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PHP Enhancing a Simple PHP Application Integrating Validation Errors Setting an Error Message Variable

Posted by joeboo2529
joeboo2529
9,805 Points

error message

quick question. why did you use:

<?php !isset($error_message) instead of isset($error_message) ?> ?

If the message is not set then why would you want to run the error message? I'm confuse...

<?php if (!isset($error_message) && $_POST["address"] != "") { $error_message = "Your form submission has an error."; } ?>

1 Answer

Curtis Schrum
Curtis Schrum
10,174 Points
Curtis Schrum
Curtis Schrum
10,174 Points

Joe,

Im not looking at the code right now but I can say from experience this type of conditional is used to catch an extra scenario. (If I remember right Randy goes back and uses if(empty))

<?php

//Basically it works like this:
if(!isset($error) && $_POST['address'] !=""){
$error = "Error"

This reads as: If the Error Message is NOT set and the Address field is NOT blank then theres an error.

This is a security check. The address field is a hidden field a person could not edit. But a machine edits code in a different way to send spam. Thus if the address field was populated, and there is not already an error we certainly need to set one.

This is an old school way of doing this without CAPTCHA's and really Randy is showing us a method here that shows his intelligence, CAPTCHA's are irritating, this is painless on the user.