Redirect by form entry

[tonyking]

I am a very new php coder and I was wondering how to accomplish the following using php:

Basically, I want to create a unique page for each of my friends, but instead of a long nasty list of links to their pages, I want one simple form where they would type in something into the box, their last name, email, not really sure what yet.
Then, based on what they entered, the script would redirect to the appropriate page.

I think this would be done with a simple html form "POST" method, to my desired php script. That script would then process the information and based on the variable redirect. Sounds easy but I can't find anything to support this.

Gurus help? lol

[Jas]

Something like this?:

<?php
    if(isset($_POST['Go'])){
        $name = strip_tags($_POST['name']);
        switch($name){
            case "Bob":
                $page = 'Bob.html';
            break;
            case "Bill":
                $page = 'Bill.html';
            break;
            case "Bart":
                $page = 'Bart.html';
            break;
            default:
                $page = "select_a_page.html";
            break;
        }
        header("Location:$page");
    }
?>

[tonyking]

I think thats on the right track, I thought it would be pretty simple. If I POST a name to this script, and it matches one of the cases shown it should redirect the page I think. I'll give it a try. I think I also need an else statement in there to redirect to a "no matching" page.

Will play around with it and post again. Thx.

[Jas]

I think I also need an else statement in there to redirect to a "no matching" page.

That's the miracle of the default case. If none of the other cases match, that one will-- and it redirects back to your form or whatever else you want it to be (if you insert the url, rather than the select_a_page.html ). I should have commented my script to show you what was happening-- I always forget to do that

EDIT: also, that script should only be used for a limited number of people. If you have a lot (30 or 40+), you will want to search arrays instead of using the switch statement.

[tonyking]

I think I might have a problem with my code. I am using this form:

<form method="post" name="name" action="registry.php">
<input type="text" name="name" class="cleardefault" size="20" value="Enter Name" /><br />
<font size="-2" color="#0099FF">(Use ALL lowercase letters)</font><br /><br />
<input type="submit" name="Submit" value="Submit" />

and this is registry.php

<?php
    if(isset($_POST['Go'])){
        $name = strip_tags($_POST['name']);
        switch($name){
            case "Bob":
                $page = 'Bob.html';
            break;
            case "Bill":
                $page = 'Bill.html';
            break;
            case "Bart":
                $page = 'Bart.html';
            break;
            default:
                $page = "http://www.google.com";
            break;
        }
        header("Location:$page");
    }
?>

Didn't really change anything. When I submit the form it just goes to the blank registry.php page and does not display an error. I am assuming I'm not passing the information to the script correctly?

I am really new to all of this, so it's probably something really simple or stupid, but thanks for your patience and help!

[Jas]

To tell you how mean I am, I figured you might get stuck there, but I was too lazy to type it out before. Sorry

My script assumes that the name of the submit button will be "Go" and the name of the text box will be "name". You can change those here:

    if(isset($_POST['YOUR NAME HERE'])){ //name of the submit button
        $name = strip_tags($_POST['YOUR NAME HERE']); //name of the textbox 

The first if the submit button, the second is the textbox. So:

    if(isset($_POST['Submit'])){ 
        $name = strip_tags($_POST['name']);

Or you can change the names in your form.

Explination: Typically in PHP, in order to check if the form was submitted, you look to see if $_POST['submit_button_name'] has a value (isset() function). If it does, the form was submitted. The second line retieves the value of the textbox, and also takes out any html tags (it's good practice for server side scripting).

[dcstow]

Try changing:

if(isset($_POST['Go'])){

To:

if(isset($_POST['Submit'])){

[tonyking]

Awesome! That worked perfectly, thanks for all your help. I will try to expand on this now with a few other things, like validation.

I think I'll run into a lot of case-sensitive based issues.

[dcstow]

I think I'll run into a lot of case-sensitive based issues.

Have a look at these to convert your string ($name) to either all UPPER or all lower case.

http://php.net/strtolower
http://php.net/strtoupper

[Jas]

Indeed you're both correct. I didn't think of the case. dcstow produced the best way to solve that problem. Just put one of those functions around $_POST['name'] and change the cases of the names in the switch statements (i.e. case "BOB": )

EDIT: That first post in strtoupper is impressive. Converting special chars (don't know why you would need to, but it's nice).