Trying to save hidden value of form in MySQL- please help 1

[sbayter]

Hi,
I relatively new to PHP and I am having some trouble with a form sending a value to MySQL.
I need to send the value in "$ref" to the database.
The value of ref comes from the URL like this:

http://localhost/index.php?ref=12345

when I click submit it says "Column 'CLIENTS' cannot be null" and does not save it in the db.
I know the problem is in
value=&quot;<?php $ref;?> but I don't know what I'm missing.
The form is like this:

<form name=&quot;form1&quot; method=&quot;post&quot; action=&quot;<?php echo ($PHP_SELF); ?>&quot;>

<input name=&quot;submit&quot; type=submit class=button value=&quot;Submit&quot;>
<input type=&quot;hidden&quot; name=&quot;CLIENTS&quot; value=&quot;<?php $ref;?>&quot;>
<input type=&quot;hidden&quot; name=&quot;MM_insert&quot; value=&quot;form2&quot;>
</center>
</form>

Thanks for your help, sbayter

 

[sleipnir214]

Try referencing the value as $_GET['ref'].

The PHP runtime configuration setting that causes new programmers the most problems is &quot;register_globals&quot;. In older versions of PHP, this was set to &quot;on&quot;, in newer, it defaults to &quot;off&quot;.

If &quot;register_globals&quot; is set to &quot;on&quot;, then you can reference that variable as $ref. If register_globals is set to &quot;off&quot;, you must reference it as $_GET['ref'].

The PHP online manual recommends leaving register_globals set to &quot;off&quot; (

http://www.php.net/manual/en/security.registerglobals.php).

I recommend referencing your input variables as $_POST, $_GET, $_SESSION, $_FILES, etc, because it makes your code more maintainable. Six months from now you may not remember how a value got into $ref. But it's pretty obvious where the value in $_GET['ref'] came from.

For more information on the superglobal arrays, please read here:

http://www.php.net/manual/en/reserved.variables.php

Want the best answers? Ask the best questions:

http://www.catb.org/~esr/faqs/smart-questions.html

TANSTAAFL!

 

[sbayter]

&quot;Try referencing the value as $_GET['ref']&quot;

I tried this with GET, POST, and FILES but it gives me the same error.
Any other suggestions?
Thanks, sbayter

 

[sbayter]

never mind, It's working now.
Thanks sleipnir214 !!! sbayter