Form apparently not reaching database

TucsonTomas

I was only too happy to plagerize W. Jason Gilmore's code on login Authentification, but after many tries, it does not seem to get to the DB. The login screen comes up, I fill it out with a valid user and password, and nothing happens.

I went into the MySql "accounts" table and there is no indication that I ever logged in. Gotta be missing some small piece somewhere.

Thanks for any help,

sneakyimp

If you have a form, the form either has a "action" attribute which specifies that URL where your data goes:

<form method="post" action="my_script.php">
</form>

or your browser will submit the data you entered in the form to the same URL where the form lives. If your form is displayed in a static HTML page with no action attribute, then the data will be GETed or POSTed to the static HTML form -- which accomplishes nothing at all.

So when you say "it's not getting to the database" then you really should be examining the flow of data

display form to user ==> user fills out form and clicks "submit" ==> data is routed to the URL specified in the form's ACTION attribute or to the same URL as the form if no action is specified ==> the form handling script receives the submitted data, processes it, and tries to stick it in the database, which may or may not succeed

It's also a good idea to be more specific than "nothing happens". Did you click submit? does your form even have a submit button? when you click submit, does a blank page load? do you get a javascript error?

TucsonTomas

Dear, S.I.

I am in the Newbies forum, and that is where I should be. While I have almost 30 yrs of exp with database and relational database design, I am just getting my feet wet with things such as HTML, CSS, JAVA, PHP, MySQL.

This is not auth for national security, it is a matter of allowing a user to see only his/her input. The script runs from a menu button and does, in fact, have a Submit button. I have an Accounts table in my database that has the username & (non-encrypted) passwords in it. When the user wants to see the stored work in a report (PHP) format, they need to login, so they only get their own work. The prompt for username and password work fine. I hit the submit button and the fields clear but the input boxes are still there. I created a "my_script.html" page and used it as the recipient of the action. As a test I pointed another menu button at that and it comes up completely blank.
?????????????????

I can "generalize" and post the site code if it would make it easier to troubleshoot.

sneakyimp

You cannot use an HTML page as the recipient of a form action because HTML pages are static only -- they can't perform any actions on the server. If you submit a form with an action set to some HTML page, the server is just going to fetch the HTML page and display it and that is all.

The URL that is the recipient of a form action must be a page that perform actions. Try setting the action attribute of your form to "form_handler.php" and then put this code in a file called form_handler.php:

<?php
echo "I am form_handler.php<br>";

echo "<h1>here are the get vars:</h1>";
echo nl2br(print_r($_GET, TRUE));
echo "<br>";

echo "<h1>here are the post vars:</h1>";
echo nl2br(print_r($_POST, TRUE));
echo "<br>";

?>

TucsonTomas

OK, I'll give it a shot. Thanks. TT

TucsonTomas

This is the result that I get from the form_handler.php. Is it what you were expecting?
TT

I am form_handler.php

here are the get vars:
Array
(
)

here are the post vars:
Array
(
)

sneakyimp

If you just visit form_handler.php by typing it in your browser, that result is to be expected. If you read my post more closely, you'll see that I suggested that you change the action of your form too:

sneakyimp wrote:
Try setting the action attribute of your form to "form_handler.php" and then put this code in a file called form_handler.php

Did you change your form and try submitting it?

TucsonTomas

This is the login portion of the form. I then created a PHP file called form_handler.php.

<form>
<form method="post" action="form_handler.php">
Username: <input type="username" name "Username" />
Password: <input type="password" name="password" />
<input type="submit" value="Submit" />

</form

Could it be the way I am accessing them. I am running the login.php from one menu button and the form_handler.php from another with the result I already set you.

Thanks,

sneakyimp

I don't really know what you're talking about when you refer to 'menu buttons'. I'm trying to explain how forms work. I suggest you dispense with any elaborate site design and try to get a grasp on basic form behavior first.

That HTML form you just posted looks pretty good. If you were to take that HTML and put it in a file called my_form.html and save that form in the same directory/folder/location as your form_handler.php document on your web server, then you should be able to visit your form on the web server by typing in some url, maybe like this:

http://yourdomain.com/my_form.html

.
Then, if you enter information into the form and click the Submit button, your browser should be directed to something like this:

http://yourdomain.com/form_handler.php

and form_handler.php should show you the data that was submitted.

TucsonTomas

Ok, Thanks.