iWeb has allowed individuals to quickly create all kinds of websites. But unfortunately the ability to add forms to these websites is not an included feature.

Luckily, with a bit of help from two free web services, forms can be added to help gather information from individuals visiting your website.

Create the Forms For iWeb

To be able to add forms to your iWeb pages you first need to create them. Google Docs recently added the ability to create forms and have the data collected stored in their spreadsheet application.

To create a form on Google Docs:

1. Login to docs.google.com
2. Open a New Spreadsheet
3. Click the Share tab
4. Check ‘To Fill Out a Form’ and then Start Editing your Form
5. Create your form and click Save
6. Return to your Spreadsheet’s Edit tab and click the link to Go To Live Form. Copy the URL of the Live Form

Now that we’ve created the form we’ll want to put the form into a format that will fit nicely into our iWeb pages. A new web application, Sprout, will help us do just that.

To have Sprout help us setup our forms in a format perfect for our iWeb site:

1. Navigate to Sprout and Get Started with a Blank Slate
2. Add a title for your Form and enter the size you’d like your Form to be on your iWeb page
3. Now that your blank slate is loaded and ready, select Services (under Components on the right) and then Google Forms
4. Instructions on how to add your Google Form to your Sprout will be displayed on your Blank Slate - Paste the URL into the Form URL field on the Right
5. After you’ve pasted the url, hit return and you should see your form on your slate.
6. Now we need to Publish your Slate.. Click Publish in the top Right (You may need to create an account with Sprout - Don’t worry its free)
7. Once your Sprout has been published, copy the code in the box to the right.

Adding the Form to iWeb

Now that we’ve created and formated the Form we need to add it to the iWeb page we’d like it to appear on. To do this, open up iWeb and click Web Widgets and select HTML snippet. Past the code from Sprout into the HTML snippet box and hit enter.

Once this is finished, you should see your Form on your iWeb page. More the Form to the location you’d like to store it on your page and publish your iWeb site. Every time your Form is filled out and submitted, the results will be stored in your Google Docs Spreadsheet for your review.

While this approach does take a few steps to get a form onto your iWeb page, it is a free solution that allows you some customization and storage options for the feedback provided by visitors to your website.

What type of Forms will you create for your iWeb site?

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This weeks Automator Tip of the Week is small but useful: Convert Movie to iPod Format.

While there are a number of different movie file formats that work great on your Apple computer not all formats work well with your new iPods. This Automator task makes converting all your movie files to an iPod friendly format easy.

To convert your Movie files to an iPod ready format add these two automator steps:

1. Find Finder Times - Do a search to select your movie files that are not yet in iPod friendly formats
2. Export Movies - This allows you to export your movies an iPod format

Once Automator has found the movie files, it will open them one at a time and convert them to an iPod format that you can quickly sync with your iPod and take them on the go.

Need some help with Automating a task? Let us know!

A number of websites posted about this information a few months ago, but in case you’re a new Mac users and haven’t yet heard the news… You can get even more iMovie than what comes with your new computer.

The best part is, its FREE!

All new Macs come with iLife 08. The main movie making tool in iLife is iMovie, but with iMovie 08 a lot changed from previous versions of the software.

Some of the strengths of iMovie 08 is that it made making home movies quick, easy, and shareable… But in its efforts to do just that iMovie 08 lost many of the customizable features and tools that made previous versions of iMovie so great.

In what appears to be Apple’s way of accounting for those lost features is to allow all owners of iLife 08 the ability to download iMovie HD for free.

So, if you want to gain some additional movie making tools for Free, head over to this Apple web page and download iMovie HD.

http://www.apple.com/support/downloads/imovieHD6.html

Use both tools to make great home movies that you can quickly share with the world!

As you’ve noticed, we’ve updated Maciverse.com! Despite how much we enjoyed the last theme on Maciverse.com we decided it was time for a new look and feel.

We hope you enjoy the new theme as much as we do. Let us know what you think and if you have any problems!

Over the past few weeks a number of software bundles for the Mac have been announced that brings a significant number of Mac applications to users at incredible prices. Of course, the deals become much more incredible once a certain number of people have purchased the bundle and thus unlock the best apps included.

MacUpdate recently announced their “Parallels Promotion” which includes a number of applications that make creating word art, writing that book you’ve always dreamed of authoring, and keeping backup copies of your DVDs quick and easy.

A solid deal as once all applications are unlocked purchasers will receive $469 worth of software for just $69. If a large number of people purchase the bundle additional software including Parallels virtualization machines that allow you to run Windows on your Mac will be part of the bundle.

Additionally, after recent success on previous bundles, Macheist has announced a new bundle for $49. This includes some software from previous bundles as well as ways to make managing your clipboard easier and providing a solid writing environment for all the would be authors.

But, if you’re not sure you’d like to put down any money for some of these software options… There is plenty of powerful free software available.

Lifehacker.com recently described a number of free alternatives to the available software included in bundles. Check out some of their suggested apps and let us know how they work.