed perfectly, but when I fill in all the required fields and hit send, the confirmation page doesn’t show, I instead receive the following message:(firefox):
“The page you are trying to view cannot be shown because it uses an invalid or unsupported form of compression.”
(ie):
“Internet Explorer cannot display the webpage”

No email message is received.

I use the Arabic version.

I’ll keep trying to get it solved, and update you if anything.

Thanks again for the contact form, I used to use formmail, but not any more :)

Mohammad 2009/04/15 12:49 pm

Update: it’s now showing internal server error (500)

Mohammad 2009/04/16 7:04 am

It’s got solved,

The first message was a result of wrong configured charset (page format).
The second is a server problem.

Thank you very much.

Jeff Starr 2009/04/19 3:59 pm • Post Author

@Mohammad: Hey man, sorry I couldn’t respond sooner — things have been utterly crazy around here. I am glad to see that you found the source of the issues and even managed to resolve them yourself. Thank you so much for your patience and for taking the time to post your followup solution. Much appreciated. :)
Cheers,
Jeff

CherryPie 2009/05/02 5:18 am

Thanks for this plug in, it is very neat and tidy. Here is the link so you can see it in use on my blog:

http://www.cheriesplace.me.uk/blog/index.php/contact/

Comments are closed for this post. Something to add? Let me know.

Alejandro 2009/03/11 2:00 am

Hi! Thanks for creating the plugin ContactColdFom is very good!

I just wanted to know if it is possible to “expand” the space for the “antispam question, for if it is too long after sending the data (in the plugin options) is cut, then do not understand (is cut).

In short, what we need is to “expand” the capacity of the form of options, which puts the antispam question and asked to write a longer time.

Thanks, sorry for my bad English.
Jeff Starr 2009/03/11 7:54 am • Post Author

@Alejandro: I am not sure if I understand you completely here.. could you maybe send a screenshot with some further explanation. I will do my best to help you!
K 2009/04/03 5:59 am

Hi,

ever thought about putting the single fields into -tags, so you could float them easier?

thanks!
K 2009/04/03 6:05 am

Hi again,

sorry for writing multiple comments in such a short time.

after looking over your code, i want to say: it’s pretty clear and good (as far as i understand it ;)

one thing that will prevent me from ever updating your plugin again: i have to hack so many things in the code (every english text, automatic mail content, form-size and, as alejandro asked: maxlength, etc.). everything works more than just fine and is pretty easy to use. as i expected. if you allow me to make a suggestion for future updates: moving more and more stuff from code to admin-options and a seperated style-sheet (maybe admin option to switch between style-sheets #1-#3).

thanks anyway for this plugin. :)
Herr Kaiser 2009/04/04 4:48 am

Is there a way to add your form with a php-function to a template?

thanks a lot!
Jeff Starr 2009/04/06 12:31 pm • Post Author

@K: Everything is completely customizable via CSS. See my custom Coldskins for more information on how to float and style the various form fields.

@Herr Kaiser: Not sure, I haven’t tried it! :P Let me know if you get something worked out. Cheers!
K 2009/04/07 1:57 am

hm. I tried simply calling it via it’s function-name. didn’t work. maybe i have to insert it into some hook. i don’t know. but due to the fact, that i couldn’t hide it and found dagon-form with a php-function in it’s doku, i switched. nothing personal. just the time :)

thanks for your plugin anyway. i’ll use it somewhere else. it’s still good :D
Mohammad 2009/04/15 5:28 am

Hi Jeff,

Thanks for the great plugin,

I have a little problem though;

It’s installed perfectly, but when I fill in all the required fields and hit send, the confirmation page doesn’t show, I instead receive the following message:(firefox):
“The page you are trying to view cannot be shown because it uses an invalid or unsupported form of compression.”
(ie):
“Internet Explorer cannot display the webpage”

No email message is received.

I use the Arabic version.

I’ll keep trying to get it solved, and update you if anything.

Thanks again for the contact form, I used to use formmail, but not any more :)
Mohammad 2009/04/15 12:49 pm

Update: it’s now showing internal server error (500)
Mohammad 2009/04/16 7:04 am

It’s got solved,

The first message was a result of wrong configured charset (page format).
The second is a server problem.

Thank you very much.
Jeff Starr 2009/04/19 3:59 pm • Post Author

@Mohammad: Hey man, sorry I couldn’t respond sooner — things have been utterly crazy around here. I am glad to see that you found the source of the issues and even managed to resolve them yourself. Thank you so much for your patience and for taking the time to post your followup solution. Much appreciated. :)
Cheers,
Jeff
CherryPie 2009/05/02 5:18 am

Thanks for this plug in, it is very neat and tidy. Here is the link so you can see it in use on my blog:

http://www.cheriesplace.me.uk/blog/index.php/contact/

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