New to PHP and very confused...

**bpakidz** · 09-01-2008 03:32 PM

Okay, so I was trying to get a form to send the results to me via email. Someone else had the same issue and was told that a php script would solve the issue. Fine, great... but I don't get how to use it in my situation. I wrote a script and called it HandleForm.php my trusty, dusty PHP book (Visual Quickstart Guide - PHP for the World Wide Web) shows how to do this. I uploaded the page with the form and the corrected action as well as the php page. But now... it doesn't work. I was getting the php page with no input but now, I get nothing.

I saw elsewhere where a member talked about phpMyAdmin. I went there on the cPanel, but it's all greek to me. Where can I get help with php and this phpMyAdmin application?

This is what I wrote. Can there only be one string/variable on a line? Is that part of my problem?

PHP Code:


<HTML>
<HEAD>
<TITLE>Form Resluts Page</TITLE>
<BODY leftmargin="10%" rightmargin="20%" bottommargin="25">
<?php 
/* This page handles the received data from the form "bpaforms.html". */
print "Thank you for submitting your information, $First.<BR>\n";
print "We show your address as $Address \n";
print "in $City, $State $ZIP.<br>\n";
print "Your phone number is $phone \n";
print "and your e-mail address is $email.<BR>\n";
print "You have asked us to send you information about our schools for your child(ren),<BR>
$Child1, age $Age1 ($Sex1),  $Child2, age $Age2 ($Sex2),  $Child3, age $Age3 ($Sex3)<BR>\n";
?>
</BODY>
</HTML>

To see it in action (or not), the page is here.

**xPlozion** · 09-01-2008 03:47 PM

PHP Code:


<HTML>
<HEAD>
<TITLE>Form Resluts Page</TITLE>
<BODY leftmargin="10%" rightmargin="20%" bottommargin="25">
<?php 
/* This page handles the received data from the form "bpaforms.html". */
$First = $_POST['First'];
$Last = $_POST['Last'];
$Address = $_POST['Address'];
$City = $_POST['city'];
$State = $_POST['State'];
$ZIP = $_POST['ZIP'];
$phone = $_POST['phone'];
$email = $_POST['email'];
$Child1 = $_POST['Child1'];
$Age1 = $_POST['Age1'];
$Sex1 = $_POST['Sex1'];
$Child2 = $_POST['Child2'];
$Age2 = $_POST['Age2'];
$Sex2 = $_POST['Sex2'];
$Child3 = $_POST['Child3'];
$Age3 = $_POST['Age3'];
$Sex3 = $_POST['Sex3'];

print "Thank you for submitting your information, $First.<BR>\n";
print "We show your address as $Address \n";
print "in $City, $State $ZIP.<br>\n";
print "Your phone number is $phone \n";
print "and your e-mail address is $email.<BR>\n";
print "You have asked us to send you information about our schools for your child(ren),<BR>
$Child1, age $Age1 ($Sex1),  $Child2, age $Age2 ($Sex2),  $Child3, age $Age3 ($Sex3)<BR>\n";
?>
</BODY>
</HTML>

depending on your form, whether the method says post or get, you would use global varialbes to get data from it.

if it's post, you'll do $_POST['input_name'] to get the data from the input field named input_name.

if you used $_GET['act'], you'll get data from the url, so index.php?act=blah&p=2 would make $_GET['act']'s value "blah" and $_GET['p'] equal to "2".

You can echo/print multiple variabes in one line. Above, what you did as far as variables is right, I just don't think you retrieved any information from the previous field.

-xP

**marshian** · 09-01-2008 03:59 PM

I can't remember which setting did this, but there's a setting in php which makes all post/get data a global variable. This is a large security risk. That's why you should always disable that setting!
This is also why your script is not working.
As xP already pointed out, you could use $_GET or $_POST (depending on your form method). I just wanted to explain a little why you/your php book failes there, and also mention $_REQUEST, which is $_GET and $_POST (and $_COOKIE) at the same time. But it's better to use the specific global instead of request, if you already know which one you should use.

- Marshian

**bpakidz** · 09-01-2008 04:05 PM

Awesome! Thank you so much!! I couldn't understand how the script could be as small as I had it and still work. I had a feeling I was missing something major. Thanks for pointing it out and for the information. Hopefully it will help in the long run.

Also, how would I use this to send an email? I'd only need to change the action, right?

**xPlozion** · 09-01-2008 04:45 PM

np, always here to help

Register globals is a HUGE security risk as mentioned above, which is why it's no longer On by default.

PHP Code:


<?php
if ($a==1) $username="Henry";
$res = mysql_query("SELECT uid, password FROM user WHERE username='$username'");
?>

with registered globals on, if the url is
?a=2&username=' OR ''=''
then that'll transform the query into
"SELECT uid, password FROM user WHERE username='' OR ''=''
and since '' == '', then it'll return all usernames and all passwords

**woiwky** · 09-02-2008 01:34 PM

Just a note, Register Globals isn't as big of a security risk as is commonly said. If you code with security in mind (as you should), you probably wouldn't run into any issues with it. However, since it promotes bad habits and can be misused by beginners, it's generally not a good idea to enable it.

**bpakidz** · 09-02-2008 02:59 PM

Originally Posted by woiwky

Just a note, Register Globals isn't as big of a security risk as is commonly said. If you code with security in mind (as you should), you probably wouldn't run into any issues with it. However, since it promotes bad habits and can be misused by beginners, it's generally not a good idea to enable it.

Thanks... I still don't understand what it is, so there's no worry of enabling it. :dunno:

**marshian** · 09-02-2008 03:20 PM

Say you got a query part of an url ?var1=value , you can access variable var1 as $_GET["var1"]. If you have Register Globals on, you can also access it as $var1 .

**bpakidz** · 09-03-2008 09:51 AM

OKay, y'all... I think this issue is resolved! Thanks SO very much for all the help. I am off to play in the land of php and see what else I can find.

Please CLOSE this thread. Thanks!

**xPlozion** · 09-03-2008 02:26 PM

Glad you got it working and learned from here.

You can close your own topics in this section (when you post, towards the bottom of the page, there's a checkbox to close the topic). Also, please give credit where due (as rep) ;)

Until next time,
-xP

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