Puzzled by $_POST

minou

Hi,

I've been programming in ASP for several years and have just started with PHP. I'm trying to do something that seems like it should be very simple, but I don't understand what's going on. Using PHP 4.0.6, with register globals on:

foreach($__POST as $key => $value){
     echo "$key is the field name<br>$value is the field value";
}

it seems to me should echo all the variables posted from the form on the previous page. However, instead I get "Warning: Invalid argument supplied for foreach()" . I tried with $_HTTP_POST_VARS with the same result.

On experimenting I find that e.g. "echo $_POST['BusinessName'];" returns nothing, while simply "echo $BusinessName;" does give the value of the form field on the previous page.

Can anyone explain what's going on? All I want to do is to loop through all the fields from the form to check that required fields have been filled in. I though they should all be in the $_POST array ... Help!

ClevaTreva

Try this:

foreach (array_keys($_POST) as $key)
{ 
$$key = $_POST[$key]; 
print "POST variable $key is ${$key}<br />"; 
}

Trevor

Shrike

Youve specified $__POST (2 underscores) should be $POST (one underscore). Other than that your example should work. $HTTP_POST_VARS should be $HTTP_POST_VARS, and I think is now deprecated and so shouldn't be used.

I'm not sure why "echo $_POST['BusinessName'];" doesn't work, but "echo $BusinessName" will work if register_globals is enabled in php.ini. This value is set to 0 (off) by default, and should be left that way for securuty reasons.

hth

minou

Originally posted by ClevaTreva
Try this:

foreach (array_keys($_POST) as $key)
{ 
$$key = $_POST[$key]; 
print "POST variable $key is ${$key}<br />"; 
}

[/B]

That gave me two parse errors :-(

Warning: First argument to array_keys() should be an array

Warning: Invalid argument supplied for foreach()

Still mystified but thanks for the suggestion!

minou

Originally posted by Shrike
Youve specified $__POST (2 underscores) should be $_POST (one underscore).

Yes -- I don't know how the extra _ slipped in there -- there's definitely only one in the code!

I'm not sure why "echo $_POST['BusinessName'];" doesn't work, but "echo $BusinessName" will work if register_globals is enabled in php.ini. This value is set to 0 (off) by default, and should be left that way for securuty reasons.

Yes, I know, but the destination server has it set to on, and I can't change that. I think I'll just have to give up on the loop for now, and code the validation a field at a time. But I still don't understand why the $_POST array apparently isn't getting populated when I can access the variables directly using their names!

minou

Originally posted by Shrike
$_HTTP_POST_VARS should be $HTTP_POST_VARS, and I think is now deprecated and so shouldn't be used.

hth

Oh! Hold on a minute -- mystery solved! I corrected my misspelling of $HTTP_POST_VARS and now the code works as I expected. I believe the $POST array was introduced very recently (apparently more recently than PHP 4.0.6 anyway!). The version of PHP on the live server is more recent, so if I'd tried it there $POST would probably have worked.

Thanks for your help in tracking down the answer.

Shrike

Is the form method actually POST and not GET?

minou

Originally posted by Shrike
Is the form method actually POST and not GET?

Yes. But I've solved the problem now -- see above.

Shrike

Ah didn't see the 4.0.6 bit heh 🙂