Why does my page save a textarea wrongly?

Debbie-Leigh

Hi,

I have a PHP page (page 1) with a textarea on it, which is saved to a database. I also have a validation page (page 2) that has the same value as the textarea posted to it, which it needs to compare with the database value.

Unfortunately, when I save the value using page 1, it doesn't match the value posted to page 2. The curious thing is that when I save the same value in the same field using phpMyAdmin, the match works perfectly.

So, can anyone tell me what difference there could be in saving a textarea on a PHP page vs saving a textarea in phpMyAdmin? I've tried using the form tag with and without enctype="multipart/form-data", but neither works.

The data I'm trying to save is:

------ LICENSE FILE DATA -------
U5U65106eL4dZIJzjqbzpuxB7/L7KC/Z
1QlZQyEkfcBYLH2HKRzfvGlnRWJ+Qjyb
fu5CfVfTadaxnNGVdnzsSNsi8IzHVQDO
P/B7H52KtI1i9Jcf3x6IHbD73H9Rld2X
vJqBBo+zlJszygJsxgnVs0FkQ2s4s6hO
852AnRaQ5QT/EE58OOECWMm6SJzPQ6L9
5h3+GN8UDelBFyK6oVkr/cTnM5emrIST
H0mqTEI1Q3My2dBIEY7RltSpfcDiXeVZ
/s4BVsoKSb5m8sDJtvSUbhga7S1liGuk
cWJHDhmxhw/eQPMbYADSde+LaV/aZSo7
03cVnM96mxvqL0ZybttJRsPE+JFhE+wS
4BekkyHlEZHW2B0D/IlTRg4g52hTeizY
eU7SQUDqhTm1yhOXHo0ftnIYjZYkc3ph
w5jN/85bKDrvzjxjO0b29F3M4+ZvS8/5
6x0D52pPUwuf0jkv9yKpPCmkzo/XGi+t
LotKoEF9zaNM/IIaJrzyUECQXbuNZAXo
A+qORwyzVGQxEJI5MTe8hUHYrtmGCOSQ
rMjzxEKtzHrL9vX9c+Q7UaM7TNcDYJcy
skvmZf6WAmtqyKZxRkaoLTfGXe82mlb6
QTPFrixn1gBBx7eQtZXS7I1AOr97jKYf
u7xy6V11biKPe7z6TdOFfUn2BxQ5T1Nv
lVKTS7ff8mVgdYtC5thyA7rkivIb15Ku
kMYDj9PciDtmNWp4uA2NL1XLFB9c4qgL
hhRKRhYFK70n4CyupfSLSDyDRksHdPlg
lhLBT5EJ5jzhCZmUdZ123d2t
--------------------------------

And I'm using a normal SQL update statement to save it.

Debbie

bpat1434

How are you escaping characters? Using [man]addslashes[/man] or [man]mysql_real_escape_string[/man]?

How are separating the lines? Are they hard-wrapped at XX characters with a "\n" new line character, or is it "softwrapped" for aesthetics?

What does your code look like? Show us the code you use already and we may see something you don't.

Can you view it in the database after it's being submitted via the form? Can you give us the output of the database row after inserting via the form so we can see what's wrong?

Debbie-Leigh

Hi bpat1434,

I'm using addslashes, but I've tried also tried it without, but the same thing happens.

