[RESOLVED] Dealing with Duplicates at record creation

[lmayer4]

Morning,

I need a way to check to see if a record is in the database before the form is submitted. So far I have this:

$RequisitionNumber = $_POST['RequisitionNumber'];
class DataEntry 
{
	function check()
	{
	// check for existing name
	$this-mssql_query("SELECT RequisitionNumber FROM dbo.tblHealth WHERE RequisitionNumber ='$RequisitionNumber'");
	if ($xid!=  $this-RequisitionNumber ) 
		{
		echo "Requisition Number already in use";
		}
	return true;
	}
}

<input name="RequisitionNumber" type="text" id="RequisitionNumber" size="7" maxlength="7" onChange="check()">

and its not working. When I type in a value in the Requsition NUmber field and tab off of it, I dont get an error.

Obviously I'm missing something, if anyone has any thoughts I would greatly appreciate it.

Thanks

Laura

[devinemke]

i think you are getting confused between server-side and client-side programming. you are attempting to run a PHP function (server) via the onChange event (client). this is not possible. you need to submit the form to the server and then do the check for duplicate records based on the form input returned to the server.

[Installer]

You're doing a few things wrong here. The main thing is that you're trying to use PHP as if it were JavaScript. [Edit: As devinemke said.] With js you can use the "onclick" event (but not to query the database on the server); with PHP you need to submit the form to a script that will then do the post variable checking/manipulation and querying. That is, "Javascript is client-side, PHP is server-side."

Also, you can't call a class function directly like that. You have to use a class object or the "::" syntax.

Inside the class "$this-" should be "$this->".

For the html form: you need to either "echo" it from PHP, or exit PHP first.

[lmayer4]

dang, I was hoping to make it so it would just check before she filled out the whole form.

[devinemke]

lmayer4 wrote:

dang, I was hoping to make it so it would just check before she filled out the whole form.

check what? if the form has not been submitted how would you know what to check for?

[lmayer4]

I was trying to use the on change event for that.