Hello,

How can I pass a variable or variables from an HTML form to a php script as variables?

Example.

<input type=text name=name value="$variable = value;">

So when I access the php script it can go like

<?
$name = $_POST['name'];
echo $name; //this will output "$variable = value;".
?>

But if I do

<?
$name = $_POST['name'];
echo $variable; //I predicted this would output "value" but it doesn't
?>

How can I accomplish that simple task?

In other words I want the script to look as if it was in this fashion.

<?
$variable = value;
echo $variable; //which would output "value"
?>

But I need to pass the value "$varaible = value;" through a form

well, if I understand you, you have answered you own question.

HTML forms send variables to PHP as $_POST['variable']
unless you have register_globals turned on, in which case they are assigned as variables automatically.

I generally just use the $_POST['variables'] in the code, but if you want to save yourself a little typing, you can reassign them like you did above...
$var = $_POST['var']

Well its not working. See this is what I would have in a normal php page.

<?
$variable = value;
echo $variable; //which would output "value".
?>

instead I want this

<?
$name = $_POST['name']; //the value of this would be "$variable = value"
//which IF sent to the browser would output that
//but I don't want to output to the browser I want to
// keep it as variable

echo $variable; //which does not output "value".

?>

$_POST is an array which holds all the values from your HTML form.

try
$variable = $_POST['name'];

well if I do that then

if I was to say

echo $variable; //that would output "$variable = value;"

I just want it to output "value".

no it wouldn't,

$variable = $_POST['name']; // Assigns the from data to $variable
echo $variable; // echos the value of $variable.


you don't have to do that much though, this would work just as well...
echo $_POST['name'];

Ok this works for me

<?
//////////$all_records = $_POST['all_records'];
$all_records = $vNAME[0] = "Raul Gonzalez";;

echo $vNAME[0]; //This outputs "Raul Gonzalez"
?>

As you can see by putting the $vNAME[0]; manually it does what I want, but I want "$vNAME[0];" to come via a form and to serve the same purpose.

in essence this is what I want

<?
$all_records = $_POST['all_records'];
////////$all_records = $vNAME[0] = "Raul Gonzalez";;

echo $vNAME[0]; //I cant get this to outputs "Raul Gonzalez"
?>

that first one only works because you are assigning it directly in you code.

$all_records = $vNAME[0] = "Raul Gonzalez";;
makes $all_records and $vNAME[0] both hold the value 'Rual gonzaliz"

You are not getting any post data that way,


PHP assigns everything it recieves from an HTML form to the array $_POST
you shold go read up on arrays http://us3.php.net/manual/en/language.types.array.php



Anyway, if your HTML input field is named 'name'
as in.. <input type="text" name="name" />

then $_POST['name'] is going to hold that value that is sent from your form,
so all you have do is

<?
echo $_POST['name'];
?>

well this is what I have on the first form

<textarea name="all_records" cols=60 rows=10>
$vNAME[0] = "AGUILAR, SAN JUANITA";
$vNAME[1] = "AYALA, ALBERTO";
$vNAME[2] = "BRIONES, JESUS";
$vNAME[3] = "CANTU, BRENDA";
</textarea>

and on the second one


<?
$all_records = $_POST['all_records'];

$i = 0;
while ($i < 4){
echo $vNAME[$i];
$i++;
}

?>


Instead of


<?
$vNAME[0] = "AGUILAR, SAN JUANITA";
$vNAME[1] = "AYALA, ALBERTO";
$vNAME[2] = "BRIONES, JESUS";
$vNAME[3] = "CANTU, BRENDA";

$i = 0;
while ($i < 4){
echo $vNAME[$i] . "<br>";
$i++;
}

?>


How can I accomplish that?

well.. if your using a <textarea> like that with all the list of names seperated by line feeds, then you are going to get them all in one $_POST var. You will have to split up the lines using the explode function.



$names = explode("\n", $_POST['all_records'});
foreach ( $names as $name ){
echo $name."<br />";
}



( a foreach loops is better than a while loop in this situation )

Actually, I know the answer to your question -- but what you are doing is basically opening up your script to all kinds of attacks from anyone.

Why do you need to pass PHP code through a form and then want to execute it? This is disaster.

To do what you want DO NOT DO THIS ON A LIVE SERVER:


<?php

if ($_SERVER['REQUEST_METHOD'] == 'POST')
{
$code = $_POST['foo'];
eval("$code;");
echo $z;
}
?>
<form method="POST">
<input type="text" name="foo" value='$z = 12' />
<input type="submit" name="submit" value="submit" />
</form>


The above will print 12 when you hit submit. Why this is a bad idea? Because if this is hosted on your site, I can write a script on my server, which posts to your site, and can execute any PHP code I want on your server, displaying all kinds of files.

