Pls I really Need Your Help With This One (THANKS)

Good day guys. I have this code on my submit page and form. I would like to limit the characters that can be entered in the text area of the description field. Can someone help me please?
Thanks

{capture name="title"} - {l}Submit Link{/l}{/capture}
{capture assign="in_page_title"}{l}Submit Link{/l}{/capture}
{capture assign="description"}{l}Submit a new link to the directory{/l}{/capture}

{include file="header.tpl"}
{include file="top_bar.tpl"}

{strip}
{include file="submitguidelines.tpl"}

<form method="post" action="">
<table class="formPage" align="center">

{if $error}
   <tr><td colspan="2" class="err">
      {l}An error occured while saving the link.{/l}
      {if !empty($sqlError)}
         <p>{$sqlError}</p>
      {/if}
   </td></tr>
{/if}

{if $posted}
   <tr><td colspan="2" class="msg">
   {l}Link submitted and awaiting approval.{/l}<br />
   {l}Submit another link.{/l}
   </td></tr>
{/if}

{if count($price) gt 0}
	<tr><td colspan="2" class="price">
	<strong>{l}Pricing{/l}:</strong><br />
	<table border="0" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0" width="75%">
	{if $price.featured}
		<tr><td><input type="radio" name="LINK_TYPE" value="featured"{if $LINK_TYPE eq 'featured'} checked="true"{/if} />{l}Featured links{/l}</td><td>${$price.featured}</td></tr>
	{/if}
	{if $price.normal gt 0}
		<tr><td><input type="radio" name="LINK_TYPE" value="normal"{if $LINK_TYPE eq 'normal'} checked="true"{/if} />{l}Regular links{/l}</td><td>${$price.normal}</td></tr>
	{elseif $price.normal eq 0}
		<tr><td><input type="radio" name="LINK_TYPE" value="normal"{if $LINK_TYPE eq 'normal'} checked="true"{/if} />{l}Regular links{/l}</td><td>{l}free{/l}</td></tr>
	{/if}
	{if $price.reciprocal gt 0}
		<tr><td><input type="radio" name="LINK_TYPE" value="reciprocal"{if $LINK_TYPE eq 'reciprocal'} checked="true"{/if} />{l}Regular links with reciprocal{/l}</td><td>${$price.reciprocal}</td></tr>
	{elseif $price.reciprocal eq 0}
		<tr><td><input type="radio" name="LINK_TYPE" value="reciprocal"{if $LINK_TYPE eq 'reciprocal'} checked="true"{/if} />{l}Regular links with reciprocal{/l}</td><td>{l}free{/l}</td></tr>
	{/if}
	{if isset($price.free)}
		<tr><td><input type="radio" name="LINK_TYPE" value="free"{if $LINK_TYPE eq 'free'} checked="true"{/if} />{l}Links with nofollow attribute{/l}</td><td>free</td></tr>
	{/if}
	</table>
	{validate form="submit_link" id="v_LINK_TYPE" message=$smarty.capture.field_link_type}
	</td></tr>
{/if}
   <tr>
      <td class="label"><span class='req'>*</span>{l}Title{/l}:</td>
      <td class="field">
         <input type="text" name="TITLE" value="{$TITLE|escape|trim}" size="40" maxlength="70" class="text" />
         {validate form="submit_link" id="v_TITLE" message=$smarty.capture.field_char_required}
         {validate form="submit_link" id="v_TITLE_U" message=$smarty.capture.title_not_unique}
      </td>
   </tr>
   <tr>
      <td class="label"><span class='req'>*</span>{l}URL{/l}:</td>
      <td class="field">
         <input type="text" name="URL" value="{$URL|escape|trim}" size="40" maxlength="70" class="text"/>
         {validate form="submit_link" id="v_URL" message=$smarty.capture.invalid_url}
         {validate form="submit_link" id="v_URL_ONLINE" message=$smarty.capture.url_not_online}
         {validate form="submit_link" id="v_URL_U" message=$smarty.capture.url_not_unique}
      </td>
   </tr>
   <tr>
      <td class="label">{l}Description{/l}:</td>
      <td class="field">
         <textarea name="DESCRIPTION" rows="3" cols="35" class="text">{$DESCRIPTION|escape|trim}</textarea>
      </td>
   </tr>
   <tr>
      <td class="label"><span class='req'>*</span>{l}Your Name{/l}:</td>
      <td class="field">
         <input type="text" name="OWNER_NAME" value="{$OWNER_NAME|escape|trim}" size="40" maxlength="70" class="text" />
         {validate form="submit_link" id="v_OWNER_NAME" message=$smarty.capture.field_char_required}
      </td>
   </tr>
   <tr>
      <td class="label"><span class='req'>*</span>{l}Your Email{/l}:</td>
      <td class="field">
         <input type="text" name="OWNER_EMAIL" value="{$OWNER_EMAIL|escape|trim}" size="40" maxlength="255" class="text" />
         {validate form="submit_link" id="v_OWNER_EMAIL" message=$smarty.capture.invalid_email}
      </td>
   </tr>
   <tr>
   <td class="label"><span class='req'>*</span>{l}Category{/l}:</td>
      <td class="field">
         {html_options options=$categs selected=$CATEGORY_ID name="CATEGORY_ID"}
         {validate form="submit_link" id="v_CATEGORY_ID" message=$smarty.capture.no_url_in_top}
      </td>
   </tr>
   <tr>
      <td class="label">{if $recpr_required}<span class='req'>*</span>{/if}{l}Reciprocal Link URL{/l}:</td>
      <td class="field">
         <input type="text" name="RECPR_URL" value="{$RECPR_URL|escape|trim}" size="40" maxlength="255" class="text" />
         {validate form="submit_link" id="v_RECPR_URL" message=$smarty.capture.invalid_url}
         {validate form="submit_link" id="v_RECPR_ONLINE" message=$smarty.capture.url_not_online}
         {validate form="submit_link" id="v_RECPR_LINK" message=$smarty.capture.recpr_not_found|replace:'#SITE_URL#':$smarty.const.SITE_URL}
         <br />
         <p class="small">{l}To validate the reciprocal link please include the<br />following HTML code in the page at the URL<br />specified above, before submiting this form:{/l}</p>
         <textarea name="RECPR_TEXT" rows="3" readonly="readonly" cols="35" class="text">&lt;a href="{$smarty.const.SITE_URL}"&gt;{$smarty.const.SITE_NAME}&lt;/a&gt;</textarea>
      </td>
   </tr>

