form textbox is displaying content incorrectly

celibate54

note: I would search this error if I had any clue how to describe it in searchable key terms

Problem: I have a form that takes in information, one being a text box that allows users to submit longer things (ie bio/text/whatever). I am not having problems storing it or anything, however if a user enters something to the extent of

"blah blah blah
blah

blah"

when I recall the text back to display it on their page the breaks/paragraphs aren't keeping form....it'll spit back out "blah blah blah blah"

do i need to manipulate the text before storing it into the DB to keep things such as breaks/paragraphs?

Also how would I go about allowing users to use things like [ php] etc (ie i want the users to be allowed to 'bold' their text)...so i'd want a user to be able to use [ b ] or something to bold XX words then use [ / b] to stop bold-ing

LordShryku

[man]nl2br[/man]

celibate54

so if a person enters in text that is stored as, lets say, $textBox

would I do

$editedText = nl2br($textBox);
mysql_query("INSERT INTO blah (text,etc) values ('$editedText','$etc')");

am I on the right track?

LordShryku

I'd store it as the original, then use nl2br when displaying the text, but you can try that.

celibate54

what would I have to do to store the text already formatted?

i don't see a point in having php being accessed 10000 times a day everytime somebody wants to read a message,etc. Wouldn't it be more 'efficient' to just store it edited and so when it's displayed it is just displaying and not figuring out what to display?

would i use nl2br as well to somehow add breaks in user inputted text via a form prior to adding into the db?