Just to show you how dangerous this is:


<input type="text" name="foo" value='$z = 12; echo highlight_file(basename($_SERVER[PHP_SELF]));' />


Change the file to that, and run it.

Ok fyrestrtr so it can be done, but its not a good idea.

Thanks, I will search for a better way to accomplish what I want to accomplish.

An instructor of mine told me that I could use a query within a query. I've never done such thing, but I will research. Thanks


Ok ok.

I have a database that logs peaple in and out at a Learning Center.

Among other fields on the database there is a "time in" , "time out" field.

when I display the records in the browser, I get all the records for one student with their elapse times. example

TABLE
________
[RECORD 1]
NAME | TIME IN | TIME OUT | ELAPSE
_____ ________ __________ _______
name 1 | 12:00 AM | 1:00 PM | 1Hour
name 1 | 11:00 AM | 1:00 PM | 2Hour
name 1 | 12:00 AM | 3:00 PM | 3Hour

Total = 6 Hours
___________________________________________________
[RECORD 2]

_____ ________ __________ _______
NAME | TIME IN | TIME OUT | ELAPSE
_____ ________ __________ _______
name 2 | 12:00 AM | 1:00 PM | 1Hour
name 2 | 11:00 AM | 1:00 PM | 2Hour
name 2 | 12:00 AM | 3:00 PM | 3Hour

Total = 6 Hours

______________________________________________
I WANT TO ACCOMPLISH

NAME | TIMES | ELAPSE
____ ______ ________
name 1 | 3 | 6 Hours
name 2 | 3 | 6 Hours



I have accopmlished it by making an array of the names, I have to do this to be able to calculate the 6 hours without showing the 3 times the student was there, which the instructor doesn't care. But I have to generate the array first, then copy and paste it on the querey, which I wanted to avoid by just generating it and then submiting it through the form, thus eliminating the copy and paste.

You can just modify the query to sum up the difference in hours for each student.

Suppose your table is like this (this example is in MySQL):


CREATE TABLE `student_log` (id INT NOT NULL AUTO_INCREMENT PRIMARY KEY,
`stu_name` VARCHAR(255), `time_in` TIME, `time_out` TIME);


Adding some sample records into the database:

SELECT `stu_name`,`time_in`,`time_out` FROM `student_log`;
+----------+----------+----------+
| stu_name | time_in | time_out |
+----------+----------+----------+
| name1 | 09:53:29 | 11:53:29 |
| name1 | 12:53:29 | 14:53:29 |
| name2 | 12:53:30 | 16:53:30 |
| name2 | 14:53:30 | 17:03:00 |
+----------+----------+----------+
4 rows in set (0.00 sec)



Finally, to calculate how much time each student spent:


mysql> SELECT SUM(TIMEDIFF(time_out,time_in)) as `hours` FROM student_log WHERE stu_name = 'name2';
+-------+
| hours |
+-------+
| 6 |
+-------+
1 row in set (0.00 sec)

Or you can do this :

mysql> SELECT stu_name, SUM(TIMEDIFF(time_out,time_in)) as `hours` FROM student_log GROUP BY stu_name;
+----------+-------+
| stu_name | hours |
+----------+-------+
| name1 | 4 |
| name2 | 6 |
+----------+-------+
2 rows in set (0.00 sec)

Hello,

How can I pass a variable or variables from an HTML form to a php script as variables?

Example.

<input type=text name=name value="$variable = value;">

So when I access the php script it can go like

<?
$name = $_POST['name'];
echo $name; //this will output "$variable = value;".
?>

But if I do

<?
$name = $_POST['name'];
echo $variable; //I predicted this would output "value" but it doesn't
?>

How can I accomplish that simple task?

In other words I want the script to look as if it was in this fashion.

<?
$variable = value;
echo $variable; //which would output "value"
?>

But I need to pass the value "$varaible = value;" through a form

Hmm, I must be missing something here... you want to pass a variable value from a HTML page to a php script, using POST, but without any output to the user interface.... <input type="hidden" name="name" value="value" /> does the trick, doesn't it ? just don't make it a type="text"

Cannot be that simple, can it ?

fyrestrtr that's deffenetly a good ideas. Is "SUM(TIMEDIFF(time_out,time_in)) as `hours`" a MYSQL function? I am using MS ACCESSS.

TIMEDIFF is MySQL specific, SUM() is standard SQL, iirc.