[RESOLVED] help with output buffering, please

[biggus]

I'm trying to use output buffering for the first time and it seems that the buffering only works when I run the php script from the command line. The script in question generates a small form and some javascript. The php pulls in a webpage and uses preg_match to pull some stock values (for example). Since the user is to type one of these values into the form and then click a button to compare his answers with the correct ones (pulled from the other webpage by php), I figured the form could show while the php finished loading and processing the external webpage. Here's what I have:

$valuesToCheck=array("grossMargin"=>"Gross Margin","returnOnAssets"=>"Return on Assets","returnOnEquity"=>"Return on Common Equity","totalDebt_Equity"=>"Total Debt/Equity");  

ob_start();  

echo "<form>Enter the ".$valuesToCheck[$_GET["val"]]." value here:  <input type=text name='studentAnswer' size=5>&nbsp;<input type=button value='Check Answer' onClick=\"compareAnswers()\"><br><small>(include a percent sign where applicable)</small><br>  

    </form>\n";  

ob_end_flush();  


echo "<script>  

function compareAnswers(){\n";  

$url="http://www.smartmoney.com/eqsnaps/index.cfm?story=keyStatistics&symbol=COP";  

$vryTmp=file($url);  

$vryTmp=implode("",$vryTmp);  

$pattern="/(".$valuesToCheck[$_GET["val"]].")(.*?)(<\/tr>)/si";  

preg_match($pattern,$vryTmp,$value);  

echo "valueToCheck='".strip_HTML($value[2])."'\n";  

echo "  

    if(valueToCheck!=document.forms[0].studentAnswer.value){  

        alert('wrong-o');  

    }else{  

        alert('correct');  

    }  

}  

</script>";  

function strip_HTML($str){  

    $str=html_entity_decode($str);  

    $str=preg_replace('/</',' <',$str);  

    $str=preg_replace('/>/','> ',$str);  

    $str=strip_tags($str);  

    $str=preg_replace('/[\n\r\t]/',' ',$str);  

    $str=preg_replace('/  /',' ',$str);  

    $str=trim(chop($str));  

    return $str;  

}  

I read on a different forum that sometimes IE needs 1k of page size to render it when using output buffering, but the same thing happens in Firefox. I read the php.net and zend.com pages, but the tips there don't really apply here. (Or maybe I'm just dense). It works like a charm from the command line: the form displays first, then the javascript comes out when the php is finished processing the external page.

Thanks for any suggestions,
Biggus

[biggus]

OK...problem solved. What I really needed was a flush() call after the echoing of the form. this worked perfectly. (I removed the ob_start and ob_end_fluch calls).

Biggus