How do I distinguish between button clicks in a form? - php

Question

So I'm creating a database for my website and I want to create an admin section that allows you to add or delete from the table. Here is a snapshot of what I want to achieve...
In my php file I have if($_POST['delete_category']) which correctly gets the delete button clicks, but then I'm not sure how to distinguish which delete button was actually clicked. I'm sure this is a very simple solution, but I'm stuck. Thanks!

Answer 1

You can discern which button is submitted by this following markup (based on your example fetched results from DB):
<?php
if(isset($_POST['delete_category'])) {
$id = $_POST['delete_category']; // the value="1" or value="3" goes in here
echo $id;
}
?>
<form method="POST" action="">
<table border="1">
<tr>
<th>ID</th><th>Name</th><th>Delete</th>
</tr>
<tr>
<td>1</td>
<td>Senior Pictures</td>
<td><button typpe="submit" name="delete_category" value="1">Delete</button></td>
<!-- each delete button has the same name, but different values -->
</tr>
<tr>
<td>3</td>
<td>Engagements</td>
<td><button typpe="submit" name="delete_category" value="3">Delete</button></td>
</tr>
</table>
</form>
If I had to guess this makes sense on the fetching: (Note: Just a sample!)
<form method="POST" action="">
<table border="1">
<tr>
<th>ID</th><th>Name</th><th>Delete</th>
</tr>
<?php while($row = $results->fetch_assoc()): ?> <!-- assuming mysqli() -->
<?php while($row = mysql_fetch_assoc($result)): ?> <!-- assuming on mysql (bleh) -->
<tr>
<td><?php echo $row['id']; ?></td>
<td><?php echo $row['name']; ?></td>
<td>
<button typpe="submit" name="delete_category" value="<?php echo $row['id']; ?>">Delete</button>
</td>
</tr>
<?php endwhile; ?>
</table>
</form>