Public forms mean: a visitor fills out a form on your website, and that data is saved as an entry you manage in admin (and optionally trigger automations).

Step 1: Create a collection

Field label	Type	Required?	Key (example)
Name	Text	Yes	name
Email	Email	Yes	email
Message	Textarea	Yes	message

Give the collection a slug (e.g. contact) — used in {entry for 'contact'}.

Step 2: Allow public submissions

In the collection Settings:

• Entry method → Public API (runtime value public_api).
• Enable rate limiting and optional CAPTCHA.
• Prefer draft / not auto-published for contact-type collections so you moderate first.

Step 3: Template form (recommended)

<div class="contact-form-wrapper">
{entry for 'contact'}
  <label>Name <input type="text" name="{name}" required></label>
  <label>Email <input type="email" name="{email}" required></label>
  <label>Message <textarea name="{message}" required></textarea></label>
  <div data-birkly-form-status hidden aria-live="polite"></div>
  <button type="submit">Send</button>
{endentry}
</div>

<script src="/birkly-client.js"
        data-cms-url="https://your-cms.example"></script>

The client wraps your markup in a <form>, posts to /api/public_submit.php, and keeps API keys server-side. Same-host project pages can omit data-cms-url. See Client setup.

Auto-generated form

{public_form 'contact'}
<script src="/birkly-client.js"></script>

After submission

• New entries appear under that collection in admin.
• Add Automation (entry created → email/Slack) if needed — Automation overview.

Security checklist

• Never put admin credentials in the browser.
• Use HTTPS.
• Enable rate limiting / CAPTCHA when available.
• Rely on server-side validation in Birkly.

Known-bad patterns

Bad	Do instead
Custom fetch to guessed REST URLs	{entry for}
Field names that don’t match schema	read_collection / admin field keys
Phantom {entry 'x'.'y'}…{endentry}	{entry for} for forms; {from …} for reading