User Documentation

Managing your encryption key

Upon activation, your SnapForms plugin will generate an encryption key. This key is responsible for encrypting the submission sensitive fields data.

You can manage your encryption key from the SnapForms Security Settings page.

Choose the Encryption tab. Here you can view and manage your encryption key.

You can download your current encryption key as a file for backup purposes, or for use on another installation of SnapForms, if you intend to migrate your forms submission data.

You can import an existing encryption key if you have one from a previous installation.

Preventing Form Abuse (Spam Protection)

Form abuse is a serious issue. Automated bots and malicious users may attempt to submit spam, flood your forms, or exploit vulnerabilities. To protect your forms and your site, SnapForms provides several anti-abuse measures:

• reCAPTCHA: Adds a Google reCAPTCHA widget to your forms, blocking most automated submissions and requiring users to prove they are human.
• Honeypot: Inserts a hidden field that only bots will fill out. If this field is completed, the submission is rejected, silently blocking basic spam bots.
• IP Rate Limiting: Restricts the number of submissions allowed from a single IP address within a set time period, preventing brute-force and spam attacks.

Enabling these features greatly reduces spam and abuse, ensuring your forms remain secure and your data stays clean. You can manage this measures from the SnapForms Security Settings page.

Choose the Encryption tab. Here you can view and manage your encryption key.

You can download your current encryption key as a file for backup purposes, or for use on another installation of SnapForms, if you intend to migrate your forms submission data.

SMTP Account Configuration

SnapForms allows you to automatically notify users via email when a form is submitted, or there is any change to their submission status. You can also send email notifications without any trigger events.

For this purpose, SnapForms requires an SMTP account to send form submissions via email. This ensures reliable email delivery and helps prevent your messages from being marked as spam.

You can save multiple SMTP accounts and choose which one to apply for each email notification.

1. In the admin menu, click SnapForms → Email Dashboard.

2. Inside the Email Dashboard, click Manage on the SMTP accounts menu.

3. Now in the SMTP Accounts list, click Add SMTP Account or the Edit button, if you want to change the configuration of an existing account.

4. Enter your SMTP server details:

• Name: The alias for your SMTP account (the name of the sender of emails that you want to be shown).
• Email Address: Your email address.
• SMTP Host: The address of your SMTP server (e.g., smtp.example.com).
• Password: Your SMTP password.
• Port: The port used by your SMTP server (e.g., 587 for TLS, 465 for SSL).
• Encryption: Choose your encryption method (TLS or SSL or None).

5. Click Add SMTP Settings to apply your changes.

Creating a folder

Folder are very important in SnapForms. They are responsible for housing your forms.

1. Click the Add New Folder button from the Main Dashboard, or the Add Folder button from a previous folder in the Main Dashboard.

Alternatively, you can access the tree view (for a more decluttered view), in which you can add a new folder by clicking the Add New Folder button.

2. Set the folder title, parent folder (if empty this will sit at the root), and whether it is active or not.

Click the folder icon to open a tree view and choose a parent folder.

Click Save to finalize the creation of your new folder.

3. Afterwards, you’ll gain access to folder actions, including visiting the folder public page, subfolders list and child forms list.

Creating a form

1. Access the Forms tab inside a folder.

2. Click Add Form to create a new form. It gives you two options: New Form (from scratch) or Create Form from Template.

3. Select one of the options to proceed.

Template Selection

By choosing a template, you can quickly set up a form with the same settings, fields and even emails (submissions not included).Just set the title, choose the template to apply and the parent folder.

New Form (from scratch)

You’ll have to set the settings for the new form, including the title, description, and any specific options you want to configure.

Save the form.

Embedding a form

SnapForms, automatically generates a page for you with the form shortcode. However, you can use the shortcode to add it anywhere:

[snapforms route="public/form/YOUR_FORM_ID"]

Replace YOUR_FORM_ID with the ID of your form.

Fields are the DNA of your forms. They define the kind of data you’ll be able to collect.

Creating a forms field

1. To access the Fields Editor, click the Fields button tab inside a form menu.

2. Do you need to export fields to another form?
Use the Import/Export Fields button in the Fields Editor to download a JSON file of your fields.
You can then import this file into another form to replicate the same fields and settings by dragging and dropping into the upload area.

3. To create a new field, click the Add Field button in the Fields Editor. It will open a modal where you can select the type of field you want to add, among the remaining field details.

4. There are a few different field types you can choose from:

• Email — email validation (inherits the user’s email, if logged in)
• Name — email validation (inherits the user’s name, if logged in)
• Text — single-line input
• Textarea — multi-line input
• Select — dropdown menu
• Image Select — allows users to select an image from a set of images defined in the field settings
• Checkbox — either single checkbox (no values) or multi-select (multiple options can be checked)
• Radio — single selection (only one option can be checked)
• Number — numeric input
• Date — datepicker-enabled
• Time — timepicker-enabled
• Consent Checkbox — requires user consent (no values, editable text – description)
• File Input — user uploads stored in an uploads table
• Image Input — user uploads stored in an uploads table

5. SnapForms supports conditional logic, allowing fields to show/hide based on user input. However, unlike the typical conditional logic found in other form builders, SnapForms’ implementation is designed to allow for multiple coexhisting conditions, or conditions dependant on multiple fields.