   {if $smarty.const.VISUAL_CONFIRM}
   <tr>
      <td class="label"><span class='req'>*</span>{l}Enter the code shown{/l}:</td>
         <td class="field">
            <input type="text" name="CAPTCHA" value="" size="10" maxlength="6" class="text" />
            {validate form="submit_link" id="v_CAPTCHA" message=$smarty.capture.invalid_code}<br />
            <p class="small">{l}This helps prevent automated registrations.{/l}</p>
            <img src="{$smarty.const.DOC_ROOT}/captcha.php" class="captcha" alt="{l}Visual Confirmation Security Code{/l}" title="{l}Visual Confirmation Security Code{/l}" />
         </td>
   </tr>
   {/if}

   <tr>
      <td colspan="2" class="buttons"><input type="submit" name="submit" value="{l}Submit{/l}" class="btn" /></td>
   </tr>
</table>
</form>
{include file="footer.tpl"}
{/strip}

PHP:

 

u need to add a function for this to check the length value. Ping me for details

 

you want to restrict the character limit by javascript or php ?

 

Thanks for replies
@ Worldlife I am not sure the best way to go about achieving this. The code above displays the submit.tpl and I see there is no value for description to be limited. So any ways to go about restricting that value would be appreciated.
Thanks again

 

If your not more concern about usability then go for php method of limiting the characters. I would suggest you to add a note on the top of textarea stating character limit and and the time of submission use substr function and get those limited characters.

 

Fantastic! Please where in the code would i put this, and what code would i put there
Thanks

 

I can't see the code which submits the user entered data in to database. ??

 

http://psacake.com/web/js.asp should sort you out...