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I'm using check-boxes to alter an SQL query.

The HTML:

        <input type="checkbox" name="chapter" value="7"  /><label>ch. 7</label><br />
        <input type="checkbox" name="chapter" value="13"  /><label>ch. 13</label>

The PHP:

   //adjust query for chapter
   $chap = $_POST['chapter'];
   $chapter = "";
   if(!empty($chap)){
        $N = count($chap);
        if($N == 1){
         $chapter .= " AND chapter = '".$chap[0]."'";
        }else{
         $chapter .= " AND (chapter = '".$chap[0]."' OR chapter = '".$chap[1]."')";
        }
   }    

       $zquery = "SELECT * FROM records WHERE ".$zipcodes.$chapter;

When the check boxes are left unchecked it works fine. When the chapter 7 box is checked it works fine. The trouble is with that 13 box. When I check that, $chap[] only returns a value of "1" instead of "13". For example, when I var_dump $zquery I get string(3384) "SELECT * FROM records WHERE (party_zip='34683' OR party_zip='34682' ) AND chapter = '1'".

Also, $N is always returning 1, even if I check both boxes. Is $_POST['chapter'] not an array? Why is it only returning the first character in the string?

Namaste

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use foreach($_POST as $value){ echo "values=".$value."</br>";} for knowing the each and every value of Post items use print_r($_POST); – Ankur Saxena 13 hours ago
Does it work when both 7 and 13 are selected? – Douglas A. Crosby 13 hours ago
@AnkurSaxena if you have an answer write in answer section.. – Dinesh 13 hours ago
@Douglas No, the var_dump I showed was after checking both boxes. The $N = count($chap); is retuning 1 every time. – Adelphia 13 hours ago
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5 Answers

up vote 1 down vote accepted

Both Dr. Molle and Douglas are correct, but I'd like to expand a little on their answers.

$_POST is an array. It can contain a variety of values, either in a key => value structure or in a series of values indexed numerically. Each value can be any other type of data. In this case, your variable:

$_POST['chapter']

is a string, most likely - PHP interprets the array index ([0], etc) as a character index when used against a string (or against a variable that can be trivially cast to string, like an integer or float.) This is why you're getting the first letter out instead of the first value: there's only the one value to get!

Of course, you might run into situations where the value of an array is itself an array - in which case you could access the value by typing, say, $array[0]['candles'] or something, but that's not going to happen with the $_POST array (which is always an array of strings.)

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Thanks for actually explaining that. I was wondering why it worked in my other scripts and not this one. – Adelphia 13 hours ago
No problem. Good luck with your script! – sudowned 12 hours ago
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up vote 2 down vote

$_POST['chapter'] is not an array, use square brackets inside the name of the inputs:

<input type="checkbox" name="chapter[]" value="7"  /><label>ch. 7</label><br />
<input type="checkbox" name="chapter[]" value="13"  /><label>ch. 13</label>
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up vote 2 down vote

Try removing the [0] if you only want one value returned from your form

$chapter .= " AND chapter = '".$chap."'";

Alternatively (and likely what you want), change your inputs to arrays and it should work

<input type="checkbox" name="chapter[]" value="7"  /><label>ch. 7</label><br />
<input type="checkbox" name="chapter[]" value="13"  /><label>ch. 13</label>
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up vote 0 down vote

$_POST['chapter'] is not an array. $N is returning 1 beacuse $chap is not an array, if variable is not an array then count() function always returned 1.

You can use like

 name="chapter[]"

Then $_POST['chapter'] should be an array.

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up vote 0 down vote

$_POST is work as array it print all value of items post through form to know post values use 

echo"<pre>";
 print_r($_POST);

$_POST work as array it contains all values which we posted through form.

for getting each value we can also use 

foreach ($_POST as $value ) 
{
   echo $values."</br>";
}
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