Problem adding text to DB when special characters are entered

Arc

In my app the user enters text into a textfield. He then hits the submit button that adds this info to a MYSQL DB.

My problem is, IF the user enters some text characters the DB is not updated.

For example: If the user enters "This is not the best program i have seen" It will work fine BUT if he enters

"This isn't the best program i've seen" It will not work because of the " ' " apostrophe's in the sentence. For some reason the DB will not update. I dont get any errors or anything.

I dont know if this could be the problem or not, but when i log into my PHPAdmin section to edit my DB there is this message. I think magic quotes have to do with how the characters are stored in the DB?

"Warning: You haven't enabled magic_quotes_gpc in your PHP configuration. PhpMyAdmin needs this to work properly. Please have a look at the configuration section of the PHP manual for information on how to enable it."

Anyone know how i can fix this so the user can enter any characters they wish?

Thanks!😃

keyser_soze

if you use: addslashes() it will add a slash before inserting into the databse, therefore relieving you of your apostrophe problem.

If someone were to write: "i won't eat monkeys" it would be unserted like: "i won/'t east cookies".

To print the result back into the browser, you will need to use stripslashes().

$text = addslashes('$text');
// Then insert into database

$text = stripslashes('$text');
echo "$text";
// Strips slashes, then echoes to browser

Arc

it worked.. thanks alot.🙂

Jayson

Actually I don't think you need to use stripslashes when you fetch the result. Only use addslashes on the variables before you use them in the query. It is also a good idea to use addslashes for security reasons too, because it eliminates the query injection problem.

With magic_quotes_gpc turned on, the variables submitted by the user are automatically escaped (slashes added) right? So if that is turned on, you don't need addslashes except for variables you create within your script.

Sometimes it can get confusing where you should use addslashes or stripslashes or neither. When writing a script, you have to be careful not to add slashes where they've already been added or stripping slashes where they've already been stripped. Some strange things can result.

Anyway, glad you got it working.

keyser_soze

thanks for clearing me up on that... i wasn't aware that you didn't need stripslashes() all of the time