Call to a member function verifyInput() on a non-object - php

Question

It seems like a pretty common problem but I can't see to find the answer to my problem. I have been getting the dreaded "Call to a member function verifyInput() on a non-object" fatal error.
<?php
// empty values
$name = $email = $topic = $message = "";
$nameErr = $emailErr = $topicErr = $messageErr = "";
// link the name tags in HTML
$name = $_POST['name'];
$email = $_POST['email'];
if ($_SERVER["REQUEST_METHOD"] == "POST") {
/* name if */
if (empty($_POST['name'])) {
$nameErr = " * Name is required";
} else {
$name = test_input($_POST["name"]);
}
/* email if */
if ( ! empty($_POST['email'])) {
if ($email->verifyInput($_POST['email'], 6)){
$fill['email'] = $_POST['email']; //$fill is the array of values passed
} else {
$emailErr = " * Email is incorrect - Try Again";
}
} else {
$emailErr = " * Email is required";
}
// Form content
$recipient = "generic#gmail.com";
$subject = "Contact Form";
$formcontent = "4 Days of Fun.ca -
\n\n\nFrom: $name \n\nEmail: $email \n\nSubject: $topic
\n\n\nMessage: $message";
$mailheader = "From: $email - Subject: $topic \r\n";
//function to send mail
mail($recipient, $subject, $formcontent, $mailheader) or die("Error!");
echo "Thank you for contacting us, $name! \nWe will respond to you soon!";
}
//function for test_input
function test_input($data) {
$data = trim($data);
$data = stripslashes($data);
$data = htmlspecialchars($data);
return $data;
}
// Validation of Inputs
function verifyInput($input, $type){
if ($type == 0) $pattern = '/^1$/';//just the number 1
elseif ($type == 1) $pattern = '/^[0-9]+$/';//just integers
elseif ($type == 2) $pattern = '/^[A-Za-zÁ-Úá-úàÀÜü]+$/';//just letters
elseif ($type == 3) $pattern = '/^[0-9A-Za-zÁ-Úá-úàÀÜü]+$/';//integers & letters
elseif ($type == 4) $pattern = '/^[A-Za-zÁ-Úá-ú0-9àÀÜü\s()\/\'":\*,.;\-!?&#$#]{1,1500}$/';//text
elseif ($type == 5) $pattern = '/^[A-Za-zÁ-Úá-úàÀÜü0-9\']+[A-Za-zÁ-Úá-úàÀÜü0-9 \'\-\.]+$/';//name
elseif ($type == 6) $pattern = '/^.+#[^\.].*\.[a-z]{2,}$/';//e-mail
elseif ($type == 7) $pattern = '/^((\(0?[1-9][0-9]\))|(0?[1-9][0-9]))?[ -.]?([1-9][0-9]{3})[ -.]?([0-9]{4})$/';//brazilian phone
if (preg_match($pattern, $input) == 1) return true;
else return false;
}
?>
This is where the error is in question:if ($email->verifyInput($_POST['email'], 6)){ however I'm confused... I looked it up and everywhere states that the variable passed in ie $email may not be an object. But the variable is declared as an object here: $email = $_POST['email']; is it not? Or am I missing something big and obvious?
I just started learning PHP but I've got a lot of foundational knowledge with C++, so there are a lot of similarities I already get... This is not one of them.
Maybe I'm just not understanding the -> operator, or maybe it's a non-object because of something else?
Thanks in advance.

Answer 1

$email->verifyInput() would call the method (function) verifyInput() that is included in the class email, but here i can see that your function is not a member of any class, so if you need to call this fuction you just have to change:
if ($email->verifyInput($_POST['email'], 6)){...
to:
if (verifyInput($_POST['email'], 6)){...
And regarding your question about ->:
As i mentioned above -> is used after the instantiated class followed by the member or the method name. probably you need to read more about PHP, i would suggest this course, or you can jump directly to get a course about PHP OOP right here.