Multiple simultaneous conditions for a field are achieved through condition groups. Each group can contain multiple conditions, and all conditions within a group must be met for the group to be satisfied.

There could be multiple condition groups for a single field, allowing for intricate logic and dependencies.

This means you can create complex forms where the visibility of a field can depend on several other fields’ values, providing a more dynamic and tailored user experience.

Automated emails are a powerful feature of SnapForms, enabling you to keep users informed and engaged without manual intervention.

By configuring email automations, you can automatically notify users when key events occur, such as registration, approval, cancellation, or rejection of a submission. This ensures timely communication, improves user experience, and helps maintain transparency throughout the process.

Automated emails also reduce administrative workload and minimize the risk of missing important data, making your workflow more efficient and responsive.

In order to use the emails, you need to set up your email automations. Email automations allow you to incorporate dynamic data, such as user information and form responses through wildcards, into your email messages.

Creating an email automation

1. Access the Email Automations list from the a form’s Email Automations tab.

2. Click the Add Email Automation button, to generate a new email template.

3. Fill in the email automation details, including the name, subject, body, and any wildcards you want to use. You only need to drag and drop the wildcards from the wildcards panel into the email body.

To edit the email body, you can use wildcards to insert dynamic data into your email templates. Wildcards are placeholders that will be replaced with actual data when the email is sent.

Keep in mind to select one of the Email Types to ensure the email is sent on the appropriate event.

Submissions are the lifeblood of any form. They are the raw data provided to you by users filling out the form.

Accessing and analyzing this data is crucial for understanding user behavior and improving your forms.

Submission data though very crucial, can cause huge headaches such as data privacy concerns, compliance issues, and the need for robust data management practices.

SnapForms encrypts all the sensitive submission data, protects submission file upload locations, and provides tools for managing data retention and deletion.

Manage Submissions

1. To access the Submissions list, click the Submissions button inside a form menu.

2. From the submissions list, you can view, search, filter, and manage all submissions for that form.
You can also export submissions to an Excel file for further analysis.

3. There are various actions you can perform on each submission. Among them: edition, email logs check, submission approval, submission rejection and submission deletion.

4. To view the details of a submission, click the edit button (pencil icon) next to the submission you want to view. This will open a new page with all the submission details.

Snapshots

Fields may change over time. However, that should not mean that previous submitted data should be lost or become incomprehensible.

Snapshots are powered by the fields versioning and provide admins with a way to view fields as they were submitted.

Snapshots show up if there’s a mismatch between the field’s current version and the submitted version.

If their alerts are expanded, admin can check the submitted field version, besides the submited value. This may help to diagnose any unwanted changes that may need to be reverted.

Bulk Actions

Sometimes you’ll need to apply the same action to multiple submissions at a time, in order to streamline your workflow.

Bulk actions allow you to perform actions on multiple submissions at once, saving you time and effort.

Select multiple submissions from the list, by marking the checkboxes at the left of each submission row.
Choose an action from the bulk actions dropdown.There currently exist the following bulk actions.

There currently exist the following bulk actions.

• Approve — marks the selected submissions as approved, triggering any associated approval emails.
• Reject — marks the selected submissions as rejected, triggering any associated rejection emails.
• Delete — permanently deletes the selected submissions and any associated personal or sensitive data, email logs, and files.
• Send Email — sends a bulk email to the selected submissions.

Then, click Apply to execute the selected bulk action.

If you choose the Send Email action from the bulk actions dropdown, you can send a bulk email to multiple submissions at once.

This will open a new page where you can write an email you want to use, customize the subject and body, and send the email to all selected submissions.This email will be sent to all selected submissions at once, saving you time and effort.

Email logs provide a detailed record of all email communications sent through SnapForms.

They are essential for tracking email delivery, diagnosing issues, and ensuring effective communication with users.

Access Email Logs

You can acces the email logs through the Email Dashboard (Main Dashboard → Email Dashboard), then either click View All Logs, (for the full logs paginated list) and click the view button (eye icon).

Or, you can access the email logs of a specific submission directly from the submission details page through the Email History button, or directly from the submissions list by clicking the Email Logs button (envelope icon).

After choosing one of the email logs through the view buton (eye icon), you’ll access the Email Log with all its details.

Then, you can check all the details of the email, including the recipient, subject, body, and its status.

Analytics provide insights into form performance and user behavior.

By analyzing form submissions, you can identify trends, optimize form design, and improve user experience.

SnapForms includes an analytics dashboard that provides visualizations and metrics to help you better understand your forms data.

Access Analytics Dashboard

1. You may access the analytics dashboard from inside any form menu, or submissions list through the Analytics button,

2. Inside the analytics dashboard, you can view various metrics related to your form submissions by field or other factors such as country, device type and primary language.

You may filter the analytics by field, as in the submissions list.
You can also export the analytics data to a spreasheet for further analysis.

WordPress creates a debug log when debug mode is enabled. To enable WordPress debug logging, edit wp-config.php:

define(‘WP_DEBUG’, true); define(‘WP_DEBUG_LOG’, true); define(‘WP_DEBUG_DISPLAY’, false); //keep errors hidden in production @ini_set(‘display_errors’, 0);