Storing page location / url into a variable?

shure

I want to store the url / page name that I have come from to the current page.

I ask this because i am a complete n00b for one lol, and and need to store the page location navigated from to a new page, so that when i perform an action on the current page, the previous page that i navigated from can be navigated to.

Also if anyone knows how to use the $_GET function to call a variable from another php file that would also be appreciated.

Thanks alot

sneakyimp

In order for some PHP script to know what the 'previous' page was, there are several ways to go about it. One is to look at the value of $_SERVER['HTTP_REFERER']. The value that PHP puts there is provided by the user's browser and may or may not be defined. I find that it usually is but you cannot guarantee it.

Another way is for you to maintain some kind of page history in session. You could manually store each page in your page history:

// you must always call this before checking $_SESSION values
session_start();
// check to see what the last page is
$histCount = sizeof($_SESSION['pageHistory']);
if ($histCount > 0) {
  $lastPage = $_SESSION['pageHistory'][$histCount-1];
} else {
  $lastPage = '';
}

// at the end of each script, you would have to make sure that you add it to the page history
$_SESSION['pageHistory'][$histCount] = $_SERVER['PHP_SELF'];

Another way is to change every link in your site so that it defines a variable which tells you that page that brought you here

<a href="somePage.php?lastPage=<?=$_SERVER['PHP_SELF'] ?>">Some page blah blah</a>

shure

brilliant, although im a compelete noob i actually understand the majority of the top code.

So if I was to direct the user back to that page stored in the $lastPage variable, i would use an if statement (like i use in my logincheck.php), and if true then:

header("Location: $lastPage "); ?

sneakyimp

Something like that. You'd have to set $lastPage first to reflect the last value added to $_SESSION['pageHistory']. You'd also have to be careful about whether or not you add the login.php page to your page history or whatever.

Another way, which may or may not be simpler, is to specify what page should be returned to after a login attempt....something like this:

if (!$logged_in) {
  // user is not logged in!  send them to login page:
  header("location: login.php?returnPage=" . urlencode($_SERVER['PHP_SELF']));
  exit();
}

Also, just calling 'header' doesn't stop code execution on a given page. You should get in the habit of following it up with an exit() call.