Keeping a Dropdown Selected With PHP

[scriderpsd]

Simple question here. I have some required fields in a form, some of which are dropdowns populated by lookup tables. If the user has selected one of the dropdowns but not populated all required fields when they click submit, I want the dropdown to stay selected. Here is what I have so far...

echo '<TR>' . PHP_EOL;
					echo '<TD align="right"'; 
								if (empty($item_type)){ 
									echo ' class="' .$textclass. '"';
								} 
							echo '>* Item Type</TD>' . PHP_EOL;
					echo '<TD align="left">' . PHP_EOL;
						echo '<select name="item_type" tabindex="2">' . PHP_EOL;
							echo '<option value="">Select One:</option>' . PHP_EOL;
							while($drop_down_1 = mysql_fetch_array($result_item_type)) { 
								if($drop_down_1['item_type_id']==@$cat1){
									echo "<option selected value='$drop_down_1[item_type_id]'>$drop_down_1[item_type]</option>"."<BR>";
								} else {
									echo  "<option value='$drop_down_1[item_type_id]'>$drop_down_1[item_type]</option>";
								}
							}								
						echo '</select>' . PHP_EOL;
					echo '</TD>' . PHP_EOL;
				echo '</TR>' . PHP_EOL;

Obviously the dropdown is not staying selected. Any help is much appreciated.

Thanks,

Scott

[jazz_snob]

You have to store the submitted value for item_type, even it is the default "" value.

Looks like you might be using $cat1 as the variable that stores that value? I'd do something like this:

$item_type = $_GET['item_type']; // user submitted item type or just '' when page 1st loads

Using the same name for the variable as the form name has proven in the long run to save my sanity.

then change the condition statement like this:

if($drop_down_1['item_type_id']== $item_type){

and use

selected="selected"

to indicate the selected option.

And take the BR element out of the options list