Ajax submit not working - php

Question

I'll make it easy, I want to submit data without using a form, etc, etc, etc...
I have this code:
HTML
<span class="categ-edit">Edit</span>
<span class="categ-add">Add</span>
<span class="categ-delete">Delete</span>
JQUERY
$('.categ-edit').click(function() {
$.ajax({
url: 'categoryactions.php',
type: 'POST',
data: {action: 'edit'},
});
window.location.href = "categoryactions.php";
});
$('.categ-add').click(function() {
$.ajax({
url: 'categoryactions.php',
type: 'POST',
data: {action: 'add'},
});
window.location.href = "categoryactions.php";
});
$('.categ-delete').click(function() {
$.ajax({
url: 'categoryactions.php',
type: 'POST',
data: {action: 'delete'},
});
window.location.href = "categoryactions.php";
});
And in categoryactions.php I have this:
PHP
<?php
$action = $_POST['action'];
echo $action;
?>
But when it redirects me to categoryactions.php I get nothing. I'm not sure if that's the way to submit data with AJAX but at least I tried. If someone knows how to fix this, I'll be grateful!

Answer 1

You click handler is making two separate requests. First, you are sending a request with AJAX, then you are going to the page. When you look at the page, you won't see the result because the result was given to the AJAX request.
The point of AJAX is to avoid changing the page.
Try this:
$('.categ-edit').click(function() {
$.ajax({
url: 'categoryactions.php',
type: 'POST',
data: {action: 'edit'},
success: function(data) {
alert(data);
}
});
});

Answer 2

You are actually calling "categoryactions.php" twice. First as an asynchronous call (ajax) and the second time as a redirect: window.location.href = "categoryactions.php";
In the 2nd call, nothing is being posted so your output is empty. This line does not serve any purpose - you should remove it.
The ajax call happens in the background so you won't see the output from the echo in the browser. if you really want to verify it is working, replace the echo with a file call to write it to a file. Then check the file contents.

Answer 3

Using redirection with Ajax doesn't make sense. You need to use the success method.
$('.categ-delete').click(function() {
$.ajax({
url: 'categoryactions.php',
type: 'POST',
data: {action: 'delete'},
success: function(data){
alert(data);
//or, put response in a div
$('#someDivId').html(data);
}
});
});
The point of Ajax is to retrieve the response from a request to another page without changing the URL in the address bar. It retrieves the response for you in the variable that is the input to your success method, and then you do something with that.

Answer 4

Example AJAX with PHP
I can't exactly answer your question, but I will help you understand ajax requests to http server and how to handle responses accordingly.
Sample jQuery
$('.categ-edit').click(function() {
$.get('/path/to/file.php', function(data) {
console.log(data);
});
});
Sample file.php
<?php
echo json_encode('HELLO');