The update query is:

UPDATE licence
SET contents = '------ LICENSE FILE DATA -------
U5U65106eL4dZIJzjqbzpuxB7/L7KC/Z
1QlZQyEkfcBYLH2HKRzfvGlnRWJ+Qjyb
fu5CfVfTadaxnNGVdnzsSNsi8IzHVQDO
P/B7H52KtI1i9Jcf3x6IHbD73H9Rld2X
vJqBBo+zlJszygJsxgnVs0FkQ2s4s6hO
852AnRaQ5QT/EE58OOECWMm6SJzPQ6L9
5h3+GN8UDelBFyK6oVkr/cTnM5emrIST
H0mqTEI1Q3My2dBIEY7RltSpfcDiXeVZ
/s4BVsoKSb5m8sDJtvSUbhga7S1liGuk
cWJHDhmxhw/eQPMbYADSde+LaV/aZSo7
03cVnM96mxvqL0ZybttJRsPE+JFhE+wS
4BekkyHlEZHW2B0D/IlTRg4g52hTeizY
eU7SQUDqhTm1yhOXHo0ftnIYjZYkc3ph
w5jN/85bKDrvzjxjO0b29F3M4+ZvS8/5
6x0D52pPUwuf0jkv9yKpPCmkzo/XGi+t
LotKoEF9zaNM/IIaJrzyUECQXbuNZAXo
A+qORwyzVGQxEJI5MTe8hUHYrtmGCOSQ
rMjzxEKtzHrL9vX9c+Q7UaM7TNcDYJcy
skvmZf6WAmtqyKZxRkaoLTfGXe82mlb6
QTPFrixn1gBBx7eQtZXS7I1AOr97jKYf
u7xy6V11biKPe7z6TdOFfUn2BxQ5T1Nv
lVKTS7ff8mVgdYtC5thyA7rkivIb15Ku
kMYDj9PciDtmNWp4uA2NL1XLFB9c4qgL
hhRKRhYFK70n4CyupfSLSDyDRksHdPlg
lhLBT5EJ5jzhCZmUdZ123d2t
--------------------------------'
WHERE licence_id = '2'

and the comparing code is:

$strQuery = "SELECT contents
               FROM licence
              WHERE licence_id = '$pstId'
            ";
$qsLicDtls = $objDbConn->runQuery($strQuery, __LINE__, TRUE);
if  ($qsLicDtls):
	if  ($objDbConn->numRows() > 0):
		$rsLicDtls = $objDbConn->fetchArray();
		if  (trim($rsLicDtls["contents"], CR . NL) == trim($pstLicCode, CR . NL)):
			echo "1";
		else:
			echo "0";
		endif;
	else:
		echo "0";
	endif;
else:
	echo "0";
endif;

From my testing, the problem lies with the update query rather than the comparison code, because saving the same query in phpMyAdmin causes the comparison code to work, whereas saving it with the update query causes it to fail. Looking at the field value in phpMyAdmin, it is visually exactly the same after saving it in both ways.

Debbie

NogDog

Just a guess: there may be a difference in line endings depending on how and where the data is being entered, resulting in the comparison failing because either the database version has carriage-return plus newline for each line while the form submitted version just has newline, or vice versa. Perhaps a quick way to see if this is the problem would be to change the comparison to:

if  (preg_replace('/[\r\n]+/', '', $rsLicDtls["contents"]) == preg_replace('/[\r\n]+/', '', $pstLicCode)) :

Debbie-Leigh

Hi NogDog,

A big, big thank you. 😃 That was the problem. I knew it was something that simple that I just couldn't see. How many days have I been frustrated trying to spot what it was??

I think you ought to be elevated to hero status for that one. 😉

Debbie

NogDog

Debbie-Leigh wrote:
Hi NogDog,

A big, big thank you. 😃 That was the problem. I knew it was something that simple that I just couldn't see. How many days have I been frustrated trying to spot what it was??

I think you ought to be elevated to hero status for that one. 😉

Debbie

Glad that was it. I have to admit that your trim() functions with the "CR . NL" got my brain thinking along that line, so you can take a little of the credit. 🙂

PS: Is "hero status" a promotion from "super moderator"?

Debbie-Leigh

Hi NogDog,,

I have to admit that your trim() functions with the "CR . NL" got my brain thinking along that line

I obviously didn't go far enough in my reasoning, though, I guess.

Is "hero status" a promotion from "super moderator"?

If it's not, it should be. 😉

Debbie