difference between $_POST and $myArray

[SeenGee]

Hi,

I am writing a class to clean posted form data, i have a function to remove newlines (\r and \n), when i test this with an array i create it works fine but if i post form data or even make my array become $_POST it doesnt work. Are there differences between these array types i should be aware of? This is my code.

<?php
// class excerpt
class myTools
{
	var $passedArr;
	function removeNewlines($passedExceptions=array())
	{
		foreach($this->passedArr as $key=>$val)
		{
			if(!in_array($key,$passedExceptions))
			{
			$cleanArr[$key] = preg_replace("/\r/", "", $val);
			$cleanArr[$key] = preg_replace("/\n/", "", $val);
			}
		}
		return $cleanArr;
	}
}
# DOESNT WORK #
$myFormTools = new myTools;
$myRay = array("one"=>"one \n ting","two"=>"two \n ting");
$_POST = $myRay;
$myFormTools->passedArr = $_POST;
print_r($_POST);
$myRay = $myFormTools->removeNewlines();
print_r($_POST);

# DOES WORK #
$myFormTools2 = new myTools;
$myRay = array("one"=>"one \n ting","two"=>"two \n ting");
$myFormTools2->passedArr = $myRay;
print_r($myRay);
$myRay = $myFormTools2->removeNewlines();
print_r($myRay);
?>

ANy help would be much appreciated.

[devinemke]

in your "DOESNT WORK" code, change this:

$myRay = $myFormTools->removeNewlines();

to this:

$_POST = $myFormTools->removeNewlines();

[SeenGee]

actually, that was just a typo when i was putting the code back together into something smaller, this is an example of where the newlines are not removed:

<?php
// class excerpt
class myTools
{
	var $passedArr;
	function removeNewlines($passedExceptions=array())
	{
		foreach($this->passedArr as $key=>$val)
		{
			if(!in_array($key,$passedExceptions))
			{
			$cleanArr[$key] = preg_replace("/\r/", "", $val);
			$cleanArr[$key] = preg_replace("/\n/", "", $val);
			}
		}
		return $cleanArr;
	}
}
// the array
if($_POST['submit'])
{
# DOESNT WORK #
$myFormTools = new myTools;
$myFormTools->passedArr = $_POST;
print_r($_POST);
$_POST = $myFormTools->removeNewlines();
print_r($_POST);
}
?>
<form action="<?=$_SERVER['PHP_SELF']?>" method="post" name="sd">
Name<br /><input name="name" type="text" value="<?=$_POST['name']?>"/><br />
Email<br /><input name="email" type="text"  value="<?=$_POST['email']?>"/><br />
Msg<br /><input name="message" type="text" value="<?=$_POST['message']?>" /><br />
<input type="submit" name="submit" value="submit" />
</form>
</body>
</html>

[Weedpacket]

$cleanArr[$key] = preg_replace("/\r/", "", $val);
$cleanArr[$key] = preg_replace("/\n/", "", $val); 

This isn't stripping "\r" from $cleanArr[$key], only "\n".

$val = str_replace("\r", "", $val);
$cleanArr[$key] = str_replace("\n", "", $val); 

(I also replaced preg_replace with str_replace in the interests of efficiency).

Here's another way of writing the function. Not necessarily better, but different.

function removeNewlines($passedExceptions=array())
{
	$cleanArr = array();
	$keys = array_diff(array_keys($this->passedArr), $passedExceptions);
	foreach($keys as $key)
	{
		$val = str_replace("\r", "", $this->passedArr[$key]);
		$cleanArr[$key] = str_replace("\n", "", $val);
	}
    return $cleanArr;
}

I notice that the function discards any elements with keys that appear in $passedExceptions (and doesn't just leave them with their newlines intact). Is this intended?

[SeenGee]

thanks for that, still not working for me though. If i put the a string like "something \n something else" the \n remains. I need it to remove either string representations of a newline or a physical newline. The $passedExceptions values are not discarded, they are picked up in a different function.

[SeenGee]

this is all the code, it removes physical newlines but not the string \n

<?php
// class excerpt
class myTools
{
	var $passedArr;
	function removeNewlines($passedExceptions=array())
	{
		$cleanArr = array();
		$keys = array_diff(array_keys($this->passedArr), $passedExceptions);
		foreach($keys as $key)
		{
			$val = str_replace("\r", "", $this->passedArr[$key]);
			$cleanArr[$key] = str_replace("\n", "", $val);
		}
		return $cleanArr;
	}
}
// the array
if($_POST['submit'])
{
$myFormTools = new myTools;
$myFormTools->passedArr = $_POST;
$_POST = $myFormTools->removeNewlines();
print_r($_POST);
}
?>
<form action="checkTools2.php" method="post" name="sd">
Name<br /><textarea name="name"><?=$_POST['name']?></textarea><br />
Email<br /><input name="email" type="text"  value="<?=$_POST['email']?>"/><br />
Msg<br /><input name="message" type="text" value="<?=$_POST['message']?>" /><br />
<input type="submit" name="submit" value="submit" />
</form>
</body>
</html>

[Weedpacket]

Ah, well it wouldn't. The string \n is not a newline character; it's two characters. Write it as "\n". The first backslash escapes the second backslash, stopping it from escaping the n.

[SeenGee]

yes, i finally figured that out myself in the end. thanks for the help.