Back button and submittion

UmneyDurak

Hi.
I'm working on the submittion page. User fill's out the info clicks the submit button and all the info is stored in to sql database. All the info is transfered trough form fields.
The problem is if the user then goes to some other page and click back button it inserts everything in to db again. How can I prevent this from happening?

I was thinking of setting some variable in session on submittion page, then on next page checking if the variable is set. If it is submitting everything to db then "unsetting' the variable.
Will this be a good way of doing this?

EDIT:
Ok I tried that and it works when user goes to next page then clicks back. But if the user clicks the back button to go to submittion page then forward again, it still resubmites everything.

Thx.

TruckStuff

The way I usually accomplish this is by creating what I call an "action" page. The form submits to this page where I validate the data then do the insert. I then redirect to another page that actually displays the results. The user can refresh the end page all they want and it still won't re-insert anything because the insert is done by the action page.

UmneyDurak

But what if the user goes back to the form page then clicks the forward button again? It will go to action page then redicrects to final page, but since it goes to action page it submits everything again. Or am I missing something?

Thx.

TheDefender

The other thing you can look into is to check the table to see if the values exists. If all of the fields submitted are already in the tabl, then don't do the insert query. The only time this won't work is if you are using now() or time() to submit the submission date and time... otherwise, it is handy, especially when used in conjunction with TruckStuff's suggestion.

rachel2004

Other option: use a time column in your table. If a user submits more than once, do a time comparison to make sure it wasn't in the last 60 seconds or 3 minutes or so. You set the time standards on what will discourage repeat posts.