PHP post all form inputs without creating variables for each - php

Question

Usually when I use PHP I create a variable and post statement for each form input like so:
$myVar1 = $_POST["formItem1"];
$myVar2 = $_POST["formItem2"];
ect......
I know if i use:
echo $_POST;
I can get all the key and values from the form inputs but I don't know how to use them in a script.
So I guess I have 2 questions:
How do I quickly post all form inputs without creating a variable for each input?
How do I use a posted in a script without having it assigned to a specific variable?

Answer 1

To simply echo all the inputs, you can use a foreach loop:
foreach ($_POST as $key => $value) {
echo $value.'<br/>';
}
If you don't want to store them in variables, use arrays:
$data = array();
foreach ($_POST as $key => $value) {
$data[] = $value;
}
Now, $data is an array containing all the data in $_POST array. You can use it however you wish.

Answer 2

You don't have to assign to a variable. You can use directly $_POST['input_name']
If you want to deal with each sended params, you can use foreach loop:
foreach ($_POST as $key => $val)
{
echo "$key : $val <br/>";
}

Answer 3

for this instance of just quickly checking and testing i typically just use the print_r() function: documentation here
as quoted from the docs:
print_r() displays information about a variable in a way that's readable by humans.
one line easy to toggle on and off (with comments)- no need to use any form of variables
print_r($_POST);
if i need my output nice and readable i like to expand it as follows:
function print_r2($x){
echo '<pre>';
print_r($x);
echo '</pre>';
}
and then you can call with: print_r2($_POST);
this way you get the pre-formatted text block on your html page and can see the line breaks and tabbed spacing provided from the $_POST object printout

Answer 4

Another way to extract (besides the extract function) variables is;
$array = array('foo'); // Which POST variables do you want to get
foreach($array as $key) {
if(!isset(${$key})) { // Check if variable hasn't been assigned already
${$key} = $_POST[$key];
}
}
echo $foo;
I would not recommend it because it can get quite messy to keep up.

Answer 5

View everything in $_POST is useful for debugging
echo '<pre>'.print_r($_POST, true).'</pre>';
Access a specific checkbox
HTML
<input type="checkbox" value="something" name="ckbox[]" checked>
<input type="checkbox" value="anotherthing" name="ckbox[]" checked>
PHP
echo $_POST['ckbox'][0]; // something
echo $_POST['ckbox'][1]; // anotherthing
// isolate checkbox array
$ckbox_array = $_POST['ckbox'];

Answer 6

Define a function that allows you to access a specific $_POST item by name (key):
function get_post_value($name, $default)
{
if ( isset($_POST[$name]) ) {
return $_POST[$name];
} else if ( $default ) {
return $default;
}
return null;
}
$default allows you to pass a value that can be used as a fallback if the key you specify isn't present in the $_POST array.
Now you can reference $_POST items without assigning them to a variable, and without worrying if they are set. For example:
if ( get_post_value('user-login-submit', false) ) {
// attempt to log in user
}

Answer 7

You can use extract($_POST), it will create variables for you.
For example, you can have for the code you posted :
<?php
$_POST["formItem1"] = "foo";
extract($_POST);
echo $formItem1; // will display "foo"
?>
EDIT : it's not PHP explode, it's extract.