Saving Input Data using PHP

Hi,

I am writing my first website and I am trying am very unfamiliar with PHP. I have text inputs on my website that ask the user to input their first name, last name, email, etc., but I don't know how to write a PHP script that will capture and save that data once the submit button is pressed. I want the script to save the data to a text file and save successive entries in the same text file. Can someone help me write a script that will do this or point me to a site that will teach me relatively quickly how to do this.

Thanks,

Keegan

 

Are you looking for the data to be stored in a database? if so do you have a mysql database? or do you want it stored in a text file?

 

I don't have a mysql database. So I guess a text file would be easier.

Thanks.

 

send the HTML for the form. so I can know what to label everything...

 

The web address is navier.aa.washington.edu/downloads

 

with a .html at the end of that

 

So, looking at your HTML, your input names have spaces. I am not sure if that poses a problem. I would suggest that you change that. for this example, I assumed you will change it...

Here is the HTML that should be changed.

                <p>
                  <label for="First Name">First Name:</label>
                   <input name="firstname" type="text" id="first_name">
                </p>
                <p>
                  <label for="Last_Name">Last Name: </label>
                  <input name="lastname" type="text" id="last_name">
                </p>

            

HTML:

Here is your php code. Name this log.php or whatever you want... You will have to point the form's action="" to this script.

<?
// Gets info from form.
$firstname=$_POST['firstname'];  // your HTML has them as "First Name       "... change the HTML to firstname
$lastname=$_POST['lastname'];    // change this in your HTML too...
$email=$_POST['email'];
$uni_org=$_POST['university_organization'];
$usercountry=$_POST['country'];

// checks that it is all there...

if (!$firstname or !$lastname or !$email or !$uni_org or !$usercounrty){
echo "There was an error. Information is missing";
} else {
// Writes to flat file.
$file1 = "filename.txt";  // <----- change filename
$open3 = fopen($file1, "a");
fwrite($open3, "Name: ".$firstname." ".$lastname."\n"."Email: ".$email."\n"."University Organization: ".$university_organization."\n"."Country: ".$usercountry."\n\n\n");
fclose($open3);
echo "Saved to file.";
}
?>

PHP:

let me know if there is any problems.

 

Thanks,

I'll try it tomorrow when I have access to the dreamweaver software.

-Keegan

 

Possibly consider using an SQLite database, i'm not sure if your hosting service supports it, but it's highly possible.

 

I am using Redhat Linux for my server. Is a SQL database free?

 

MySQL and Postgres is free software so yes. However Oracle and Microsoft's SQL is not, I don't think.

 

Hey, I just realized I made a typo error...

original line...

fwrite($open3, "Name: ".$firstname." ".$lastname."\n"."Email: ".$email."\n"."University Organization: ".$university_organization."\n"."Country: ".$usercountry."\n\n\n");

PHP:

change line to...

fwrite($open3, "Name: ".$firstname." ".$lastname."\n"."Email: ".$email."\n"."University Organization: ".$uni_org."\n"."Country: ".$usercountry."\n\n\n");

PHP:

Sorry about that. If you get a MySQL DB, let me know.

 

I would highly recommend setting up a MySQL database if that is at all possible. Most hosting plans will come with support for MySQL, and usually they will have access to phpMyAdmin, the software used for creating MySQL databases. If you CAN create a MySQL database then you can use the following code for your pages.

On the HTML page:

<form action='process.php' method='post'>
<p>
<label for='firstname'>First Name: </label>
<input type='text' name='firstname'></input>
</p>
<p>
<label for='lastname'>Last Name: </label>
<input type='text' name='lastname'></input>
</p>
</form>

HTML:

In Process.php:

<?php

//Edit the following according to your database settings

$db_name = "DATABASENAME";
$db_user = "DATABASEUSERNAME";
$db_pass = "DATABASEPASS";
$db_host = "DATABASEHOST";

//Do not edit anything below

$con = mysql_connect($db_host,$db_user,$db_pass);

$firstname = mysql_real_escape_string($_POST['firstname']);
$lastname = mysql_real_escape_string($_POST['lastname']);

$sql = "INSERT INTO `users` (firstname,lastname) VALUES ('$firstname','$lastname');

$res = mysql_query($sql) or die("Could not perform query: ". mysql_error() ."");

mysql_close($con);

?>

PHP:

Now, in this case your database would be set up as follows:

Thats it. If you need any more explanation let me know - taking the sql route and learning SQL is very important in core PHP knowledge. I would definitely recommend using it!

Good luck with the site!
-Brett

 

Hi Haney,

Sorry it took so long to reply. I had to get PHP installed on my server first. I have run your code and I'm getting this error:

Parse error: syntax error, unexpected T_VARIABLE in /var/www/html/logscript.php on line 13

My logscript.php looks like this:

<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-transitional.dtd">
<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml">
<head>
<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=utf-8" />
<title>Downloads</title>
</head>

<body>

<?PHP
// Gets info from form.
$firstname=$_POST['firstname'];  
$lastname=$_POST['lastname'];   
$email=$_POST['email'];
$uni_org=$_POST['university_organization'];
$usercountry=$_POST['country'];

// checks that it is all there...

if (!$firstname or !$lastname or !$email or !$uni_org or !$usercounrty){
echo "There was an error. Information is missing";
} else {
// Writes to flat file.
$file1 = "log.txt";  // <----- change filename
$open3 = fopen($file1, "a");

fwrite($open3, "Name: ".$firstname." ".$lastname."\n"."Email: ".$email."\n"."University Organization: ".$uni_org."\n"."Country: ".$usercountry."\n\n\n");
fclose($open3);
echo "Saved to file.";
}
?>

</body>
</html>

PHP:

 

<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-transitional.dtd">
<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml">
<head>
<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=utf-8" />
<title>Downloads</title>
</head>

<body>

<?PHP

//http://localhost/shop_dev/scrape.php?firstname=hi&lastname=by&email=0ne@two&university_organization=bbb&country=IN

// Gets info from form.
$firstname=$_REQUEST['firstname'];
$lastname=$_REQUEST['lastname'];
$email=$_REQUEST['email'];
$uni_org=$_REQUEST['university_organization'];
$usercountry=$_REQUEST['country'];

// checks that it is all there...
echo "$firstname . $lastname . $email . $uni_org . $usercountry";
if (!$firstname or !$lastname or !$email or !$uni_org or !$usercountry){
echo "There was an error. Information is missing";
} else {
// Writes to flat file.
$file1 = "log.txt"; // <----- change filename
$open3 = fopen($file1, "a");

fwrite($open3, "Name: ".$firstname." ".$lastname."\n"."Email: ".$email."\n"."University Organization: ".$uni_org."\n"."Country: ".$usercountry."\n\n\n");
fclose($open3);
echo "Saved to file.";
}
?>

</body>
</html>

Test This running fine now as u have done a mistake in "usercountry" spelling just.

 

Thanks avimusicstore,

That code worked. I need to get the code to save the system time into along with the user's information into the text file. Also I want to send a link for the actual download page to the user's email that they have inputted.

Thanks in advance for your help,

-Keegan

 

http://php.net

Search for "date" and "mail". PHP's site has some of the best documentation you can ask for. If you get it working and notice the links won't come out as links make sure the content type is html. This is under example #4 in the mail function documentation.

 

Thanks AntelopeSalad.

 

I suggest you go to www.w3schools.com and learn more about MySQL Databases when used with PHP. It is very rarely seen nowadays that data is saved into a text file [apart from server logs, etc], as the database means that you can search through the data faster than you can with a text file.

Just a thought.